Try The Tech REVIEW - NOKIA LUMIA 1020

[Anonymous]

Members Review - Try The Tech Nokia Lumia 1020

My Thoughts:

Thank you @Toby and the team for giving me another opportunity to “Try The Tech”. Being a die-hard Android (Samsung) fan, giving me a Windows phone was always likely to be a challenging concept……..or so I thought. Initially I expected to get frustrated with it. That it wouldn’t be as simple as my android. That it just wouldn’t be a Samsung quite frankly.

However, the more I played with this phone, the more I liked it overall. Granted every phone has plus & minus points but overall I really enjoyed my “Try The Tech” on this one.

Would I buy this phone?

Overall, I will surprise myself and say yes, I would consider this phone (and therefore other top end windows handsets). And this from a die hard Android fan! That said, I would prefer to see a larger screen and improved battery life.

Plus points:

• 41 mega pixel camera, without a doubt the selling point of this device

• Picture quality superb, both on photo & video. Very sharp.

• Front facing camera (1.2 mega pixel)

• Build quality is excellent, a very reassured device

• Call quality incredibly sharp with no background noise to be heard

• Lovely device to hold, a good size and the camera nodule behind caused me no issues

• Excellent screen quality

• Good sized screen (4.5 inch)

• 2gb RAM (although at times this seemed a little underpowered)

• 1.5ghz dual core snapdragon processor

• Connects to 2g, 3g, 4g, bluetooth & wifi

• 64mb internal memory (see negative points below)

• Volume up / down & on / off buttons on right hand side easy to handle

• Good music player and standard 3.5 jack

• Device links to your email service, ie if you have GMail or Yahoo (instead of a Microsoft product) it will sync easily.

• Links to Microsoft Office products easily and efficiently

• Links to corporate email accounts easily and efficiently

Negative Points:

• Text message notification included a “preview” which was not optional, therefore anyone looking at your handset can see the first two lines of your text, even if the handset screen is off (this was a deal breaker for me and would stop me buying the phone)

• At times internet was slow. (sometimes I had my Note 3 next to the 1020 & Note 3 was much quicker everytime

• Battery fairly poor, generally having to charge twice a day (I am a fairly heavy user). Overnight battery would use between 15 & 25% even though I wasnt actually using it, this compares with 1 - 5% on my Note 3

• Device is sealed, therefore unable to remove battery

• Device is sealed, therefore memory not expandable (although my device came with 64gb so probably wouldnt need to).

• Sim Card requires a “key” to access the sim card holder at the top (not supplied), unusual design and quite fiddly.

• Video quality was excellent, however I could not get the sound to work. A look on Google identifies this to be a regular problem with this handset that has yet to be cured.

• When making a call on speaker, person I was calling couldnt hear me

• Unable to toggle between 2g, 3g or 4g manually. Only offered selection of “highest available” of 3g or 4g. An issue if you live in a 2g area (much of the South West is 2g only or no signal).

Setting Up

Very straight forward. The device was happy to sync to my GMail account and did this effortlessly (as long as you dont have 2 stage verification turned on - if you do you will need to turn this off first, sync GMail and then turn 2 stage back on).

It was also necessary to set up a Microsoft account although this only took a minute or two and was effortless. Everything else was on screen prompted and worked first time, effortlessly.

Operating System

Windows 8.0, a pretty good operating system. Bearing in mind I am a die hard Android fan (have I mentioned this?), I found Windows Phone to be pretty straight forward and really just took a bit of getting used to. If you are used to Windows 7 or 8 on a PC, this is fairly straight forward to master. For the die hards, windows 8.1 is due out from Nokia very shortly.

Battery

An area of disappointment for me here, perhaps as I am used to the huge battery on my Note 3.

• EXTREME use (i.e. 4 hours wifi streaming, 1 hour on internet via wifi , 15 minutes on calls) battery lasted about 6 hours.

• HEAVY use (i.e. about 1.5 hours streaming on wifi, 3 hours online and 1 hour using phone with screen on) battery lasted half a waking day.

• MEDIUM use (i.e. 4 hours online), battery easily lasted much of the day before needing charge.

• Overall the Nokia Lumia 1020 will need regular charging by heavy users whereas the occasional user should be ok for a daily charge.

Internet

The Internet screen was crystal clear, easy to read and easy to zoom in / out. The search bar was at the bottom of the screen (I am used to the top but this was easy enough to get used to). The search engine was great at remembering previously searched pages and bringing them to the fore. It was also straight forward to delete history etc.

On the downside however, there were times when the internet was painfully slow. I would put the Nokia 1020 next to my Note 3 and the Note would bring the chosen page up instantly whereas the 1020 would take several seconds (fyi my home broadband is BT Infintiy at 74mg downloads).

Apps

One of the main concerns from buyers about non iphone or android handsets is the lack of apps. For Windows Phone things are getting better but there is a long way to go. In terms of my favourite apps (Sky News, BBC Iplayer, YouTube, Bloomberg Financials, Speedtest.net) they were all there and they worked absolutely fine. The big absentee for me was SkyGo which is not currently available. On the plus side though, one expected this handset to connect to all things Microsoft and it certainly didnt disappoint on that score.

Signal Strength

Signal strength generally pretty good, especially at home where I sometimes lose signal on android but this didnt happen with the Nokia 1020.

Wifi: Solid performance but with lag from time to time.

Bluetooth: Excellent performance with no issues.

Push services:

GMail was set up (by me) to update on demand rather than by push and was generally ok although slower than the Note 3.

Facebook was set to push but only updated when the app was opened.

TuGo

TuGo was not tested as part of this review as Tugo isnt available on Windows phone

Call Quality

Generally excellent although the volume settings on the phone were a touch quiet for me, would have liked to be able to turn the volume a bit higher (personal preference). Almost no background noise could be heard when talking to others, regardless of where they were.

There was also an issue with the speaker. When on a call, if I pressed the speaker button on screen, I could hear the other person but they could not hear me. Not sure if this was a fault with the handset or not although I would suggest this might link with the video recording issue below (see camera)

Notifications

Phone was set up so that notifications were not visible when the screen was off although the first two lines of texts were visual even when screen was off. This was not optional and has put many off from buying this phone.

Inbound calls were easily heard and easily identifiable although it was necessary to press the screen twice to answer the call.

Screen

The Nokia Lumia comes with a 4.5 inch screen. Screen quality was excellent and more than a match for any other top end device.

Touch screen was responsive and I liked the fact there was a setting where the user could make the screen more or less responsive to suit the user needs.

I also liked the fact that there were 3 settings for brightness on the screen, low / medium or high, which were very effective (more so at times that my Note 3 that has a sliding brightness which it could be argued is more responsive to individual needs).

Camera

Where do I start with the camera? I could write a book!!!!

The Nokia Lumia 1020 comes with a massive 41 mega pixel camera and believe me, for a phone it definitely DOESNT DISAPPOINT! Picture quality was excellent (I will try to add a couple of examples later in a separate post as they are on a different device). Pictures were very sharp, especially those of wildlife or plantation for example, some of the best I have ever seen on a phone.

Video quality was also excellent, easy to use and easy to set up. However a note of caution, when recording video on this phone it didnt capture sound. Having done a google search it appears this is quite a common problem although the device is meant to record sound.

There is also a 1.2 mega pixel front facing camera which, whilst basic, was fine and worked well.

The camera is most definitely a reason to buy this phone!

Would I Recommend This Phone?

Having had the device for a week, I can put hand on heart and say the more I played with the handset the more I liked it. It wasnt perfect, but having never had a windows phone, being a die hard android / Samsung fan, it was going to be challenging to get me to consider an alternative. The Nokia Lumia 1020 definitely opened my eyes to the point that when I am ready to consider replacing my Note 3 I will certainly look at the top end Windows Phone at that time.

The 41 mega pixel camera is a definite selling point. If you like reasonable photography and only want to carry one piece of tech this could be the phone for you.

Conclusion

The Nokia Lumia is currently available Sim Free for between £380 and £450 from most reputable retailers. Prices are likely to fall in the coming weeks / months with the release of several other high end Windows Phones.

Overall I never thought I would be writing this review with one eye on the idea of buying a Windows Phone in future however this device has done just that. It has opened my eyes to a world out there that may not be dominated by Android. (Sorry @Anonymous but I wont be getting an Apple).

I look forward to seeing Nokia’s future offerings but for the moment, whilst I have no plans to replace my Note 3 (which is totally brilliant) I have been pleasantly surprised by the Nokia Lumia 1020 and would recommend this phone for people who want a high end camera and / or a handset with a mid to large range screen. I would also recommend this phone for those who want to link their Microsoft Office / Windows world via PC to their phone.

Finally, THANK YOU to @Toby and the team for letting me trial this handset as part of the Try The Tech scheme. This is my third trial and third review. I hope you enjoyed reading it.