Nokia N9: the World's Most Underrated Smartphone? 176
jrepin writes "Eighteen months ago, Nokia announced a smartphone unlike any other it has produced before. It was a proper smartphone, one that looked miles away from previous Nokia phones: it was sleek, modern and simple at the same time. The hardware was pretty modern, too; no underpowered processors with severely limited RAM issues to be seen here. And, it runs on an operating system that Nokia had announced dead months before the phone's announcement. This, ladies and gentlemen, is the Nokia N9."
It really is a pity it was killed (Score:5, Informative)
I own one, and it really is very nice. It's too bad Stephen Elop intentionally refused to have it sold in most major markets; I guess he wanted his precious WinPhones in people's pockets instead.
Where-ever it was sold however, I hear it did very well among enthusiasts such as myself. The UI has been marveled about by non-geeks when they've got to play with mine.
Surprisingly Competitive (Score:5, Informative)
According to communities dominate brands by Tomi Ahohen [blogs.com], the poor N9 and the outdated Symbian are expected to outsell the great savior, the Lumia Windows Phone 8 at Nokia this quarter. Not too shabby.
I would keep the N9 on my resume.
Re:It really is a pity it was killed (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Fuck Nokia and Fuck Phones (Score:5, Informative)
Not underrated at all (Score:5, Informative)
The N9 has actually been rated pretty highly by people that managed to get one, and it's done really well in the market for a phone that got absolutely no corporate support at all from Nokia. Elop sent it out to die, and it didn't.... which has only made the Lumia's sales performance look bad in comparison. (Not that the Lumia's sales performance needed any help to look bad.)
As a US N9 User... (Score:5, Informative)
I love the phone. It has some rough edges in the UI, but overall emotion = love. I have not felt that way since I got the Apple iPhone 2g. For the record I've used Android 2.3.5, 4.0 and iOS up to 4 as well.
What it does that your phone does not:
When not in a pocket or face-down it always shows the time. Always. This does not drain the battery at all.
Around the time are basic notifications - VM, facebook message, facebook notification, missed call. and there's a app for battery percentage.
My battery will last two whole days. And it completely charges in ~2 hours. Topping it off in a 1/2 ride to work in the car will keep the battery from going below 50% every day.
The swipe interface is good. You get 3 columns so swipe from the edge left/right between. Notification Feed (Facebook Twitter, RSS, etc) with weather at the top, a scrolling app icon list, and your running apps screen which shows 4 or 9 apps, which live-updates the screen. Swiping down from the top edge kills the app.
The top bar (battery indicator, WiFi, connctivity) etc is tap-able and you can change the state of what is on it. 2 taps to change your ring profile. (Android and iPhone are jarring because you have to pop to home and you have no idea if your app will be left running or killed)
All messaging services use the same messaging UI.
The phone never resets (my android did it a lot and iPhone did it occasionally)
What I don't like about it:
Some of the UI is layout less than optimally. For example in the dialer, if I bring up the number pad in-call I can't change speaker/mute without dismissing the number pad.
When reading items from my feeds list (in the application - like facebook) sometimes I get reset to the top of the list.
Lack of awesome apps. For the most part all your major services are supported by the phone and/or are free plugin download.I don't use many apps because the phone already does so much.
When calling voice mail, it shows you your voicemail number that you have to click on, rather than dialing it immediately.
What I wish:
I do wish for a dual core. it only does 720p video, and barely at that. Once in a while I'll get a force-close message but the app recovers by the time you get your finger over the button.
A better dialer UI. It's not a bad UI. It's just not "optimal".
I really like this phone and I look forward to trying Ubuntu's phone when this one dies.
Re:Damn Microsoft (Score:4, Informative)
I think you missed the GP's point entirely, there are tons of locked-down "toy computer" phones out there, the N900 was a handheld PC that you could run anything you want on.
Re:Damn Microsoft (Score:4, Informative)
I have a N900 as my daily phone and I have yet to see any phone that comes close. I can (and do) use the touchscreen with a small-tipped stylus for greater accuracy, the hardware keyboard is the best I have ever used and I love the openness and hackability.
Re:Damn Microsoft (Score:1, Informative)
Quit lying, dumbass. The world doesn't end at the US border, and Korean phones were way ahead of Apple. [engadget.com] (That's 333 PPI in 2008, in case you can't do the math yourself.)