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Nokia N85 Review
PA rating
Nokia N85 Review
Published on: 11 November, 2008 by PhoneArena Team
Performance:
It may be an all-in-one multimedia device, but is the N85 still a good phone? Fortunately, Nokia has not overlooked this all-important aspect. The sound quality during a call is really high-level and we got the feeling that we were communicating face to face. We were fascinated by the deepness of the sound, and the side noises were almost unnoticeable. They could also hear us loud and clear at the other end of the line, but without the same “Wow!” effect.
We all like smartphones, but sometimes they can be a real pain with their constant lagging and crashing. The N85 did relatively well and in spite of the active transitions, the phone had to spend some time “thinking” just a few times, during the test. What left us with a bad taste in our mouth was that the device didn’t respond adequately enough when we wanted to navigate through the menus more quickly. You can experience this especially with the central key.
The main reason for some to choose the N85 instead of its big brother N96 is the battery. With manufacturer ratings of 363 hours of stand-by time and 6.5 hours of talk the battery is almost twice as good as the N96. We’d imagine that for most people good battery life is it is more important than, let’s say a TV tuner.
Conclusion:
On the whole we are quite disappointed by the N85 due the total lack of new features. It’s not a bad phone, but there are no innovations compared to previous models. The OLED display is indeed good, unless it’s exposed to direct sunlight. The poor video support means you won’t be able to watch high-quality clips or even movies. In all other aspects the N85 isn’t innovative, but it’s just fine – a smartphone with a nice browser, satisfying audio performance and camera.
To us, current N95 owners have no reason to buy it. We would instead recommend the INNOV8 because it out performs the N85 in several high-end categories. If you’re a loyal Nokia users, the N85 is a decent solution trading the N96’s DVB-H tuner for a better display and battery.
We all like smartphones, but sometimes they can be a real pain with their constant lagging and crashing. The N85 did relatively well and in spite of the active transitions, the phone had to spend some time “thinking” just a few times, during the test. What left us with a bad taste in our mouth was that the device didn’t respond adequately enough when we wanted to navigate through the menus more quickly. You can experience this especially with the central key.
The main reason for some to choose the N85 instead of its big brother N96 is the battery. With manufacturer ratings of 363 hours of stand-by time and 6.5 hours of talk the battery is almost twice as good as the N96. We’d imagine that for most people good battery life is it is more important than, let’s say a TV tuner.
Conclusion:
On the whole we are quite disappointed by the N85 due the total lack of new features. It’s not a bad phone, but there are no innovations compared to previous models. The OLED display is indeed good, unless it’s exposed to direct sunlight. The poor video support means you won’t be able to watch high-quality clips or even movies. In all other aspects the N85 isn’t innovative, but it’s just fine – a smartphone with a nice browser, satisfying audio performance and camera.
To us, current N95 owners have no reason to buy it. We would instead recommend the INNOV8 because it out performs the N85 in several high-end categories. If you’re a loyal Nokia users, the N85 is a decent solution trading the N96’s DVB-H tuner for a better display and battery.
Pros
- Magnificent image of the organic display
- Loud and high-quality sound no matter whether you’re talking or listening to music with the headphones
- A good camera
Cons
- It’s not offering anything new, besides the cool display
- Its overall build quality doesn’t match its high price
- The Navi wheel sensor is almost unusable
- The camera shutter is not user-friendly
- The captured videos freeze
PA rating 
- Good
- out of 10
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