Nokia N8 Review: Unboxing, Camera & Video Comparison

Introduction

The Nokia N8 has been heavily featured on this site in recent times; it made a large appearance at Nokia World 2010 (in fact the event was dedicated to it), it ushers in the Symbian ^3 mobile OS era, it attracted large crowds in China when it became available to buy and it features the largest camera sensor seen on a mobile device. Not to mention of course, the 12MP Carl Zeiss camera lens on the back with a Xenon Flash, 720p HD video, HDMI out port and USB-on-the-go. All in all, a great beast and the next top device on the market?

Well you’d be right and wrong in that case. We had the device for a few weeks but lost a lot of screen shots due to a mishap with a hard drive and have had to adapt the review massively. Luckily we have some absolutely beautiful camera samples, taken on a really sunny day in London recently in optimum photography conditions. We’re going to split the N8 review in two parts; the first focusing on the camera & video of the device along with some highs and lows of the device and the second part will be an in-depth focus on the core of the device (i.e. the OS) and also the additional features such as TV-out (via HDMI port) and the USB-on-the-go.

A quick recap on the device:

Specs:

• 135g, 113.5 x 59.1 x 12.9 mm
• 3.5 “, AMOLED Capacitive touchscreen, 360 x 640 pixels
• 16GB Storage, 256MB RAM, 512MB ROM, MicroSD (up to 32GB) support
• 3G, HSDPA 10.2 Mbps, HSUPA 2.0 Mbps
• Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n, UPnP, Bluetooth v3.0 with A2DP
• USB-on-the-Go support
• Scratch resistant Gorilla glass display
• 12MP autofocus camera, 4000 x 3000 pixels, Carl Zeiss lens, Xenon Flash
• 1/1.83″ sensor size, geo-tagging, face & smile detection
• 720p (25fps) HD Video Recording, VGA videocall camera
• Symbian^3 OS
• ARM 11 680 MHz processor
• 3D Graphics Hardware accelerator
• TV-Out (720p) via HDMI & Composite
• Dolby Digital Plus via HDMI
• Anodized aluminium casing
• Digital Compass
• DivX/XviD support
• Flash Lite v4.0
• Full Landscape QWERTY touchscreen keyboard with T9 Portrait support
• Integration with Ovi Services including Ovi Maps with free worldwide voice-navigation drive and walk sat nav for life
• 3 homescreens with widgets
• Brilliant Gaming experience with the accelerometer
• Improved S^3 UI with one touch selection implemented in most places

Not so good:

• Slow and buggy at first start up
• Browser is slow to render
• Keylock slider on the side is not 100% effective
• Slow to respond to certain tasks
• Slow transition time from camera to photo viewer
• No portrait QWERTY keyboard; no SWYPE keyboard
• Occasional judder when playing games
• Lack of widgets (will change over time)
• Direct sunline legibility is not the best

The N8 has its great points and it has its bad points, the most of which are actually to do with the Symbian ^3 OS. Being the first device using the OS, there were bound to be glitches and it is a huge improvement over Symbian ^1 but is still not in the same class as iOS, Android and even possibly the newly-announced Windows Phone 7.

The best thing to note has to be that the majority of problems are software related and software can change (look how far the Nokia N97 has come in a year) but hardware cant. Despite their past problems, Nokia seem to have got this device’s hardware spot-on.

We’ll leave you here with some unboxing pictures and hit the jump to continue reading as we test out the camera & video capabilities of the N8 by putting it up against the very capable compact camera, the Panasonic Lumix TZ10.

Unboxing, Size, Build, Design

We recently posted a preview of the N8 and whilst we await the arrival of our zesty orange N8, we’ll repost the unboxing pics from our preview and will run you through some design features and the build quality of the phone.

First off, the unboxing.

Without a doubt, Nokia’s new offering really is a picture of beauty. However, we have shown it to several people and a lot of the comments regarded the actual design and how similar it is (from a design aspect) to the ever popular Apple iPhone.

On the subject of the iPhone and N8 comparison, I have noticed a large increase in demand for the N8 in retail and whilst that’s great, Nokia really needs to attract customers from other manufacturers. Keeping Nokians happy will stabilise market share; gaining customers who are switching to Nokia from other brands will increase market share.

Where I believe the N8 to be a huge success is its imaging prowess. A couple of years ago, it could be said that the age of the camera phone is dead and Apps were the future. Whilst apps and app stores may rule the roost for now, it won’t be long before the N8′s smaller app store and not as refined UI are sacrifices people will make for the ability to shoot stunning pictures and take great video. This leads me on to the next section; the camera. Not just the camera but a comparison with a top-class everyday point and shoot. We’ve got a treat for you. Join us to compare the undoubted quality of the N8′s 12MP Carl Zeiss lens!

Camera & Video Comparison

Now to the main section of this part of the review. The N8′s primary focus is capturing photos and taking videos. Everything else pretty much comes second. As a previous user of Nokia’s last iconic camera flagship, the N95, the N8 takes imaging to a whole new level. We’ve got 24 picture comparisons for you all taken during daylight, we’re saving the night photography for the rest of the review. The weather was absolutely perfect for taking photography and we combined a day in London with a varying collection of photos taken in some tourist hotspots.

All the images in this review have been reduced in size down to 1024 x 768 pixels or 768 x 1024 pixels, in order to accommodate for bandwidth and page loading times. Being a relative notice in photography terms, I left each device on auto settings with flash off in order to see how they compare in every day going out situations.

The Nokia N8 photos are on the left, the Lumix TZ10 equivalent photos are on the right.

The first thing to notice of course is that the N8 produces slightly duller pictures and doesn’t pick up as much light. That being said, for a phone, the detail captured by the N8 is phenomenal and the Lumix TZ10 only slightly betters it through the use of its Intelligent Auto mode which automatically sets the settings based upon your environment. The Lumix TZ10 does it rather well, I must add.

With the zoom in use, there seems to be very little difference between the two pictures and comparing to the actual view, the N8′s picture is closest to the real image. The pictures from the Lumix do appear a touch out of focus even though they appeared to be taken in full focus.

Whilst taking this comparison collection, I noticed one thing; the Nokia N8 seems to focus on the background as well as the foreground whilst the Lumix TZ10 on Intelligent Auto mode focuses on the foreground with a distinct lack of clarity on the background. In the N8 picture (above left), the white building work appears in focus and detail whilst in the Lumix TZ10 shot (above right), the same building appears quite washed out leading to a slightly distorted building in the picture.

One of the hardest photos to compare in my opinion as the image changes between photos. I will say this though, both are very realistic photos and capture moving images (the top part of the display) in clarity.

Although a little more zoomed in than the Lumix TZ10, the N8 picks up a lot more detail, from the bow in the statue to the colours of the flag in the background. However, once again, the Lumix TZ10 seems to capture the light better with the photo appearing a touch duller and in fact more realistic given the angle and position of the sun.

Rather than run through all the pictures with an explanation, we’re going to just leave you with the rest for you to make your own mind up over them. I’ve tried to vary angles, light conditions and heights taken from to give an overall perspective of both devices’ imaging ability.

If you’ve made it this far, we hoped you enjoyed those photos. Sound off in the comments with your thoughts! We’ll leave you with some short video samples (2 of the same performers from different angles using zoom). Look out for the rest of our review very soon!

The videos are in this order: N8 Video 1, TZ10 Video 1, N8 Video 2, TZ10 Video 2.

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Category: Opinion