Nokia which is having half of its sales from emerging markets like India and China has launched a series on phones in the popular N Series in these markets. However, after the initial euphoria, Nokia hasn’t lived up to people’s expectations [which only went higher after they saw the coolest ever mobile phone – iPhone]
Review of the Nokia N78 Mobile Phone:
This is targeted at the youth as a convergence device. Yes it has capability for Wi-Fi and GPRS [Don’t rely on GPRS. We tested with Airtel and Vodafone and both simply suck really badly in GPRS services.]
It is worth a laugh when Mr. Taneja of Nokia India said with this phone users can log on to Web 2.0 destinations like Facebook, but How ?
N78 is the slimmest of the N-Series devices. This phone is pre-loaded with Maps of 8 Indian cities and Points of Interests [ATMs, Banks, Restaurants, Hospitals etc] The screen is bit smaller than N73 [far smaller compared to iPhone] which simply makes it unfit for someone to use the Maps.
The only interesting feature we found on Nokia N78 was the “location tagger” which automatically tags location data to the picture, allowing users to save picture by date and by geographical co-ordinates.
Nokia N78 supports add on memory up to 8GB. Internal speakers sound quality is barely acceptable and has support for standard 3.5mm headphones. N78 didn’t sync completely with the PC Suite software provided and don’t ask about the hanging problem.
Before iPhone we thought Nokia phones are really cool and value for money, however, what is obvious now is Nokia lacks R&D and has been selling just a mash up of applications with different name and higher memory. Nokia N78 is priced at a whopping Rs 19,990 in Indian market while iPhone is expected to launch in the range of Rs 20,000 to Rs 22,000 making it a much better BUY than N78.
Nokia phones in Europe come with 24 months warranty while in India its just 12 months, we hate this discrimination by Nokia.
Subir,
How can you access Facebook and Web 2.0 applications without proper network infrastructure ? Relying on GPRS ? Good Luck. How much of India is on WiFi that you can be on SOSH Nets ?
Guys, I have an N78 and it rocks. I dont know about India but here in Europe we have HSDPA and it’s fast. Otherwise you can use Wifi. The N78 also comes with some bundled services : Ovi, Flickr and Vox. With one click on can take a photo and upload it to your Flickr account. Very cool. You can also see photos that your friends have posted on Flickr. You can read/add comments, etc. Web 2.0 dude.
I don’t say that the iPhone is not cool. But it is severely over-hyped. Battery is supposed to last 5 hours !?!? I don’t want to have to recharge my phone twice a day. And here in Europe you always have to get it with an expensive 2 year contract. They say that over 2 years it ends up costing 2000 euros. No thanks. I’ll stay with my cool iPod Touch + N78.
Sounds quality is pretty good through the speakers. You can actually have a conference call with a bunch of people on a room and others over the phone, just put your phone on the table.
Photo quality is quite nice with the 3.2M Carl Zeiss lens and much better than iPhone – iPhone does not even have a flash. Good luck trying to take a photo in a bar when you are having fun.
Anyway, each phone has + and – but the reviewer is clearly biased. Dude dont waste your time write crap like this.
I have always been a fan of nokia phones. To tell you the truth I still have a vintage 5310 in my home. I throw it around and it still works! Geesh…talk about durability! And what about those 3210’s huh??? The first no antennae series…just love em. You can even trample on it but it continues to work! Talk about toughness!!! The guys of Nokia must have came from another planet….Ah err…WHAT MODEL ARE WE TALKIN BOUT HERE????
i do have an n78 & to be honest dis phone rocks!!!. wifi connectivity is gr8 so i never rely on gprs. Music is gr8 when heard in earphones. Cam qualiy is good. i phone is way too delicate and totally uncomfortable in terms of holding it. battery life also sux in i phone.