7 Reasons Why I don't regret buying the Nokia N97 (despite the rumours of upcoming devices that on paper upstage it).

7 Reasons why I don’t regret buying the N97 (despite the rumours of upcoming devices that on paper upstage it).

[Above] N97 Playing Madagascar Escape 2 Africa using SmartMovie (review and chance for free licences coming tomorrow Saturday)

1. I have the N97 right now. As soon as you start the waiting game, it’s difficult to stop as by the time you’ve waited long enough, there’s something new to wait for. Neither the N97 mini nor the N900 have the xenon flash I really wanted in a new phone. The only xenon equiped phone I have my eye on is the Satio – and I have reasons for not wanting that that could spawn a new post on its own.
2. The N97 is absolutely beautiful. Thanks to Donna and the Crew at WOMWorld, I got to trial a white N97. From the get-go, I’ve always prefered the black N97, but was surprised at how much I actually like the white one. But the white N97 is prone to staining, plus the keyboard on the black N97 strangely feels better; both in texture of the keys and tactile feedback. Gun-metal trim, black back, charcoal-grey front. Sweet. (Though a killer combination simply would have just been glossy piano black all over and gun metal)
3. The N97 is relatively cheap on contract. Though you’ll have to search hard to find a good SIM-Free price (best around the 400 mark), it’s actually relatively cheap on contract. Total ownership cost over 12 months is about 540 GBP. Consider the minimum monthly usage anyway of £20/month for calls/text/web. Over 12 months that makes the N97 300GBP. Over an 18month contract of similar monthly usage, the equivalent price of N97 drops to 270GBP
4. The N97 is an excellent media device: 3.5″ 16:9 screen, 29.8GB memory (+ more with micro sd) makes it an excellent music and video player. Through the headphones, (and higher bitrate tracks + via decent headphones) it sounds stonkingly good. BBCi Player’s a great service for download/streaming, SmartMovie’s absolutely amazing for films.
5. The N97 is awesome at keeping me connected: Facebook, Gravity, Nimbuzz, Nokia Messaging – My Social networks and my email are there at a tap of a screen.
6. The N97 is great for messaging: After extensive usage, I can type really fast on the N97. Great for longish emails or facebook-chat via nimbuzz. It’s just more productive to have both a touch screen and a keyboard.
7. Steady firmware upgrades are improving the N97. Though we really didn’t see much in the latest V11 to V12 upgrade, we should expect a lot more to come to the N97’s firmware. There was a Q&A session with WOM, Nokia and a collection of bloggers about a month ago to discuss firmware suggestions – a lot of those are still to come. Plus, with the mini being pretty much identical to the N97, perhaps any improvements meant for the mini can be given to the N97 too. Though some will say the need for so frequent FW upgrades is a negative

I thought I’d have serious buyers remorse, what with the rumours already of upcoming high end Nokia phones. I can’t really blame my liking for the N97 on that “honey moon period” where all devices are good for a week or two because it’s new as I’ve been using an N97 for 2 months already.

Compared to other high end devices, the N97’s “out of the box” experience isn’t so good. It doesn’t have the eye-candy UI that everyone’s after nowadays or the processor/ram/graphic chip specs to drool over.

But what’s great about the N97 is how much it grows with you. Tweaking to your particular settings/themes/applications/menu configurations and the software updates.

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meh – I oversaved this post with a half missing version and I’m too tired to rewrite it so that it makes sense…zzzzzz 🙁

Tags: 5th Edition, N97, Nokia, Nokia N97, Nseries, S60, Symbian

Category: 5th Edition, Nokia, Nseries, S60, Symbian