The Nokia N79: Full of toys for the mainstream

[slitchfield]

Another of Nokia's latest wave of S60 3rd Edition FP2 phones goes under Steve Litchfield's scrutiny. This time it's the Nokia N79, which, like the N96 before it, though full of 'toys', is ultimately not powerful enough when compared to the older N82 and N95 variants. A lack of graphics acceleration and poor video capture are two aspects which Steve felt disappointed with, but the all-in-one, slim, fashionable form factor will, I feel, ensure mainstream success.

Read on in the full article.

[genXhippie]

The review was nicely thorough imo, thanks.

(IMHO) The white N79 is the most beatiful Nokia phone in a while. Certainly the prettiest N-series device so far, altough I gotta admit that I've considered all previous N-series designs to have been either 'safe, bland & boring' (like N95) or ugly (N82).

I would be very interested to know which Nokia team designed N79. There is something very Nordic in the way it looks.

[Tzer2]

Not many comments for a hardware review thread, do people realise this is the full review? Maybe the newspost should have used the word "review" at least once? ;-)

Excellent thorough job as usual Steve, the photo samples are great.

[slitchfield]

Good point, I'll edit the text now....

[Williamoni]

Not many comments? Unfortunately the summary leads me to think that I won't bother taking the trouble to read the whole review. Nothing personal - I love Steve's reviews but he's not exactly bigging up this device.
For me the choice is between the N85 and the 5800. Actually this highlights one of the problems with Nokia. They have so many phones out it's hard to keep up with them all. They should release less new devices and ensure their software works properly on the devices they do release.

[fernando20]

The N79 is the best looking Nseries ever. Hmm... except for the N70, of course.

[Dr Tran]

Beauty must really be subjective. I find nothing at all interesting about this handset.

[Tzer2]

The N79 is the best looking Nseries ever.

Beauty must really be subjective. I find nothing at all interesting about this handset.

The two opinions above illustrate why Nokia (and other manufacturers) do release so many models a year. If 1000 million people a year buy phones then there's bound to be a lot of variety in what people want, so the phone makers have to offer them a variety of models.

It's' a phone. It lives in my pocket or is pushed on the side of my face. Who gives a stuff what it looks like? It's really not important.

I never use A-GPS, just the GPS only on my N95, I don't want to use the network unnecessarily and I find it's perfectly good at locking on and staying locked on.

For some people, looks do matter. This one actually looks better in real life than in the pictures. I saw a silver version which looks really nice. But for me the D-pad is really ugly.

[Tzer2]

It's' a phone. It lives in my pocket or is pushed on the side of my face. Who gives a stuff what it looks like? It's really not important.

Well, it's personal taste isn't it? :-)

The way their phone looks is important to a lot of people, that's why (for example) the RAZR was popular. It wasn't particularly good or interesting as a phone, but its sleek looks made a lot of people buy one.

I think a lot of people see it as an accessory, like glasses or jewellery or handbags.

[slitchfield]

"I never use A-GPS, just the GPS only on my N95, I don't want to use the network unnecessarily and I find it's perfectly good at locking on and staying locked on."

What an uninformed attitude. A-GPS only uses a kilobyte or so, costing at most a cent or a penny. And drastically speeds up lock times down to almost instantaneous.

[Jejoma]

No, the E71 is the most beautiful Nokia ever. I just wish people would stop asking me whether it is an iPhone

lolz...
same here... i never used the A-GPS on my N95...
I'll always load my Nokia Map earlier when i know i am going to need it...
well... saving is always a good life ethic isn't it =D