First of all I would like to thank The Nokia Review and WOMWorld for giving me the opportunity to test out a new Nokia N97 mini. Although I have only had it a week, I have learned a lot and I want to share what I have experienced. This is my first review, so please feel free to suggest any tests or screen shots so that I may add more to my review. Thanks!
Unboxing
The box that the N97 mini came in is significantly smaller than any of my E series phone boxes (only 2″ thick!).
Inside we have the N97 mini, a BL-4D 1200mAh battery, a set of high quality earbud headphones, a USB charger, and the usual Nokia information booklet and various OVI pamphlets.
The Hardware
Boot-Up Video
Here is a boot up video to show in real time how long it takes to boot to the standby screen on the Nokia N97 Mini.
(click on the image above to view the boot-up video at ovi.com)
Design
The first thing that came to mind as I was unboxing the N97 mini was that it was VERY heavy compared to the N97. The sleek metal finish on the case adds to both build quality and elegance of the phone. The metal fold-out battery cover does not creak or loosen. The N97 mini is how the N series phones SHOULD OF been made of in the first place!
(click on the thumbnails to view the full image)
Keyboard
The Keyboard is much different than the N97 as it does not have a D-pad. Instead it has the Up, Down, Left & Right keys in the bottom left corner much like a typical PC keyboard. The colors are also different from the N97 for it has Blue(Letters), White(arrow keys) and orange (symbols and numbers). The keys are kind of hard to press at first, but after a short while I got used to it. I supposed its so that you don’t accidentally mash the keys when you casually hold on to it while it’s open.
Memory
The included 8GB mass memory is a lot of room, but it was a quite a downgrade from N97′s 32GB. The phone memory was doubled from N97′s 128mb to a whopping 256mb, but the ram stayed the same at 128MB . At Idle, the N97 mini would have around 40MB free and filled up quite fast once a few applications were loaded. *Note to Nokia* : NEEDS MORE RAM!
Screen
The N97 mini has a slightly smaller 3.2″ screen from the N97′s 3.5″ but makes up for it by it’s smaller form factor. It also makes movies much more watchable than on my E63′s tiny screen!
Carl Zeiss Camera
The Carl Zeiss optics 5MP camera as usual is phenomenal. The Autofocus feature allows you to take close-up shots of something as small as a bug all the way up tall buildings or landmarks. Compared to an N96, the picture quality is about the same. The only thing that I noticed from comparing it to my N96 is that the processing speed if the N97 mini was MUCH faster than an N96. A big plus!
(click on the thumbnails to view the full image)
Front Camera
The front camera is very useful, especially for video calls. Since video calling is not allowed in the US yet, I had a chance to try it out using Fring’s Skype Videocall feature. It was VERY cool and did not lag much at all!
3.5″ Audio Port / TV-out
The included earbuds were surprisingly impressive! The sound quality was superb to my old earbuds and fit comfortably in my ears. The cord wasn’t round like typical audio cords, but were similar to a very thin “noodle”! Unfortunately these were the L-cord type earbuds (where the left cord is shorter than the right) but due to the cable being incredibly light, it did not effect my listening at all!
*I did not have a Television handy so hopefully during this next week I’ll post a video up on the TV-out features.
USB Port
The supplied usb cable was incredibly fast when uploading music and downloading pictures for this review! The USB charging capability was especially handy since I am in computer labs at college most of the week.
GPS
Google Maps connected to the satellites almost instantly! The only downfall is that when the N97 mini is placed on a flat dashboard, the reflection from the light makes it almost impossible to see the screen. On the N97, you would not have this problem. An easy fix for this would be to get a stand or suction-cup phone holder and attach it to the windshield.
(click on the image above to view the video)
Network
Unfortunately 3G was not available because this was the euro 900/1900/2100 model so I had to use edge instead.
SOFTWARE
Touch UI
I was rather impressed with the touch UI and that it had kinetic scrolling for most of the applications that were on the mini. Scrolling through large lists of songs or pictures was a breeze and the vibration made the experience feel like I was actually pushing or selecting buttons.
Photo Browsers
The photo browser was definitely an upgrade from what I was used to on my N96. Although it was an efficient browser, I felt the need to download Nokia Beta Labs Photo Browser. Their photo browser added many visual effects such as 3d side-to-side kinetic scrolling effects, magnifier, and face browsing. All-in-all, they are both good browsers, but the next update, I would like to see nokia use the Beta Labs’ Browser.
(click on the image above to view the video)
Installed Apps
There were many pre-installed applications on the mini such as myspace and facebook, but the only ones I actually used was Qik and the Ovi store. Through the Ovi store I downloaded many applications such as Level, Strobe, Hourpower and many more.
(click on the image above to view the video)
Music Player
The music player was actually quite fun to play around with. With my E series phone, it would take forever to find a song if it wasn’t in a playlist. On the N97 mini, all you have to to is kinetically scroll down the list or type the first letter of the song and it will instantly take you to that area. Very Cool!
(click on the image above to view the video)
Bluetooth Blocking
A neat feature that my E series phone does not have is the ability to block a bluetooth phone or device from sending you files or messages. This is very handy especially at the workplace if there is someone bombarding you with annoying messages or pictures.
(click on the image above to view the video)
The bad side of the Nokia N97 Mini
I didn’t notice this at first, but after glancing at TheNokiaReview’s N97 mini review, they mentioned a wobble when using the keyboard with the N97 mini on a hard flat surface. Now knowing that the mini has a wobble, it bugs me enough that I have to set it on something soft and spongy whenever I set it down on a table or desk.
My suggestion to those who own the N97 mini : Look for sticky-pad rubber-feet (the ones that go on the bottom of laptops), then just attach 4 to the bottom on the Mini and problem solved.
(click on the image above to view the video)
ALSO
As I was taking a few night pictures, I noticed a significant amount of light coming out of the front camera hole, and out of one of the hinges behind the screen. It really isn’t too much of an issue, but makes the phone look cheap even though you payed a ton for it.
Final Thoughts
From the squeaking battery door to the self-harming camera lens slider, the mini’s build quality has indeed improved from the N97. It’s speedy 434Mhz processor can run any program with ease. With it’s large screen, you can easily watch movies, pictures or surf the web. And with the camera, you can capture priceless moments in the blink of an eye. It is a very impressive phone and I’m glad I had the chance to try it, but I believe the one thing Nokia could have done to make this phone 10,000% better would be to add more RAM. I continue to buy Nokia smartphones for their ability to multi-task, but when you create a phone that does EVERYTHING super quick, but can only do a few of them at a time…
Nokia has the build quality with the mini, now they need to start putting more RAM into their newer devices. Just like comparing computer programs and memory from the 80′s to today, they’re just going to get bigger and bigger!
Hope you enjoyed my review!
Feel free to check out Naypalms N97 Mini Album!
great review!
naypalms,i’v read the review.you’ve focused the problems of n97 mini well.You’ve sorted out the problems with the design of the phone,although all are saying the main plus point of the mini is the build quality,huh.
-But you ‘ve done comparisons the n97 mini with n96.Why?n97 mini runs Symbian OS v9.4 Touch UI and n96 runs Symbian OS v9.3.
-What about the gaming solutions.Off course there isn’t any in the phone.Right?
Maybe Nokia has forgotten there is a thing called “Games” that used to be a feature of a mobile phone from the born of the mobile phone era.
…just got my mini yesterday and i started to download ‘GAMES’ from ovi…the qwerty keyboard is fun (much better than 5800 offered)the games are great and the resolution of screen makes it better.The reason for comparing n7 mini camera with n6 is that both have same camera and touch screen doesnot make anydifference…btw nice review and my slider is perfecto!!
I know there are a lot of games available in OVI store.I am a n97 user.I know how the games are.Really man stop saying them games,if you’ve seen the games that apple offers for the Iphone.
I think i made several other points that stated other features of the device that worked out quite well (boot-up time, GPS, audio/headphones etc.) but yes, the build quality is superb to the N97.
My main issue was with the RAM. 40MB free is terrible! On my E63, I usually have 70-80MB free and can load 15-20 programs with ease. On the N97mini I opened 10 programs, and the RAM was filled and started to auto-close my idle programs. If I were running Office and was editing or typing up an important paper, I would loose all that hard work. Nokia needs to do something about this RAM shortage issue on their flagship $600 phones!
As for using the N96, I was just comparing the slower n96 5MP camera with the faster 5MP n97mini camera. Both have the same quality in photos but speed and processing was different. It would have been nice if nokia included an 8MP camera instead.
The N97mini is a good phone, not a whole lot of bugs (yet), but if your picky about RAM and need a lot of programs running, then you might want to maybe look into an E series phone.
I will immediately add you’r blog to my favorites! Thanks
Hi, nice review.
One think i wd like to add is that with the new firmware, i am getting abt 53 MB free ram when device boots up. A lot of memory is taken up if u open and close the camera application. I use ytask to close the hidden camera application, handytaskman wouldn’t help on this..
Btw, can u list all the applications that came preinstalled on n97 mini.
Mine documented three free games ; asphalt 4, spores and one other, but the games folder was empty.
Rgds