Nokia is back!!! The King is back?. Many of us had a mix of excitement and nostalgia when we heard the announcement that a remake of the Nokia 3310 phone will be introduced into the market, not only did the excitement come from the new 3310 phone itself but for the fact that the Nokia brand is actually coming back and will run Android operating system.
I personally thought that the name Nokia had long been buried, no thanks to Microsoft that had the opportunity to bring back the Nokia brand to life after a takeover but instead further made us forget about the brand by changing the name to Lumia, then embedding the devices with its proprietary Windows mobile, an operating system plagued by clumsiness, less user friendly and app deficiency.
Anyway, Nokia has made its way back to the handset scene with the announcement of a total of 4 Android powered phones by HMD Global, Nokia’s new partner behind the new lines of smartphones. The latest of the device range is the Nokia 8, a flagship that was announced on August 17, 2017, preceding this are Nokia 3, 5 and 6. I have been using the Nokia 5 for about two weeks and so far, it has not been a bad experience.
First point of attraction to the Nokia 5 is the design, it is simple, smooth, oozes quality and premium. The phone looks really great with the aluminium back, feels cool in the hand and comfortable to hold with the gentle curves at the edges. There’s a caplet shape housing at the back which is raised a little, housing the camera and the flash, this makes the phone look more attractive at the back.
The weight is just intact at 160g. The soft navigation keys are placed on the lower bezel of the phone. The home button is a soft key that also doubles as the fingerprint sensor, which was easy to set up and responsive to touch. There is a single speaker at the bottom edge on device; audio quality this time around isn’t so great. Although Nokia did well with speaker volume but the audio gets distorted as the volume is increased. Overall design is great, durable and premium.
The display is 5.2-inch HD polarise display is sharp and brightly coloured at a resolution of 1,280×720 pixels. Viewing angles are great and screen is so bright it makes reading under the sun easy and convenient but the display of the Nokia 5 isn’t very spectacular.
There’s a 13MP AF camera at the back and an 8MP front camera, equipped with a tiny flexibility option of switching between automatic and manual camera settings. These manual setting doesn’t provide option to adjust shutter speed.
Picture quality of the Nokia 5 isn’t too awesome, daylight photo taken with the back camera looks good and vibrant on the display and same applies to the video recording. Also worthy of note is the capability of both cameras to record video in 1080P, 720P and 480P.
Pictures taken with the front camera looks good also but a bit noisy. A downside of the is the poor performance of both front and back cameras under lowlight, camera technology to doesn’t allow sufficient light pass through to cater for low light imagery. Overall, camera features and modes are pretty lean. A double tap on the power button initiates the camera quick launch.
Nokia 5 runs on the stock Android 7.1.1 Nougat without any customization nor bloatware which may not be useful. There is no custom Nokia user interface yet, offering a clutter free experience with access to all Google services maybe we can expect this in the future but for now, it stays that way.
One other advantage of having pure unadulterated Android is the frequent Android update and Nokia stated on its website that it will provide regular updates to stay on top of features and security.
Nokia 5 is powered by a 64bit Octa-core Snapdragon processor and this performs considerably well. However you need not expect the speed obtainable from a flagship device as there is a noticeable lag between tapping an app and it fully opening up. RAM size is pegged at 2GB while internal memory is 16GB, however internal memory has been reduced by 7GB out of the box already, leaving users with about 9GB of space. To make up for that, there is a MicroSD card slot to expand storage.
The battery capacity of the Nokia 5 is 3,000mAh, while Nokia didn’t provide details about how long the battery will last, my experience during usage shows that the battery can conveniently last for a full day on minimal usage. Heavy users with more on-screen time, increased brightness and utility apps frequently connecting to servers, will struggle to get through the day without recharging.
Conclusion
Nokia has been able to successfully position itself into the market with a quality, durable and competitive smartphone that places more emphasis on design over high end specs. Everything from camera, processor and screen resolution seem simple.
Now that the king is back, at the time when the brand name is just not enough to sell the devices, a time when there is a stiff competition in the smartphone market in Nigeria, we will be watching to see if the king will be able to wear its crown once again.
For the Nokia 5 which is a midrange device and obviously one of the best presently available in Nigeria today, if I am asked ‘whether to buy or not’, without mincing words I’d say ‘TO BUY’
