Customer review from the Amazon Vine

™ Program (What's this?)
I was extremely excited to open up the Nokia N96, because from its specs it looked to be one of the most powerful mobile phones on the market. It certainly lived up to its expectations in some areas, and exceeds them in others, but fell short with some very common issues.

For anyone looking for a camera/media device that also does phone calls, this might have been a serious contender.

The media player works well for audio, the built-in FM tuner is great, and the internet radio feed was easy to use and loaded with content. This phone does everything well, but not nearly well enough to justify its astronomical price tag.

------------------
Things Done Right:

Browser - The browser on the phone rendered the pages I tried perfectly and it was very easy to navigate using the device. Bookmarks and other features you'd want were all there.

FM Radio - This worked like a charm! It was very cool to have this in a mobile device.

Light Weight - The phone weighs considerably less than my AT&T Fuze and Tilt.

Massive Storage - The phone's best feature is its internal 16 GB of storage.

Looks - Trust me when I say the phone looks even better in person.

---------------
Half-Way There:

Mapping - Rather than relying on a live internet feed for maps, it had very detailed maps of the US right on the phone. This is great if you are in an area with patchy service and need directions. But, it's no Google Maps. I've been spoiled by having Google Maps on my Windows Mobile phones for some time now, and while the mapping application on this phone is good, it's not Google Maps. Plus, many of the advanced features of this application require an extra fee such as turn-by-turn directions and traffic reports.

- Connecting the phone to my home wireless network with WPA/PSK was a breeze. HOWEVER, many of the features on the phone such as the mapping tool, internet radio, and others required use of data plan, even if you were connected via WiFi. And despite trying, I could never get it to connect to my computer for WiFi Sharing.

Help - The phone has online help for nearly every menu, most of which was well-written and useful. Some of the more rare settings had no help, however.

- While this phone won't replace your $, it's better than what I've seen on most mobile phones. I especially liked the on-screen menus for making adjustments on the fly. The flash on the back of the camera is great for close-up subjects.

Voice Command - There is a utility which reads you your messages to you, which was pretty neat. And, you can dial your contacts through voice command, plus launch applications. Unfortunately, that's all. Voice command apps on other devices allow you to dial numbers as they are spoken, play specific media, or dictate text messages.

-----------------
More Work Needed:

No Keyboard - This device lacks both a keyboard and touch screen, limiting all input to the numeric pad and a plethora of other buttons. If you are a heavy text/emailer, this is going to be a deal-breaker for you.

IM Difficult - The phone includes an IM application, but it was intimidating to configure with settings that I had no clue about. Other phones include apps which are preconfigured for Yahoo, AIM, and MSN, but that was not the case here. The manual and help were useless here.

Micro USB - Every portable device I own uses Mini USB for sync and charging, but the Nokia N96 introduces the even smaller Micro USB. That means that I need to carry yet another cable.

No USB Charge - To make it worse, you cannot charge via USB. While the phone comes with an AC charger and a car charger, its proprietary and means yet ANOTHER cable to carry.

WMV Playback - Despite being touted as a media player, the phone would not play any of the WMV files I copied to it. These were non-DRM files that worked fine on other phones.

AGPS - The manual claims that the phone supports Assisted GPS (to speed up your positioning) but it would not work.

Other Annoyances - There were a few other things that bothered me about the phone. For instance, the music playback stuttered while using the phone for text messaging or mapping, and there was no option to disable the power-saving features while on AC power.

--------------
In Conclusion:

For the price that this phone sells for, and comparing it to other devices on the market at half the price, I find it very hard to justify recommending the phone to anyone.

Its only real saving grace is the 16 GB of storage, although some of its competitors will support memory cards with 4-16 GB of capacity.

If the price came down considerably, and they issued a software upgrade to fix several of the above issues, it would probably beat its competitors hands-down. But until then, I recommend passing this phone up for any of its half-priced competitors.
Comment Comments (4) | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)




23 of 28 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars Great Phone, but not for T-Mobile 3G, November 13, 2008
By Alan Maubouche - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
This phone is amazing. But please keep in mind that you will NOT be able to use this phone on T-mobile's 3G network, because the frequencies are different than HSDPA 850 / 1900 (american version). If you dont care about 3G, I really recommend this phone; however you don't need to get the US version ($100 more expensive than buying it from someplace else) if you are on the T-Mobile network.
Comment Comments (7) | Permalink | Was this review helpful to you? Yes No (Report this)




9 of 11 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars great phone, November 15, 2008
By W. Cahue (chicago) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)
This phone does it all dvd quality video 5 mp camera wifi and gps.I didn't give it 5 stars because its a bit slower than my n82 the dual led is good but no were near the xenon flash on my n82. Also the gps won't lock as fast.I really like the dual slide option with the media control their great they feel sturdy and have a nice click to let you know you pressed them.the screen is bright and pretty big compared to my n82 the over all size is similar with the same build quality.The Symbian OS is the greatest feature its runs very smoothly and theres lots of cool programs to be downloaded from nokia or mosh some are even free .This phone is a must have for a tech freak or any person who doesn't want to carry a camera a camcorder a laptop an mp3 player a tv and some video games in your pocket ! the mobile tv is already supported in some US states with more to come soon.Also google maps works better than nokia maps in my opinion. Worth every dollar maybe 4 stars and three quarters