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Nokia N96 16 GB Unlocked Cell Phone with 5 MP Camera, 3G, GPS, Media Player Micro SD Slot--U.S. Version with Warranty (Black) | 
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| Brand: Nokia
Category: Wireless
Buy New: See price in cart
New (5)
Rating:  18 reviews
Sales Rank: 102
Color: Black
Media: Wireless Phone Accessory
Autographed: No
Memorabilia: No
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.3
Dimensions (in): 4.1 x 2.2 x 0.7
MPN: N96
Model: N96
UPC: 758478024935
EAN: 0758478024935
ASIN: B001DN5030
Release Date: August 26, 2008
Shipping: Eligible for Super Saver Shipping
Availability: Usually ships in 24 hours
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| Features:
| • | Unlocked quad-band GSM cell phone compatible with 850/900/1800/1900 frequencies and US 3G compatibility via 850/1900 HSDPA plus GPRS/EDGE capabilities | | • | 5-megapixel digital camera with Carl Zeiss Optics, autofocus, digital zoom and Flickr support; DVD-quality video capture (640 x 480 pixels at 30 fps) | | • | Wi-Fi networking (802.11b/g); A-GPS for navigation with Nokia Maps app; Bluetooth 2.0 connectivity for both handsfree communication and stereo music streaming | | • | 2.8-inch screen; 2-way slider design reveals keypad on one side and media controls on other; access to personal email; full PIM features | | • | Up to 3.7 hours of GSM talk time, up to 220 hours (9.2 days) of standby time. |
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Product Description
N95 8GB Smartphone. Works with AT&T and T Mobile service only. 16GB Internal flash memory plus microSD memory card slot (hot swappable). Digital music player 5MP Camera Maps Internet
Amazon.com Product Description
REVIEW: The followup to the sensationally popular N95, the Nokia N96 is a veritable Swiss Army knife packed with all the mobile communication, multimedia, location and computing tools you need. With a large 2.8-inch screen, 16 GB of internal memory, additional MicroSD expansion, and support for high-quality videos in a wide range of formats, the dual-slide Nokia N96 represents an exciting new chapter in mobile media. 
The Nokia N96 multimedia computer has a large 2.8-inch screen. | 
Its face slides up to reveal an alpha/numeric keypad. | The quad-band Nokia N96 GSM/EDGE phone makes it easy to roam globally and stay in touch with voice and text messaging, and this model is also ready to run on 3G networks here in the US (850/1900 MHz HSDPA), enabling fast downloads and streaming multimedia while on the go. It also includes integrated Wi-Fi connectivity (802.11b/g) for accessing open networks at work, at home, and on the road from a variety of wireless hotspots. You'll also be able to connect to a wide variety of peripherals--including stereo headphones--with the Bluetooth 2.0+EDR capabilities. It's based on S60 software operating on the Symbian OS, enabling you to personalize the N96 by choosing from a wide choice of compatible applications that can be downloaded--including games, navigation, entertainment, and productivity titles. Other features include a 5-megapixel camera/camcorder with Carl Zeiss optics, assisted GPS (A-GPS) for navigation using the Nokia Maps application and geotagging of photos, FM radio, USB 2.0 connectivity, TV-out capability for displaying photos and videos on external televisions, access to live TV (operator service using DVB-H or streaming over 3G, where available), and up to 3.7 hours of GSM talk time. This unlocked cell phone can be used with a GSM network service provider and it provides quad-band connectivity (850 MHz, 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, 1900 MHz). It does not come with a SIM card, and it requires that you provide a SIM card for usage with your selected service provider. Phone Features
Offering a design similar to the N95, the N96 has a large 2.8-inch LCD screen with a 240 x 320-pixel resolution and support for up to 16 million colors for terrific depth when viewing photos or playing immersive 3D games. The screen also offers Auto UI rotation based on the integrated accelerometer. The innovative 2-way slide concept makes it easy to switch between different modes, going from reading maps to watching a video with a simple slide. A numeric keypad slides out from one end of the device while dedicated media keys slide out from the opposite direction, converting the display into full screen landscape mode. In addition to the internal 16 GB memory, the N96 also offers memory expansion via optional MicroSDHC media up to 8 GB in size--providing a whopping 24 GB of mobile storage, enough for up to 40 hours of high-quality video. 
The phone also slides down to reveal media playback controls, and the screen auto-rotates from portrait to landscape for optimal video viewing. | 
Capture vivid still imagery with the 5-megapixel Carl Zeiss lens, as well as smooth DVD-quality video. | The Nokia N96 actually has two cameras, a high-resolution, 5-megapixel camera on the back of the device and a lower resolution camera on the front (VGA resolution, 640 x 480) on the front of the phone for video calls (requires network compatibility). The main camera on the back of the N95 supports an image capture resolution of 2592 x 1944 pixels. You can use both cameras to take still pictures and record videos. It allows DVD-like quality video capture at 30 frames per second at VGA resolution (640 x 480 pixels). Further, with the integrated A-GPS, you can now "geotag" pictures with location data and share them with online communities. With the Carl Zeiss optics on the 5-megapixel camera, you can capture print quality photos and DVD-like quality video clips. Carl Zeiss, a world leader in high quality camera lenses, brings an award-winning legacy to the Nokia N96 with state-of-the-art optics for mobile photography and mobile video. The Zeiss name has been associated with cameras from Hasselblad, Rollei, Yashica, Sony, and Nikon. This auto-focus Carl Zeiss Tessar lens has a 5.2mm focal length, F2.8 aperture, focus range as close as 10cm. The camera also features a flash, video light, auto-focus assist light, self-timer, white balance and exposure compensation settings, scene settings, and digital video stabilization. Images are saved as JPEG or EXIF files while videos are recorded in the MPEG-4 file format with the .mp4 file extension, or in the 3GPP file format with the .3gp file extension (sharing quality). Photos and video clips can be enjoyed on a compatible television thanks to the device's TV out feature and support for Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) technology. Accessing internet videos is quick and simple. The Nokia N96 supports common video formats including MPEG-4, Windows Media Video and Flash Video, making favorite videos easy to view. The Nokia Video Center also offers one place to discover and access a variety of mobile content ranging from movie trailers and comedy to news from world-leading content brands such as YouTube, Reuters, and Sony Pictures. Transferring and accessing videos is even faster with the high-speed USB 2.0 connection and WLAN and HSDPA support. In select markets, the integrated DVB-H receiver offers live broadcast TV with an automatically updating program guide. For added convenience, the Nokia N96 features a "kickstand" on the back cover that allows for hands-free viewing. For a superb music experience, the Nokia N96 features media keys, a 3.5 mm headphone connector and built-in 3D stereo speakers. You'll easily be able to control playback with the dedicated media keys, and the digital music player supports playlist editing, equalizer and categorized access to your music collection. You'll also enjoy podcasts, Internet radio, and access to FM radio with RDS. 
The back of the phone includes a kickstand for easy handsfree viewing of videos. | 
Side profile of the N96. | This smartphone has an integrated Wi-Fi LAN (802.11b/g), enabling seamless connectivity with wireless networks at work, at home, and on the roam via Wi-Fi hotspots at airports and coffee shops. Because the N96 is Bluetooth enabled (with version 2.0+EDR), wireless communication headsets can be configured with the phone for total hands-free operation. It also offers Bluetooth stereo audio support (A2DP), enabling you to enjoy your music without any wires. If your laptop is Bluetooth enabled, you can connect wirelessly and enjoy dial-up networking (DUN)--surf the Internet, send email, and access files from a server. With A-GPS functionality, you'll be able find your route quickly and easily, whether walking or driving (A-GPS is a network dependant feature that requires a data plan; additional charges may apply). The Nokia Maps application offers richer maps with urban details and satellite views and the ability to search and download information about points of interests, such as restaurants, hotels, companies, travel agencies, airports, and more. It also provides optional upgrades such as City Guides, turn-by-turn pedestrian mode and voice-guided car navigation. The N96 has all the bases covered when it comes to messaging. Support is built in for sending and receiving text, video, graphics and sound via messages. It also enables you to check your email on the go (supporting POP3, IMAP4, and SMTP protocols). T9 text entry, which is a technology that makes it easier for people to enter words and text on handsets, is built into the unit--a plus for mobile text messaging users. View web pages as they were originally intended with the integrated Nokia Web Browser, which enables you to zoom out to a full screen view of the entire page using the Mini Map feature. Find the section you want and then zoom in to the content you need. The text instantly adjusts to the size of your screen. The browser also keeps a history of your browsing so you can quickly get back to where you started. Universal Plug and Play (UPnP) technology means that this Nokia phone will discover, interact with, and control other compatible home electronic devices. This includes PCs, media centers, home entertainment systems, new smart appliances, home automation systems, networked peripherals, and Web-based services. With compatible equipment, you can stream video from your Nokia device directly to your TV, or hear music tracks stored on your PC through your living room's sound system. Other features include: - Supports the Ovi family of Nokia internet services, including maps, music, media sharing and more
- N-Gage application with try-and-buy games
- Music playback: MP3, AAC, eAAC, eAAC+, WMA
- Video playback: MPEG-4 / SP and MPEG-4 AVC/H.264, up to 30 fps, up to VGA resolution (scaled max QVGA on device, SDTV on TV-out); RealVideo up to QCIF at 30 fps
- Bluetooth version 2.0 with the following profiles: A2DP (stereo music streaming), AVRC (remote control), HFP (hands-free car kits), HSP (communication headsets), BIP (for sending images to another device), DUN (dial-up networking), FTP (file transfer), OPP (object push for business cards, calendar items, and pictures)
- 128MB RAM, 256MB system memory (operating system plus dynamic user data area)
- 3.5mm stereo headset plug , TV-out support (PAL/NTSC)
- Wi-Fi supports WEP, WPA, and WPA2 security settings
- Speaker-independent voice commands
- Document viewer (compatible with Excel, PowerPoint, Word, PDF, ZIP)
- Flight mode
Vital Statistics
The Nokia N96 weighs 4.4 ounces and measures 4.06 x 2.17 x 0.71 inches. Its 950 mAh lithium-ion battery is rated at up to 3.7 hours of GSM talk time (2.5 hours on 3G networks), and up to 220 hours of GSM standby time (200 hours on 3G networks. It runs on the 850/900/1800/1900 GSM/GPRS/EDGE frequencies as well as the 850/1900 MHz HSDPA 3G frequencies found in the US.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 13 more reviews...
 Feature Packed, Not Easy to Use, but Some Strong Points January 4, 2009
Stephen Hall (USA)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
I anxiously awaited the arrival of this Nokia N96. Its included features are enough to make anyone drool.
I am using the device with AT&T Wireless in the United States. I quickly found that your basic phone functions are more or less easy to use. Slide down the bottom keypad, and you're ready to dial a number.
However, the other features I was so excited to try on the device were somewhat less easy to use. The small indented power button on top of the device is even a bit confusing. You have to depress it for a fair amount of time. This can be a bit of a challenge, with large fingers.
The web browser is quite quick, and the silver navigation ring on the front of the phone made it relatively easy to move around webpages. However, somewhat less easy was figuring out how to connect it to the Internet. I added my home wifi network, which wasn't too difficult, but I imagine would be a challenge for some users. However, now, whenever I try to use any Internet based application or service, I have to select what connection I want: my home wifi, the mobile carrier's data network, etc. It doesn't just connect, you have to confirm and select information every-time you go to do something Want to listen to Internet radio, get ready to confirm you want to do that and that you want to connect to the Internet, and what connection you want to use. Want to use Nokia Maps? Get ready to select your Internet connection. It's really troubling.
The phone is also setup by default in metric measurements. I changed a setting from metric to imperial, but my maps still calculate everything based on kilometers rather than miles. This does not bother me, for the fact I'm very comfortable with metric measurements, but I imagine others might find this confusing and frustrating. Surely, there is setting to change this, but it is not obvious.
Turn by Turn Directions is a bright spot for the Nokia N96. Nokia will give you a 3 month trial of Turn by Turn Directions. Then all you need is a connection to the Internet, with your mobile provider, and you can get turn by turn directions from your current location to a destination of your choice. You can also search for businesses, restaraunts, or anything else you might be interested in driving to. Walking directions are also available. I would give the maps and turn by turn implementation on this phone a 4/5. It works quite nicely, once you get it running, though it is still a bit cumbersome.
The camera included with the N96 is another bright spot. For a mobile phone camera, it's one of the best. It is 5 megapixels, but more importantly it has a good camera lens that take solid pictures under good lighting. It has an autofocus as well. Perhaps even more impressive, the video you can shoot with the Nokia N96 is the best quality setting, is also very good. The video recording capability is one of the things I plan to use the N96 for the most.
Connect the N96 to your computer for some exciting options. On a Windows computer, you can use the Amazon Unbox service, to sync the mobile copies of your purchased TV shows. This can be good, if you need to watch a show on the go. It's also easy to use popular music applications (except iTunes obviously) and included software to sync your MP3 files to your phone, such as the ones you can purchase from the Amazon MP3 store. Videos from Amazon Unbox look quite good when viewed on the N96, and the sound from the Internal speaker and headphones were both impressive.
I also tried connecting the N96 to my Mac. Surprisingly, selecting the mass media option from the handset after connecting it via USB, even my Mac could sync with iPhoto the photos and videos I recorded on the phone! That is fantastic. Mac users can still use the N96 to pull the photos and videos they take. A nice feature.
3G - The N96 can connect to AT&T 3G network where available. This does allow faster map searching and internet browsing, though drains the battery somewhat quicker.
FM Radio - A surprising feature of the Nokia N96 is that when you connect standard headphones, you can listen to your local FM radio. It may sound like something of the past, but when your device has the capability it is more convenient than you might think.
Drawbacks - Again, a big drawback of the N96 is that it is not always easy to use. You'll spend several minutes, if not longer, the first time you try to do anything. Furthermore, without a dedicated QWERTY pad, typing messages, emails, or web addresses can be a challenge.
Overall, the Nokia N96 brings together a tremendous number of features. You have a solid phone camera, solid video recorder, multimedia player, music player, FM radio, calendar, web browser, 16 GB of included memory and more. However, there is a high learning factor, to use many of the features. Furthermore, with the power and capability of the phone, you sometimes find yourself wishing for a QWERTY keyboard, or a touch screen.
The N96 has some amazing capabilities, but for the several hundred dollars the device requires to purchase, I am left wondering how many people should pay that much money, for it. If you really believe it's the perfect phone for you, I would not discourage you. However, if you are not completely against getting a contract phone, an offering from Blackberry or the iPhone may be a simpler to use solution.
Designed for Overseas Use More than USA January 3, 2009
Admiralu (Camarillo, California United States)
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
The new Nokia N96 phone reads like a powerhouse smartphone packed with features. It is a full color, unlocked GSM slider phone with a 5MP camera, stereo sound, music and video features. While it is a quad band world phone, here in the US it works on T-Moblie and AT&T networks (although AT&T is recommened for its faster 3G network). Let me start out by describing what you get. Nokia has packed quite a bit in the box. They include cables to hook your phone up to you TV to watch video, a car charger, a sync cable to sync your phone to your pc for updates, video, app and music downloads, battery, travel charger, a remote that hooks into the phone along with earbuds that hook into the remote, (no you can't use the earbuds without the remote and you cannot hook alternate headsets into the phone or the remote),an invitation to use the OVI service (an online backup service with tiered features to backup your phone), a User Guide, Get Started Guide, the Nokia PC Suite CD, an NGage free game offer, warranty info and of course the phone.
Now for the phone. It is a beautiful, full color, lightweight device that promises much, but delivers less. Since this is a GSM phone, after calling to switch service, you only need to add your SIM card to start using it. The battery was partially charged out of the box, so it did not take long to charge. Despite what I have read from other reviews, I had no problems adding contacts from my SIM card to the phone. Since this phone IS NOT a touch screen, everything is menu driven. Nokia did not do a good job of letting you know where all the menus are. While a User Guide is included, the full version of how to use the phone is included in the online version of the guide that can be found at the Nokia product page. The buttons on this phone do not stand out as much as I would like. The call and end keys are on opposite sides, but are not as prominent as they should be. The Power key is on top and it takes a few minutes to turn it on. There are "media keys" that work for video or music playback that surround the larger scroll key. The scroll key is used to navigate the various menus, with the usual Nokia context sensitive Selection keys above the Call and End keys. The scroll key is very sensitive, I kept hitting selections that I did not want and it is also used for navigating web pages. There is a menu key that is usefull and a multimedia key which isn't that helpful. The display is beautiful and call quality is excellent. You slide the main section up to bring up the keyboard and number pad. This phone should have had a qwerty keyboard, as the typing on the keypad is time consuming pressing keys until you come to the one yo need. This is also even more frustrating for the Internet. While the display is very clear, the browser is only a WAP mobile browser, not the full Internet browser that an iPhone or iPod Touch would have. Using the scroll key to move a too small arrow around is a pain. While this phone offers YouTube, the Internet video quality is very spotty. The stereo sound in 3D is very clear and you do not need a headset to listen. This phone is one of the few compatible with the Amazon UnBox service. To try out the service, I installed the Nokia PC suite. It installled a software updater, Video suite manager, photo app, PC suite app, and a Map loader for the GPS function. The installation of the apps was fast, though starting the PC Suite app took a very long time. The Amazon UnBox service is a video on demand portable player to watch video on you PC or mobile device. It was very easy to download the player and install it. Amazon has a nice selection of videos and I downloaded a Stargate SG-1 episode to view on my phone. Purchasing was fast and easy although downloading took a very long time because of the extra option for portable files. The UnBox player interface is nice, but I had a difficult time trying to transfer the files to the phone. The help files say that you can just copy files to the phone, but you actually transfer the files by clicking play. After finally getting the files to transfer to the phone, I was able to watch the video. The video playback on the phone for the Amazon purchase was clear and of excellent quality. Playback on the phone is in the widescreen format. It will play in both portrait and landscape mode, although queing up takes a while unlike an iPod or iPhone. You can slide the main phone the other way to show the video keys in landscape mode. The main 5MP camera with the Carl Zeiss lens is outstanding, the best camera I have seen on a phone so far. It has a flash and is located on the back. There is also a lower resolution camera on the front. Both can capture images and video. Photos look fantastic. The N96 is also supposed to broadcast TV signals through the LIVE TV service, but like most of the Nokia service options, it is not available in the US. Neither is the Nokia Music Store and the Nokia Maps turn by turn service. The phone will play music via the Windows Media Player (no Apple iTunes formats) and podcasts. It also has an FM radio and Internet radio playback capability. The radio feature will only play with the remote and headset attached. You cannot listen to the radio without the attachments, another boneheaded manuever by Nokia. The Maps feature, which is the GPS function to me was useless. After the app opens, you see a 3D image of the planet. You have to install the Maps software before the actual street level option will work and as I mentioned before, the turn by turn doesn't work in the US. My iPod Touch handles GPS faster and easier than this. The N96 is also supposed to be Bluetooth compatible, but I could not get it to discover my Bluetooth headset despite numerous attempts.
This phone has a lot of quirks. While it does turn on fairly quickly and you can make calls quickly, Using many of the features means responding to a number of silly requests such as "go on Internet now?" after selecting the web option. I personally prefer touch screen phones because it is much easier to navigate than having to drill down through numerous menus. Some shortcut options are available, but not for a lot of features. I did not try the OVI service, since I already use a wonderful service called Dashwire to backup my phone. The N96 does have a large 16 GB storage with a memory card addition available, it does leave a lot to be desired. This phone is better engineered for the overseas market rather than the US. It would a good option for those who use the Windows Media audio files for music and radio and camera and video fans. It is a good effort, but falls short, especially for the high price.
 Some decent features, but too many issues to recommend January 1, 2009
Mary Jo Sminkey (Carlisle, PA USA)
3 out of 4 found this review helpful
I was excited to try this phone out as I have been using Windows Mobile devices for awhile (currently using the AT&T Tilt) and never been completely satisfied with their performance. A 16 gig phone geared for music and video looked right up my alley. Having used this phone for several days and tried as many features as possible, I'm not nearly as enamored with it as I hoped. For a $600 phone, I expected something far more polished. This seems to have been rushed into production and has quite a few bugs and problems. Let's run down the good stuff first.
PROS:
- Light, compact form factor. Considerably lighter than my Tilt.
- 16 gig of memory. Excellent amount of included space, and can take a microSD card for even more media files.
- Beautiful screen. Video is sharp and colorful, although it could be a bit brighter. But hard to complain with the quality of the picture. See below though for more comments on video playback. It also is much more visible in sunlight than my Tilt is.
- 5 gig camera with flash and video capability. I debated whether to include this under the "pros" as I didn't find the quality of the images produced by the camera all that great, particularly indoors. But having a flash and being able to record video with it is still at least better than not having it at all.
- Excellent sound quality and nice loud speakers. Includes two speakers for "sort-of" stereo playback. This phone can really produce some serious volume, I was quite impressed. Granted, the sound quality out of the speakers is not going to blow anyone away. But it's pretty good regardless. And make sure you turn the volume down before using the headphones, it will totally blast you away! If you regularly try to listen to music in noisy situations where volume is crucial, you will know how important this can be.
- Excellent multimedia features included. FM radio, internet radio, podcasts, etc. Most of these I could do on my WM phone, but great to have them included for seamless integration right on the phone.
- Good included accessories. Includes a remote with speakerphone, car charger, TV out cables, free game, etc. Better package overall than most phones.
Now for my fairly long list of negatives.
CONS:
- Lack of fullsize keyboard and/or touchscreen. I was surprised to see there was no touchscreen on this phone, that makes it really hard to compete with other smartphones in the same class like the iPhone and any Windows Mobile phone. With my Tilt, I not only have a full QWERTY keyboard (which granted, is not the greatest way to enter text for most people, but nice for things like passwords and WEP keys) you can use a wide variety of entry methods that work with the touchscreen. I personally use ones like Fitaly and Touchpad which can give good speed and yet still easily handle non-standard text at any time. One of the things I particularly find annoying with phones like this that use T9 is that you often have to turn it on and off which requires going to the menu. Likewise with the multi-key entry of letters and numbers, you have to constantly switch back and forth, which takes far longer on this phone than just about any other smartphone I've used. It's incredibly tedious and if you use your phone as a PDA or anything other than quick texting, you should probably look at better options.
- Problems using Wifi versus AT&T data plans. I personally use pay-as-you-go currently as I don't need to pay for monthly cell phone service and almost always have access to Wifi networks. With my Tilt, it's a simple matter of a one-time configuration of the phone for any Wifi network and it will use that automatically versus accessing the AT&T data network. This phone just would not cooperate with that. It often would switch over and use the data plan and charge me no matter how I configured it, even going into the settings and making my Wifi the default. Worse, you would have to do this *every* time you access a new Wifi network, setting it up as a default and then switching it back, and even then, it seems to randomly hit the data network and charge me for usage without warning. And to make it even more annoying, just about every time it needs to access the internet, it has to ask me what network to use, the Wifi or AT&T. Why bother setting a default (and configuring it for automatic) if it's not going to just use it?? It's almost like the phone is trying to get you to use the paid data plan whether you have access to Wifi or not. Just about everything else on this phone I can kind of deal with, or work around, but this is so frustrating for me and COSTS ME MONEY that it's a total dealbreaker. So if you want to use Wifi as your primary data access network, and not pay the significant cost of a monthly data plan, you will probably want to use a different phone.
- Bare-bones email and web applications. The email and web apps that came with the phone didn't do much for me. Emails with HTML were not properly formatted at all, and the options for handling email as well were very limited compared to what I am used to. When I tried to adjust my settings, it wiped out my custom POP settings and I had to enter them all over again (which due to the lack of keyboard is particularly annoying). The web browser was not quite as bad, but navigating the pages without a touchscreen is slow and tedious and it kept popping up the "overall" page view when it was inconvenient. The back button brings up little thumbnails of the pages but for some reason they were often blank and kept skipping the actual page I wanted to get back to. I was easily able to load on the free Opera Mini browser however, which gave me a far better experience. If you use a smartphone, I highly recommend grabbing a copy of it. I've not yet found a free email replacement, I'd probably have to pay to get an email application that just does the basics that I would have liked to come with the device.
- While there's certainly plenty of games on Symbian and for N-Gage, the library of applications is a bit more limited. Also just the fact that it doesn't use a touchscreen makes game play often more limiting and somewhat more tedious as it relies totally on keystrokes, particularly the types of games I prefer (card games, adventure games, etc.) Still, the games offered were decent enough and the graphics top-notch for a mobile phone, and I do notice more places offering Symbian versions of their software. Both my Hava player and Roboform mobile apps had versions that ran okay on the N96 (although not flawless).
- Performance issues. My main hope was that this device would be zippier and less prone to locking up than the Tilt. Unfortunately this was not the case. The processor is downgraded from the previous N95 model, most likely done to allow them to also downgrade the battery as well but I can't say if the problems I saw are a result of this or typical for Symbian phones. While the video was sharp and beautiful to look at, I still experienced pauses and skips...particularly with the sample videos included! Almost all of the ones included with the phone did not play smoothly all the way through. I had better luck with some small videos that I synced to the device and a couple TV episodes that I downloaded from Amazon Unbox. While they did not always play perfectly, they were at least watchable for 95% of the time. The phone itself also often temporarily pauses and/or freezes and a few times locked up on me completely. Unlike the Tilt which has a reset option, I could not figure out how to unlock this phone when it froze other than to remove the back and pull the battery out. Very annoying.
- Camera image quality. It's important when evaluating cameras to realize that megapixels means little about quality. So getting 5 MP with the phone means mostly that the images it takes will just take up more space on the phone. They certainly aren't of a quality that I would be interested in printing them out which is where the 5 MP would be of any use. They are of similar quality to most cellphones...which means only good for snapshots when you have nothing better on-hand. And indoors in anything other than very bright light, they were definitely worse than what my Tilt is able to take, even though the camera includes a flash.
- Battery life. Barely passable, no better than my Tilt which was equally a battery hog. You definitely need to charge it every night and if you use your phone much, you may find you need to charge it during the day as well.
- Voice control. This is one of those phones that you don't really train, it just recognizes the names you speak and picks the default phone. Also some basic application control. This type of VR can be problematic if you have people with similar names and I just much prefer training my own names and commands as I can with the software on WM phones. And of course, there's nothing in the manual about how to even use this feature.
- Live TV. Touted as a feature, but won't work for most people due to very limited coverage right now. You're probably much better off just getting a Slingbox or Hava which will work with a wide range of phones these days, including this one.
- Non-standard USB cable. May seem like a small nit, but things like this just annoy me. Why not use a standard mini-USB cable, which most people have multiple ones of, and also a USB cable that will simultaneous charge the device? It's really annoying when you are syncing the device, moving videos, etc. and it runs out of juice. Using this new micro USB cable means I'll need to buy another one for travel....and probably another cable for charging in different places.
- GPS. I only tested the GPS briefly as this was another area where it seemed to insist on using the data plan rather than Wifi. But I just don't see the benefit in using a GPS on such a small screen and paying monthly fees for it, when you can buy dedicated GPS units for as little as $100 these days that are larger and easier to read while driving, and with much better features. This GPS didn't work nearly as well as my simple Garmin unit and didn't even compare with running TomTom on my Tilt which I don't pay any fee to use (other than the purchase cost of the software).
- No case or screen protector. For the price, some kind of cheap case would be nice. The device comes with a plastic skin covering the front and back that would do nicely as a screen protector, but for some reason, they plastered a big "NOKIA" over the front so it can't be used. The screen and phone itself really shows fingerprints and smudges pretty readily so a screen protector would have been highly appreciated.
- Nokia PC Suite issues. I didn't have too much trouble syncing my Outlook contacts, but had various issues with other parts of the PC Suite. Forget using the music application, for some reason it didn't read 99% of the tags in my MP3s, so had to use Media Player to sync music to the device. The video manager as well did not work very well for me. It handled small videos okay, but as soon as it got to anything with length, it locked up on me. Took me several tries to convert videos of more than 100 meg in size. I want to try and do some conversions myself and see what videos it really can handle, as I have other mobile video conversion software that does a good job, but I know already it doesn't seem to handle Divx video which is a shame.
- Bare bones user manual. The manuals included cover the basics, but you won't find much help in them if you need more than just "getting started" information. For instance, I was trying to figure out where I turn on T9 predictive text, but there's absolutely no information in the manual on text entry whatsoever. I went to the Nokia site to see if the support section had a better manual to download, but nope. You better be good at figuring stuff out on your own to use this phone (and yes, I did figure out where the T9 setting was).
- Other issues. I seem to just run into random problems with this phone. YouTube videos for instance would not play at all, regardless of which browser I used. It doesn't seem to like most of my album art in the music player, and does not always play smoothly if playing in the background while doing other activities on the phone (web browsing for instance). The microSD slot is harder than most to get the card in and out of. The build quality is very plastic, cheap feeling. And there are just some things that make it obvious it was kind of rushed to market. For instance, there's a settings screen for a "scroll wheel" even though the phone doesn't even have one! Would be nice if it did, but to have settings in there for something that does not even exist on it, makes me wonder how much testing they really gave this phone before releasing.
To summarize, this is a phone I really wanted to like. It's got huge potential as a portable media device and phone, but there are just too many problem areas to recommend it over other devices in the same price range.
Great Specs, Too Many Short-Comings, Way Too Pricey January 1, 2009
D. Diskin (California, USA)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
I was extremely excited to open up the Nokia N96, because from its specs it looked to be one of the most powerful mobile phones on the market. It certainly lived up to its expectations in some areas, and exceeds them in others, but fell short with some very common issues.
For anyone looking for a camera/media device that also does phone calls, this might have been a serious contender.
The media player works well for audio, the built-in FM tuner is great, and the internet radio feed was easy to use and loaded with content. This phone does everything well, but not nearly well enough to justify its astronomical price tag.
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Things Done Right:
Browser - The browser on the phone rendered the pages I tried perfectly and it was very easy to navigate using the device. Bookmarks and other features you'd want were all there.
FM Radio - This worked like a charm! It was very cool to have this in a mobile device.
Light Weight - The phone weighs considerably less than my AT&T Fuze and Tilt.
Massive Storage - The phone's best feature is its internal 16 GB of storage.
Looks - Trust me when I say the phone looks even better in person.
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Half-Way There:
Mapping - Rather than relying on a live internet feed for maps, it had very detailed maps of the US right on the phone. This is great if you are in an area with patchy service and need directions. But, it's no Google Maps. I've been spoiled by having Google Maps on my Windows Mobile phones for some time now, and while the mapping application on this phone is good, it's not Google Maps. Plus, many of the advanced features of this application require an extra fee such as turn-by-turn directions and traffic reports.
WiFi - Connecting the phone to my home wireless network with WPA/PSK was a breeze. HOWEVER, many of the features on the phone such as the mapping tool, internet radio, and others required use of data plan, even if you were connected via WiFi. And despite trying, I could never get it to connect to my computer for WiFi Sharing.
Help - The phone has online help for nearly every menu, most of which was well-written and useful. Some of the more rare settings had no help, however.
Camera - While this phone won't replace your $200 digital camera, it's better than what I've seen on most mobile phones. I especially liked the on-screen menus for making adjustments on the fly. The flash on the back of the camera is great for close-up subjects.
Voice Command - There is a utility which reads you your messages to you, which was pretty neat. And, you can dial your contacts through voice command, plus launch applications. Unfortunately, that's all. Voice command apps on other devices allow you to dial numbers as they are spoken, play specific media, or dictate text messages.
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More Work Needed:
No Keyboard - This device lacks both a keyboard and touch screen, limiting all input to the numeric pad and a plethora of other buttons. If you are a heavy text/emailer, this is going to be a deal-breaker for you.
IM Difficult - The phone includes an IM application, but it was intimidating to configure with settings that I had no clue about. Other phones include apps which are preconfigured for Yahoo, AIM, and MSN, but that was not the case here. The manual and help were useless here.
Micro USB - Every portable device I own uses Mini USB for sync and charging, but the Nokia N96 introduces the even smaller Micro USB. That means that I need to carry yet another cable.
No USB Charge - To make it worse, you cannot charge via USB. While the phone comes with an AC charger and a car charger, its proprietary and means yet ANOTHER cable to carry.
WMV Playback - Despite being touted as a media player, the phone would not play any of the WMV files I copied to it. These were non-DRM files that worked fine on other phones.
AGPS - The manual claims that the phone supports Assisted GPS (to speed up your positioning) but it would not work.
Other Annoyances - There were a few other things that bothered me about the phone. For instance, the music playback stuttered while using the phone for text messaging or mapping, and there was no option to disable the power-saving features while on AC power.
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In Conclusion:
For the price that this phone sells for, and comparing it to other devices on the market at half the price, I find it very hard to justify recommending the phone to anyone.
Its only real saving grace is the 16 GB of storage, although some of its competitors will support memory cards with 4-16 GB of capacity.
If the price came down considerably, and they issued a software upgrade to fix several of the above issues, it would probably beat its competitors hands-down. But until then, I recommend passing this phone up for any of its half-priced competitors.
 Not for hardcore business types -- otherwise very cool. January 1, 2009
N. Jenkins (Raleigh, NC)
2 out of 2 found this review helpful
Reader's Digest Condensed Version:
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If you are looking for a phone geared more towards entertainment than providing a mobile office, this phone is for you. If you are looking for a work-friendly phone, keep then perhaps the Nokia E90 Communicator Unlocked Smartphone with 3.2 MP Camera, 3G, Wi-Fi, GPS, MP3/Video Player, MicroSD--U.S. Version with Warranty (Red) would be a better (and more expensive) choice.
Also, if you do buy this phone, make sure you buy a case/holster and a screen protector, as well.
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The Details...
I had a hard time deciding on a star-rating for this phone because it is quite different from any other smartphone that I have used. In the last couple of years, I have used:
Blackberry 8300
Helio Ocean
AT&T 8525
Samsung SCH-i760 (my current phone)
With the exception of the Helio Ocean, the Blackberry, AT&T and Samsung are business-centric phones. All four feature a Qwerty keyboard. The Helio, AT&T and Samsung each have their own numeric keypad in addition to the qwerty keyboard.
All except for the Helio, did business applications, email, telephone communication, and syncing with easily -- that's what they were designed to do and that is the frame of reference that I am coming from.
The Nokia N96, to me, isn't really aimed at the business centric crowd. It is aimed at the multimedia "I want to be entertained" crowd (and a rich crowd, that must be judging by the price tag).
Sure, the Nokia does email and "office stuff" ok -- but because they decided not to include the qwerty keyboard and opted to include so much multimedia stuff, it is clear that they decided "work can wait". Not necessarily a BAD thing... just different than I'm used to.
So let's talk about what the Nokia IS designed for: talking, listening to music, taking pictures/video, and watching video.
First, initial impressions about aesthetics:
-- it is actually smaller than I'm used to (the Samsung). It is lighter, shorter, and thinner. You open the box and you certainly experience that "WOW" factor -- this phone is elegant and sophisticated. The finish is the shiny "piano finish" that is so common. Frankly, I HATE that because the moment you touch it, it is smudgy and that just drives me crazy. The sides are metal but the back is a flimsy plastic and overall it just doesn't feel as solid as the other phones which were mostly metal cases.
The screen is unbelievably gorgeous and bright. No other smartphone I have used can hold a candle to it (I have not seen an iPhone so don't really have a basis of comparison there).
The first thing I did was call someone. Call quality is excellent -- also much better than any other cell phone I have used. Very very close to Landline quality. I paired it with a Nokia 02705X6 BH-503 Bluetooth Stereo Headset and sound quality (both receiving and talking better than most phones. One of the things that is good about the call quality is the ability to really turn up the volume. With other phones, I could seldom get the volume loud enough to hear over road/wind noise in the car. With the N96, you actually have to turn it down because it can get uncomfortably loud.
Even using the speaker phone is very good. The N96 has "stereo speakers" and while you aren't going to throw out your home theater system, the speakers make the phone even better.
Camera
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The N96 has a 5 mp Carl Zeiss camera built in. The camera can take stills or video at 30 frames per second. I really like the camera because it allows me to be more spontaneous with taking pictures/video. With my Samsung, the only time I used the cell phone feature was when I wrecked my car and wanted pictures of the evidence. With Carl Zeiss optics (Zeiss is known for making the best optics in the world), you can take very solid photo album quality pictures with this camera. It isn't going to replace your 12 MP SLR but for "on-the-go" pictures that you wouldn't otherwise catch, it is really nice to have.
Music
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Again, the music quality on this device rivals any MP3 player. I actually used it with a set of high-end Denon cans today and it was almost as good playing the CD through a PC. I say "almost" because I was able to pick up some crackly artifact that resulted from the Nokia converting my higher bit-rate recordings to a lower bit-rate for space considerations. But this trade off is worth it. With 16 GB of main memory, I have over 3 hours of music loaded on the phone with space to spare.
Keypad and controls:
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I'm still not sold on the T9 only keyboard. I read a previous commenter about how you can learn to type faster with T9 than Qwerty and I intend to try it. I do have to say that T9 typing seems to work better than I remembered it on previous phones.
I'm not wild about the feel of the buttons. They are all flat and do not feel "solid" to me. I could see them cracking with a lot of use.
Web and email
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Even though this is a smaller device, the screen is actually larger than my Samsung. You wouldn't think a couple of pixels in either direction would be that big a deal but it really helps with page display.
Video
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I believe the N96 was designed around this feature. Downloading videos from Amazon was very easy and the playback is just like a tiny TV. To me, though, this is the least "useful" feature of the phone. If I'm sitting around and have some time to kill, I'm more likely to check email, listen to music or just plain read.
Battery life
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Average battery life. I was able to use the cell phone for about 1.25 hours of talk time and 3 hours of listening to music before the battery died. That means if you use your phone a lot, you'll need to keep it plugged in (fortunately, the phone comes with both an AC charger and a car charger -- very unusual in this day and age).
Syncing with your PC
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Included with the phone is a software suite that will allow you to sync with Outlook etc. Installation took awhile (I had to download .NET) but getting all my contact data onto the device was a snap. Transferring music wasn't great -- it could be that I just don't have the sync settings set up correctly. However, the N96 requires Windows Media Player 11 for the syncing. I have A LOT of music loaded in WMP and didn't want to load EVERYTHING on. I tried to create a playlist to identify just what I wanted transferred over. Unfortunately, it still grabbed more than I wanted it to.
Miscellaneous
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-- The USB cable that comes with it is not your standard USB cable -- at least on the end that connects to the phone. It has a smaller connector than most devices (like MP3 players, external disk drives, my other cell phones, etc. So if you want to sync up at home and at work, you'll have to hang on tight to this cable (or buy another one online).
-- The Nokia does provide both a car and standard AC charger which is good since you will need to keep this thing constantly plugged in. There is no way to accommodate an extended battery at this point -- it would require a new "back plate" (this is the approach that AT&T adopted for their 8525). Hopefully, this will be something Nokia will provide down the road. However, I will say that this device provides a LOT of options to tweak the features to maximize battery performance. For example, you can specify during what hours to go fetch email. There's not much point in fetching email 24/7 when you may only want access to it 12x5. You can also set it up to shut down during night hours etc.
-- The screen is not a touch screen. Also, if you want to protect it, you're probably going to want to get a HTC Touch Diamond JAVOScreen (Ultra-Clear) + JAVOedge MetaCharger Bundle (Euro) screen protector to hide the finger prints and prevent scratches. I had one left over from my 8525 and it isn't a perfect fit but works good enough.
-- You will also want to invest in a good case/holster. I can't believe that Nokia is selling a 700.00 phone with a screen like this and yet they don't even provide the most basic protection required. Even the bluetooth headphones came with their own carrying pouch.
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