After our
quick hands-on at the
Nokia N9’s launch in September, we came away impressed. The hardware was stunning, and MeeGo was a solid operating system in general which brought fresh concepts to the table.
We’ve since had the opportunity to play with the N9 a little bit more, and despite its many flaws we still feel that it was a great phone which should have been given more time to shine instead of getting cancelled. Let’s dive deeper into the review, shall we?
Hardware and designWe’ve covered the N9’s hardware and design before, so we’ll keep it brief. Quite simply, the
N9 is the most beautiful phone Nokia has ever produced. Fit and finish was top notch, and the polycarbonate body felt sturdy with just the right amount of heft.
The design is all-round minimalistic, with clean lines and subtle curves. It’s a little fat, but the smooth curves around the sides make it comfortable to hold. But this attention to quality is somehow neglected on the volume and lock/unlock keys at the side: those feel loose and rattled about when we pressed them.
A strip of metal which houses the camera lens provides a classy accent on the back. The front of the phone is, of course, dominated by the 3.9-inch screen, and its lack of buttons a signature feature of MeeGo inside.
The brilliant display looks great even in direct sunlight. This is most evident on the app screen, where the colourful icons pop vividly out of the black background. Viewing angles, however, wasn’t that great as the screen takes on a slight greenish hue when view from the side.
You’ll be able to chuck the N9 in your handbag or pocket full of keys or coins without a worry, as the display is made of Gorilla glass. We stabbed the screen several times with our keys and no scratch appeared.
The only downside to the hardware is how slippery the plastic can feel. Exceptional care must be taken when taking the phone out of your pocket or you risk the whole thing sliding out of your hand.
Nokia opted to go with the micro-SIM card and a non-removable battery, which can turn off some consumers. Plus, the lack of storage expansion slots brings down its desirability.
Unsurprisingly, reception and call quality was excellent, as always on Nokia phones. Clarity remains one of Nokia’s true strengths, as no other phone we’ve tested can come close.
SoftwareThis is the most defining and unique feature of the N9 – it’s the only commercial phone in the world running MeeGo. And it’s likely to be the last, too, as Nokia is now fully committed to Microsoft’s Windows Phone platform.
There are a lot of things to love about MeeGo. The phone’s user interface, while having a slight learning curve to it, feels natural enough once you get used to it. Scrolling was smooth, and it was pretty responsive all around.
But MeeGo is not completely flawless.
For one, there’s no way to organise your apps on the app screen in folders or pages. That’s going to be a problem if you install a lot of apps.
Performance was mostly decent, and the N9 could handle our demands without making much complaints. But once you get more than 10 apps running on the background, the phone starts to choke a little.
The “perfect fluidity” tagline used to market the N9 is really not that “perfect”. The bezel-swiping navigation style seems to be the phone’s only trick, and once you delve deeper into individual apps, everything becomes more or less similar to other smartphone platforms.
Plus, some parts of the user experience are downright un-fluid. For example, clicking on a link in Facebook or an email opens up the browser automatically, but once you’re done with reading the webpage, there’s no way to go back except swipe back to the home screen, swipe to the open apps screen, and then re-open it manually.
KeyboardWe’re picky about software keyboards, as they’re central to our textual communication on smartphones, but the N9’s shouldn’t see many complaints. The light haptic feedback provides a fantastic tactile experience, and the soft click the phone makes when a key is pressed is music to our ears.
On the downside, autocorrect is not a very smooth experience. When you type a word wrong, one suggestion pops up next to the word, like on the iPhone. But unlike on the iPhone, you must reach up and tap the suggested word to replace your misspelled one, instead of correcting itself automatically.
Tapping on the misspelt word itself brings up a list of possible words that the phone thinks can replace your work. Again, it doesn’t feel very fluid to have to hop to another screen when you’re still on the same task of typing.
Copy and paste was the worst. Selecting text was an inconsistent experience, and we can’t figure out where it works and where it doesn’t. When trying to input our username on a site in the browser, for instance, it was impossible to either select text, or move the cursor around.
CameraNokia is marketing the N9 as the ultimate phone shooter, and the camera does sound great on paper: 8 megapixels, f/2.2 lens, super wide 28mm lens, auto focus with Carl Zeiss optics and dual LED flash. But it falls short of our expectations in reality.
That’s not saying that it’s a bad camera, of course. The N9’s camera works almost instantly, capturing images the moment you press the shutter button and resuming quickly. It handles low light situations admirably and also does an excellent job at close-ups.
However, it isn’t that great at colour balance, and we found the sharpness of captured images wanting. Images in general also looked slightly washed out.
It’s not going to replace your point-and-shoot, but the N9 has a decent camera which is great for casual photography enthusiasts. And of course, we have to disclaim that good photos are due more to good photographers than good cameras.
Wrap-upUnless anything happens to change its fortunes, the N9 is dead. Although Nokia promises to update MeeGo for years to come, we don’t know how regularly that will be, or whether it’ll just bring bug fixes or new functionality. Plus, developers will likely shun the platform now that it’s dead, so don’t expect a lot of shiny new apps.
But if you can look past all that, the N9 is a solid phone that we can recommend to the smartphone user who won’t need a tonne of apps beyond the essentials: email, Facebook, Twitter, foursquare, and even exclusive games.
As long as you can manage your expectations regarding software updates and app selection, the N9 isn’t that bad a purchase. We just wish that Nokia had given MeeGo a bit more time to prove itself before killing it off so unceremoniously.
