Wednesday 20 March 2013

Some Thoughts on the Nokia Lumia 920

The purchase of the Lumia 920 was unfortunately a fiasco. The Rogers kiosk in West Edmonton Mall (Rogers Wireless – Phase II by West 49) really gave me a hard time. The kiosk is run by Digital Communications Group. Needless to say, after that experience we will not be back to any of their stores.

On to the White Nokia Lumia 920.

Wow, is it _heavy_! This is one solid phone and will take a bit to get used to the weight.

One would not think of it, but button placement on the Samsung ATIV S was a real pain. The buttons on the Lumia 920 are in a perfect spot.

Power is right where one’s ring and middle fingers sit naturally so powering up and down is easy. The volume and camera buttons are on the same side and in easy reach.

The ATIV S has the volume along the bottom, so when the phone is rotated landscape for tapping messages the volume control slider occasionally comes up due to a knuckle hit on the button. A real pain. The power switch is on the left near the top of the phone when screen faces forward. That was always tough to get to or it would be hit accidentally while landscape tapping.

WOW! The Lumia 920 takes _awesome_ pictures and the first shot is fast!

WP_20130319_009

My daughter took that shot in the passenger seat while poking around the phone. We were driving West into a full-blown 1630 Hours low horizon sun. The camera compensated really well for the light changes especially considering I’m wearing a black shirt!

Suweet: When the phone was first fired up the first question the OS asked was: Do you want to restore your settings from the ATIV S phone?

Answered, “Yes” and about 10 minutes later _everything_ that was on the ATIV S was now on the Nokia. There are a few apps/games that are stuck in the download queue that need to be looked at though.

Screen: The screen quality is noticeably better on the Lumia. This was surprising as Samsung makes one of the better quality LED/LCD panels out there. Everything is crisp, clear, and colour rich on the Lumia’s screen.

The screen’s glass is a bit thick so it will take some getting used to when it comes to tapping out messages.

In the end, the original decision to run with the Samsung was a solid one. Yes, we have the added cost of the Samsung however we now have a reasonable “loaner” if the Nokia gives us any issues, plus after having worked on the Samsung for a couple of months or three the contrast between the two already stands out.

We shall see what happens three months down the road! :)

Note that the Rogers LTE version of the Nokia Lumia 920 has _all five bands_ for the LTE radio where TELUS and Bell tend to strip bands out. This is important for those that intend to roam into the US or other areas of the world.

Also, the Lumia 920 on Rogers has 32GB of internal storage. So, no real loss there since the ATIV S had 16GB of internal and a Micro-SD card at 16GB.

Vlad: I stuck with Windows Phone because I do like the OS. Yes, it has its issues. Another reason is that I am heavily invested in the Xbox Music Pass music content. It has literally saved me four figures worth of downloads on other services that would otherwise get trashed.

The one thing that bites about Android is this: In our make-up art class yesterday (Anne-Marie and I have been going to art class once a week during the school year together for over three years now) Anne-Marie finished her piece. Dixie, our art teacher, likes to take photos of the finished work. She has an S3. She said yes to an Android update the other day.

Guess what her complaint was? And, I’ve heard this many times before after Android updates...

Since the update things are missing and other things don’t work. Her camera on the phone can no longer focus on the art pieces that she takes shots of plus, as above, things are missing and/or now broken.

At least with Windows Phone updates I know that the phone will be the same after the fact.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

1 comment:

Nick Stango said...

Well, its about time. Excellent phone choice.