Microsoft (aka Nokia) Lumia 925
This is a hard review to write, because when it comes to Microsoft (who owns both Nokia and Windows Phone 8) absolutely anything is possible, and there’s often no way for me to tell where the issue lies, whether in the hardware or the software. So, I apologize in advance if I make mistakes when blaming on one or the other some of the many issues this couplet has.
By the way, I’m new to Windows Phone, which is an OS I was never curious about, and I would’ve never gone for if it weren’t because Nokia is the only brand providing the most valuable feature I want a cellular to have: free offline maps (HERE maps). Lastly, for the tests I’m subjecting the Lumia to, I’m using two other devices as a reference: the Nokia C7 (running Symbian Belle) and the LG Optimus black (sunning Android).
Look and feel
I won’t digress much in this section. Physically, the Lumia 925 is one of the sexiest handsets I’ve ever beheld; a pleasure to hold and slim as can be, feeling very light while not fragile (regrettably too prone to slip off your grasp) and featuring a fine form factor, though a bit too wide for single-handed use. Its design is simple and elegant: an aluminum frame holding together the display and the plastic back cover (pity it’s not also aluminum, but it pays off for the sake of lightness). The three discrete physical buttons are placed on the right side, and hence the first fault I find about it: the volume rocker. Nokia should learn something from Apple and start placing that on the left, where it’s handier and allows for a firmer grasp. Right below the display sit the three haptic (and awkward) buttons that Microsoft imposes on Windows Phone handsets. On the back there is the mandatory camera lens, a very good quality Carl Zeiss, the flash leds and the loudspeaker.
Usability. The Windows Phone OS.
Very regrettably, Windows Phone is just about restrictions. I’ve never seen such a fine hardware spoiled by such a dreadful software. WP8 is totally unworthy of this device, and definitely wastes its capabilities. There are sooo many glitches, setbacks and restrictions in WP8 that I’m at a loss about where to start?
Perhaps the first thing I noticed is that waking up the phone needs two steps, instead of just one like any other handset. Even without setting a key for safe-locking, you need to: 1st, push the power (or double-tap the display) for getting past the standby screen (called glance); 2nd, slide up the lock screen; only then you’re presented with the tiled Win_8/ WP8 iconic home screen (and it’s pretty obvious where Bill Gates wants to lead us: to purchase both his computer OS and his smartphone OS.)
Tapping on the central haptic button always shows the only one home screen, where you can pin, in a vertically scrollable matrix, your favourite apps’ tiles (each providing three optional sizes for different levels of “live” information); and sliding the home screen to the left takes us to the very unwieldy applications screen: a one-colum, big-font-sized list of all installed apps, in alphabetical order, seemingly designed for the inexcusable purposes of wasting display room and–lacking a scrollbar– turning app search into a cumbersome task. As you can see in the screenshot to the left, WP8 shows barely seven apps where any other smartphone would show twenty.
The right haptic button is arguably one of WP8′s most inconvenient features: not only tends to stand always in the middle of every thumb movement we make, thus often being hit by accident, but also serves to the only purpose of marketing Microsoft’s Bing search engine: it brings forward a redundant IE10 browser, somewhat featured with two buttons for music recognizing and QR code reading. Worst of all, you can’t remap haptic buttons, nor cancel them, so as to -at least- not hit search all the time. But this is obviously made on purpose. Sorry to say, I find this is almost a swindle: a total waste of a precious haptic button, blatantly serving Microsoft’s own profit instead of the buyer’s use.
Finally the left haptic button, return, being most used is the hardest to tap single-handed. Unles you’re long fingered, you’ll need to tap it with your left thumb, or really stretch your right one… only for chance hitting search once more. For the rest, return works very much like a browser’s left arrow: it takes us to wherever we were before, and often it’s the only way for collapsing the popup keyboard.
All three haptic buttons have a vibrate feedback that can’t be turned off, which is a power waste for a device so short of battery life. Why not make it an option?
Now: so far, so bad.
Another down side about WP8 OS (though they sell it as the eighth wonder) is the severe development and use restrictions imposed on us, most of all when it comes to filesystem access, which is close to null. Microsoft is paranoid about this, and their staff have done a hard job here, even hackers at xda-developers being at a loss. There’s almost no way of file exploring except for three MTP-accessible folders. This is a big issue for anyone willing to have a minimum control over which files they’re storing in their device, and takes up a lot of the Lumia 925′s very scant storage room.
Say, for instance, you download a file for which there’s no associated app in your phone. Well, you won’t ever find that file, nor be able to use, transfer or delete it, even if you later install the appropriate app. You’ll have to download the file again. For the same reason, filesystem cleaning tasks can’t be performed, which leads to a ceaseless increase on the garbage we usually collect through normal web browsing, quickly shrinking the already scarce storage. In my unit, after one month use, the so called other (aka dump) category in the filesystem rounds up to 800 MB. There are a couple apps in the Market to help delete this garbage, but they use shoddy and slow indirect means.
Settings layout
One more WP8 issue is the phone settings: instead of a hierarchy with ten or fifteen main categories holding subcategories–as Androids or Symbians have–we get here a settings scroll list with 54 categories (!!), divided in two groups: system and applications, with elements sorted out without any criteria whatsoever, logical or alphabetical. So, if you want to make sure you don’t miss the setting you’re scanning for, you need to slowly scroll through this long list; which happens to be extremely inconvenient, and ends up being annoying.
For example: a category named store is counter-intuitively listed under applications, whereas under system there is an apparently similar category named storage check, and yet another one called phone storage. The same goes for wallet, phone or background tasks: who on earth would expect to find them under applications? Inversely, email accounts, internet sharing, kids corner or even company apps, don’t go under applicatoins, but are listed under system. Sorry, Microsoft guys: what the hell?
As you can see, WP8 is no short of ‘misdesigns’ and missing basic features. Here are some others.
There is, for instance, an odd lack of a direct key to the dial pad. While in every other phone on the planet you can acces the dial pad with one single press or tap, on WP8 you need at least two: first hit the phone tile, and then the keypad option. To make things worse, the T9 keypad lacks a transliterate feature; i.e., it can’t be used to dial a contact’s name by clicking on the letters: they’re there, but good for nothing. Fortunately there’s a free app (Phone dialer) offering transliterate. Thanks to DreamTeam Mobile for this.
Or what to say about one of the most arguable points in WP8?: its preventing any app (or shortcut) from directly changing the phone settings. Apps are only allowed to provide us a link to a given setting, thus being required two taps where other OSes need just one, which is yet another bothersome behaviour. WP8 devs say this is purposely devised on account of– the shooing and always vague–security reasons; but until someone tells me a real solid argument to buy those reasons, I’ll keep thinking it’s but Microsoft’s bullshit; sorry.
What else? Oh!, yes. Except for calls and SMSs, you don’t get background notifications in battery saving mode, which is close to unacceptable for apps like Skype or Whatsapp, for example. You can’t stay socially connected and preserve power at the same time, which is an extraordinary inconsistence: if you are socially connected, you’ll soon run out of battery and can’t stay socially connected any longer; but if you preserve the battery power in order to stay socially connected, then you can’t be socially connected. To top the bill, for viewing the apps’ notifications in battery saving mode you have to: first wake up the phone, second unlock the screen, and third bring forward the app. Too cumbersome.
Keyboard in predictive text mode leaves 25% screen to the app.
To be done with this section, let me talk about -perhaps- one of the worst flaws in WP8: the virtual keyboard. I’ve never had to deal with anything the like: drawn after the maximal-minimalistic kind of style with which Microsft designers seem to think they’ve re-invented the hot water, WP8′s oversized and simplistic keyboard is both unpractical for typing on, and obstructing when it comes to deal with the app running behind. To name three of its main issues:
1.- it lacks some basic signs (a one-tap question mark, for instance),
2.- its lower row is totally misplaced to the right, to the point that, in the Spanish layout, letter B sits almost underneath letter J (for anyone used to blind typing, WP8′s keyboard typing experience is odd: keys to be pressed with our left thumb are noticeably closer to the right one),
3.- in predictive text mode, an unnecessary stripe, way too wide, is added on top of the upper row for showing the suggestions, leaving barely one fourth of the screen to the app.
It’s my belief that when something is not polished, not perfected, all efforts to improve it are welcome; but smartphone virtual keyboards have already been brought to perfection by iOS and Android designers, and hardly anything else can be done to make them better; therefore, any step in the line of bringing to humankind a new way of typing is plain extravagant to say the least; outlandish to be more precise. The wheel can not be reinvented, Microsoft: WP8′s keyboard does not contribute with anything to the typing experience while certainly detracts usability.
One good thing can be said about this keyboard, though: predictive text works like a charm. Most of the time, except for fuck and some other inspiring words, it gives me the right suggestions (which, I admit, doesn’t tell much about my English vocabulary span).
Enough. As a last word here, suffice to notice that I haven’t even started talking about the apps themselves, most of them lacking features present in other OSes’ counterparts. Perhaps the most relevant of these applications is Skype, with which you can’t send SMSs. Funny enough, Skype belongs to Microsoft Corporation.
Usability. The device.
First let me talk about what, in my regard, is one of the two best sides of this handset: the display. Simply superb: resolution, color density, responsiveness, brightness, reflections… Any aspect of the screen is great, even compared to the Nokia C7 or the LG OB, both being good contenders. The other strong point in the Lumia 925 is the camera, which is surprisingly good for a mobile, being able to take pictures sometimes even better than a “real” camera. The 925′s lens, along with Lumia’s five photo applications, let you profit its possibilities to the max. Where I don’t see the point, though, is in Nokia’s four camera apps (besides the WP8 default), which turn to be redundant and confusing. I wish there was just one app (the default, tweaked to offer all the added features of the rest), because oftentimes I lose a good shot just because I’m thinking which of the five apps should I open in that moment.
Lumia 925′s call quality is–in my experience–acceptably good, compared to both the Nokia C7 or the LG Optimus Black. Voice through the earpiece sounds clean, undistorted and crisp, without background white noise. But that’s as good as it gets, because this Lumia has TWO HUGE FLAWS: 2G data transmission and storage memory, both unforgivable in a flagship device.
Whatever its origin–hardware or software–the poor creature can’t establish a 2G connection even in normal (2-3 bars) signal conditions. In the same spot where both my C7 and OB take ten seconds to synchronize mail or chats, the Lumia 925 is a helpless failure, taking sometimes up to three minutes to connect (!!), only to finally give up unsucceded. Here, this handset scores an absolute zero. No problem with 3G, however. But 2G saves power and is definitely more appropriate for voice calls. And what if we’re somewhere out of 3G signal? I’m afraid that Microsoft’s Nokia division has done a very poor job there, mostly taking into account that this is supposed to be a flagship phone: it oughtn’t have any problems working with data over GPRS, even when signal is poor. At least, not where an outdated Android Froyo or a relegated Symbian Belle do the same job flawlessly. Hence, trying to chat, download a text message, connect to the Market or search on Bing over 2G is a frustrating experience.
As to the storage, the phone has a chip with just 16,000,000 bytes (which is only 15.2 GB, not 16 GB as the marketing goes) for containing the operating system itself (which can eat up to 2,6 GB!), plus the apps, plus our country’s maps, as the very essentials; hence, if we consider the 8.7 Mp camera, there’s definitely a severe shortage of storage room for our pictures and multimedia content. And, as I don’t see any reason for not shipping 32 GB (only some branded models do) or at least a microSD expansion slot, I strongly believe that this is done deliberately to force us to use SkyDrive. Actually, it’s no little coincidence that, along with the small storage, comes an aggressive marketing campaign for promoting Skydrive. Microsoft doesn’t want us to store our data and information on the phone, but on their servers, wherefrom they can collect it for being sold to the best bidder. So, have this in mind when you buy a Lumia 925: you’ll be contributing to the success of the data business and, in a way, to people’s control.
Another important weak point in this phone is the battery life: deplorable; utterly disappointing when it comes to practical use. I know that other reviews say the opposite, but… if you want my advice, don’t pay attention to those reviews. Sure, if you put the handset to sleep and in eco-mode mode, it can last well over two weeks untouched; but nobody buys this phone for not using it. Likewise, if we only use it for calls over 2G, battery life is also acceptable: we can get three or four days without a recharge; but then again, after spending 350 € in a piece of hardware like this, a Lumia 925 buyer is looking for much more than just a reasonable talk time: he’ll want to chat, browse the web, use VOIP, videoconference, listen to music, play videos, take photos, check email, use HERE maps, etc. But then, unfortunately, a fully charged battery won’t make it till the end of the day without a recharge. See this screenshot here?:
Battery drain
Notice the huge drop between 4 and 6 pm? That’s two hours of Whatsapp chat, draining around 45% of the power. This means only four hours of chatting over 2G will give you a dead phone… supposing it was fully charged. Besides, the processor gets noticeably hot. I don’t know if this is a Whatsapp or a Lumia issue, but I don’t care much: whoever the fault, it’s unacceptable. On my C7 I can chat twice or thrice that time until I run out of power. Other web apps don’t drain the Lumia’s battery so quickly but, in general, with any kind of internet/navigation use, this cell phone’s won’t render more than five hours of intense use. Doing exactly the same things with my other Nokia I get almost three day’s use, and two days with the LG Optimus Black.
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And that’s all, folks! Here you have your Microsoft Lumia 925. I’ve left behind in this review some typical aspects like multimedia capabilities, camera details, web browsing experience or extended information about calls. This is intentional: there are dozens of professional reviews that will give you extense and, as far as I’ve read, quite reliable information regarding those features. My main point here was to talk about those sides most other reviews never mention.
I can’t really see what kind of customers is Microsoft targetting with WP8 phones. Buying a new smartphone for losing features seems to me utterly absurd. Perhaps it’s a matter of fashion, but I don’t get it. Actually, many WP8 buyers comment online that they were just bored of Android and wanted to try something different. Well, I reckon you need to be ample on money for that. From my point of view, the only one good reason for purchasing a Microsoft Nokia is HERE maps. True, some things are really cool about the 925: Glance is cool; the stability of WP8 is cool (yet, sometimes it freezes for half a minute), but only at the cost of forbidding the apps to do many things they can do in other environments not less stable.
Conclusion: If you don’t want to get frustrated, don’t buy a Lumia 925 and, if possible, don’t buy a Windows Phone 8 at all.
Please feel free to comment anything. I’m open to all opinions if they’re expressed with respect to the author of this post. On my side, I can only say one last significant word: my MS Lumia 925 is for sale.
