Robustness: the Forgotten Factor

While it's interesting to hear that your N82 survived the abuse, I think it's a bit of a stretch to try to grade other phones in order of their "apparent" robustness, without any hard evidence to back this up...

Well, in the case of almost all the devices mentioned, I've either owned them or had them to play with for long periods, so I know the hardware well. And I do have a decent degree in Physics, ten years of industrial engineering and almost 30 years as an adult of 'breaking stuff'.

So, although the above are my opinions, hopefully they're informed ones... 8-)

where would N85 fit in your list?

I know of an A1000 that survived falling off a car roof at 60 kph. A few months later, the same phone survived a dip in a spa. A rapid pull apart, followed by some hair dryer treatment, it was all good.

A friend of mine had his iPhone screen crack whilst it was just in his pocket against a few other items. It seems there's a weak point where the ear-hole is cut into the glass, and this allowed cracks to develop from there (a bit like the windows in the old De Havilland Comet plane were square; modern aircraft windows are round to avoid stress points). Apple wanted £180 to replace the glass!!!

I agree with Buster...experience, degrees and expectations will not necessarily reflect the reality. Personally, hitting the phone with your shoe and checking the results would have been more scientific than your "impressions" ;-) sorry

As far as I know there was only one Nokia phone that had a commerical in which a truck drove over it and it survived flawless. In still own it. Though Casio nowadays builts models which have Mil-spec .

Well, I'm sure many of the reviewers (I include myself) aren't willing to test robustness with their own devices! Sadly, many of them only copy press releases and what they read on other blogs, only a few made the complete homework.

That's fair enough. I just think it's not entirely reasonable to "guess" how robust a particular model may be, based on nothing more than a hunch!!

my e71 is quite fragile. it dropped 1 metre onto carpet and keyboard popped out so that keys on the left side stopped working. it popped back in and i'm now supercareful with it.

ny oldl n70 on the other hand... my boss was showing me a rugged windows pda. he dropped it 1 metre on to the same carpet and the battery worked lose so it wouldn't turn on. had to be opened with a screwdriver and reconnected. to compare i threw my n70 at the ceiling tiles. knocked one out and let it fall 3 meters and bounce of the floor. worked perfectly. it was a tank of a phone that i only recently gave away to a new home.

i'd prefer the tank approach to the super fragile one. but there is a cost in the size of the device. the e71 packs in more in a space about the same as a n70. it'd be nice to have the option though.

One minute of heavy rain rendered it completely unusable. The phone was in my pocket inside of a krusell case. I paid 70 euros for the replacement of the motherboard. Probably Nokia should mention that the phone is meant for indoor use.

can we get a full face picture of the N82? I'm having trouble visualizing where/how the cracks ended up where they are.

The Nokia 6120 I have seems to be a very robust design, dropped all over the place and apart from a few minor scratches and the battery door flying off it survived all sorts of abuse. But the iphone I have seems very fragile and wonder if it will last to the end of the 18 month contract! Brilliant usability but always careful not to drop it anywhere, the glass screen is known to crack if dropped at a certain angle, the rear will scratch as soon as its out of the box, the screen sinks into the front bezel, also had dust appearing behind the glass. Now on second phone due to these and poor 3G reception. All known iphone issues...

All my previous candybar style phones appeared to be more robust compared to previous smartphones (be it apple, windows, palm or symbian) that used large screens or where additional mechnical design such as slide keyboards were used.

What about the E51 - tough as nails with more features than 6120c (have both, love 'em both. My old N80 seems pretty indestructible too.

Ooh, yes, I'd forgotten the E51. Added to the list, as it's got a story to tell in our household too 8-)

Re: full face. Not quite sure what you need. The main impact was on the top right of the phone. All other scratches are to the front-right side, few minor chips in other places due to secondary impact and final resting on its front etc.

I know it is not a smartphone, but a few years ago my Nokia 6110 fell out of my pocket into a raspberry patch and was returned to me 9 months later after being out in the elements all that time. I still use it as my backup emergency phone.

This article could not have come at a better time for me! Just yesterday, i flung my satchelbag into the car and the N95 (RM 159) which was in the bag hit a hard corner and the top area just near the power button got zinged.
The phone per se works fine but i'm now reminded that this is not a man's phone. It has to be mollycoddled and placed on plush upholstered stuff. :(
It has been with me for less than a year and the slide has already become loose and the plastic shell that "wraps around" the back of the phone is beginning to come apart at the sides. I think Nokia should do a better QC on this count when they run for production quality phones.
The problem i think could be that Nokia in order to cut costs might have outsourced the production of this handset to a different geographic region.

Kaizer.

Of course they have. A lot of the Nokia phones are manufactured in China. And this is a story with a lot of the electronic stuff that we all use... It is made in China due to lower production costs.

I think that how robust the phone is purely a matter of personal opinion.. We have all dropped phones and I am sure everyone's heart skips a beat at the thought that the phone might stop working...
Overall, I have seen (my personal experience) that Nokia phones are fairly robust and do a decent job of surviving falls and abuse.

Are the AAS team planning to audition for "The Gadget Show". You could have endless fun blowing things up, driving tanks over them, and drowning them there ;-)

Yup, E90 is a robust son-of-a-gun. Perfect tool in the business world. Now, if only they figured out the keyboard screen scratching issue prior to releasing it :)

The wife drove the car over her N95 the other week (by accident), it was pressed completely into the slightly soft ground, apart from a couple of minor scratches there's no indication of anything having happened to it.

The slider's no better or worse than before either...

My wifes old 5500 went through 45 mins at 60 degs in the wash and, after a dry-out worked fine until it got upgraded to an N82. The N82 got fropped once and the whole casing got bent and the keyboard popped up so that the keys were rendered useless. I had to force it back into shape and beat the keyboard back to where it was supposed to be.

My old E70 went into the bath for a fraction of a second and never worked again.

My E61 has been in my pocket for two years and its as battered as all hell. Its scraped, dented and creaks and moans at the slightest touch.

I really feel that ALL mobile phones should be rubberised, mil-spec'd and made STRONG. All!

Man, talk about abusing phones. You dont deserve to own these things :P

My 5500 is now nearly 2 yrs old. I hv dropped it innumerable times, face-first mostly. But it still works gr8.
Even posting now thru dat only.
Only -ve point is, with the normal wear n tear, all the side-buttons placed within its rubber-casing hv come out, including the power button, PTT and pencil.
Had to use a third-party app ThePencil to use my # key as pencil
Does anyone know where can i get a new cabinet for my phone ? Failed to find it in my local town.