Nokia N95

Call Quality

Calls and Speakerphone: Call quality on the Nokia N95 is clear, even in places where it’s typically hard to hear callers. For example, in noisy, crowded restaurants, callers still came through just fine. Additionally, in well-known dead spots, we were able to get clear reception. We’re also happy to report we never had to use the side volume keys to adjust audio on this cell phone, and the speakerphone works well, never cutting off when two people speak simultaneously. However, activating the feature is a different story.

Audio Playback: The Nokia N95 sports an MP3 player. We found playback of MP3s over the N95’s speakers to be loud and clear, though occasionally tinny. Additionally, when you use the included stereo headset, music is clear and loud, even at the softest settings. Another bonus is that the cell phone comes with a 3.5mm jack adapter; if you have stereo headphones for another MP3 player, you can use them with the N95.

Ease of Use

Menu/Phone Book: Since the Nokia N95 is essentially a mini computer with an included cell phone, you’ll likely need a little time to get acquainted with the system. If you’re willing to make that commitment, you shouldn’t have a lot of issues with this Nokia. Besides, it really does a lot. One of our favorite features is Web Feeds, which is essentially an RSS reader-type application that lets you get all of your blog updates on the Nokia N95. However, if you’re going to use this application a lot, you should get an unlimited data plan. Another feature worth mentioning is the alarm on this cell phone; if you set it, it will sound even if the Nokia N95 is turned off and you’ll be forced to navigate through many menus to turn it off. Also, since it is more of a multifunction pocketable device than a basic cell phone, the Nokia N95 will occasionally freeze if you try to launch a couple of applications simultaneously or speed through the menu options; you’ll be forced to restart it by powering off/on. We're happy to report, however, that this doesn’t happen often, but it occurred enough to mention.

Overall, the menu interface is similar to that of a PC. The main screen has a taskbar across the top, which launches the most frequently used applications. You should also become uniquely acquainted with the diamond-shaped button, the one that has arrows pointing north, east, south, and west. This is essentially a quick-launch menu. You should immediately program the applications you will use most. For example, we found it imperative to dedicate one of the keys to launch the voicemail application; it’s too hard to locate otherwise. If you’re not a fan of the quick-launch keys and are more of a purist, we suggest becoming acquainted with the key that has an elliptical icon. Think of it as the equivalent of the Programs folder on your computer; all the applications are located there.

As for making calls, you can dial right away if you remember the numbers and are in the main screen. However, if you want to place a call to a phone number stored in Contacts, it can take a few steps. For each contact, you can store the first name, the last name (a nice organizational touch), the company, a job title, six numbers (including Internet Telephone and Video Call), and an e-mail address. There’s also an e-mail application, so you can send and receive e-mails and even send attachments (mostly multimedia). Since the cell phone supports POP3 and IMAP4 accounts, you can set it up to receive work e-mail and web-based e-mail such as Yahoo or AOL mail.

Camera: The Nokia N95 sports a 5-megapixel camera with a Carl Zeiss lens, which means you truly have a digital camera built into this cell phone. As such, it has a plethora of camera-centric features that we haven’t seen on many cell phones. The list is long, but some highlights include 7 scene modes for taking better pictures based on what you’re shooting, flash with a red-eye-reduction option, an exposure compensation meter, white balance, many color tone options, a light-sensitivity scale, and contrast and sharpness adjustments.

Taking a picture is fairly easy when you’re in camera mode; you just point and shoot, though the shutter time is a bit painful and you'll have to figure out a way to work around that. For example, we would literally push the button to take a picture first and then tell people to say “cheese” to get the timing right. We should note that accessing the camera is slow since you have to make sure the lens cover is open before hitting the dedicated camera key. While it’s a bit of a safety feature to prevent you from accidentally snapping pictures of the inside of your purse or pant pocket, it does require a certain amount of patience when you want to use the integrated camera.

Overall, we found this camera to be pretty good. As expected, color accuracy is impressive when viewed on the cell phone, and even when we transferred pics from the N95 to the computer, the colors remained true and details were crisp. Since this is a 5-megapixel camera, you can do a lot with your pictures, including uploading them to a Web site and printing them. However, a favorite feature is the Slideshow (even though images are not as crisp when viewing in Pan and Zoom mode), where you can show off pictures from a trip and drop an MP3 song onto the file to add a soundtrack to your vacation photos.

The video recorder also had its fair share of features, such as sporting a multitude of white-balance options (Automatic, Sunny, Cloudy, Incandescent, and Fluorescent). There are also 5 Color tone choices, the ability to record in Night mode (best for low light), and Automatic. Overall, we found video quality to be acceptable for both viewing and shooting. We particularly liked the way the screen flips automatically from vertical to horizontal viewing mode, just by turning the N95 in either direction.

Music: The Nokia N95 includes a 1GB MicroSD card, which you’ll need for the music player. It also includes headphones and a 3.5mm jack adapter, so you can use your own headphones with it as well. As noted above, for the most part, songs sounded good though a little tinny when played on the Nokia N95. The cell phone supports MP3, AAC (Apple iTunes format), and Microsoft WMA music files.

Getting music onto the cell phone via the included PC Suite software is fairly straightforward. If you save the songs on a media card, save them to the Sound folder and they will automatically appear in the list of available songs in the music menu. As for music player features, it has shuffle, repeat, playlists, and an equalizer with predefined settings.

Connectivity/Bluetooth/Wi-Fi/IR: Talk about connectivity; the Nokia N95 is fully loaded. If you can’t connect one way, there’s bound to be another option. It even has a built-in application so that you can place voice calls over the Internet (similar to how Skype works). For starters, this cell phone has IR, so you can use it to exchange info with other IR-enabled devices such as Palms or older notebooks. If that’s not enough or if you prefer old-school wired connections, there’s a USB cable in the box that you can use to sync the N95 with a computer. We should note, however, that making the initial connection takes a fair amount of time. So, again, have patience. Additionally, you can use Bluetooth to sync up contacts, photos, and even music stored on your computer. This is our preferred method as it went much faster (it took about 5 minutes to transfer 7 songs) than taking the time to set up the cable. That’s not all; it also comes with VGA cables so that you can hook up the cell phone to a TV and view stored videos and pictures on a much larger screen.

Perhaps our favorite connectivity feature in this cell phone is the inclusion of Wi-Fi--yes, Wi-Fi. If you can’t get a wireless connection or don’t have a data plan, you can always use Wi-Fi. Since there isn’t a lot of free Wi-Fi floating around these days, be sure to consider either a wireless or a Wi-Fi plan if you get this cell phone.

Design

Look and Feel: For a cell phone that has so much going for it, you’d think it'd be a heavy brick. That’s simply not the case with the Nokia N95. In fact, even though the Nokia N95 shares a similar size and shape to the Nokia N80, it weighs noticeably less. Though the screen isn’t as vibrant as we would've liked, we're happy to report that since it’s slightly indented, it doesn’t pick up face grease or easily attract fingerprints. Since the cell phone is a bit chunky, it feels a little odd when you put it up to your ear. On the plus side, however, you can rest it comfortably between ear and shoulder when making longer calls.

The Nokia N95 has an innovative design; it’s a two-way slider. Slide it up and there’s a keypad for texting and making calls; slide it down and it transforms into a multimedia machine with play, pause, and fast-forward/rewind buttons. It also comes with video cables, so you can plug into a TV and watch videos or photos captured on your cell phone on your TV. One of the nice things about this design is that you can do just about anything on this cell phone without needing to slide it open.

Keypad: We particularly like the keypad on this cell phone. The blue-backlit keys are well spaced, keeping misdials to a minimum. We particularly like the slight bump on all the keys, which makes them pretty tactile, but that doesn’t mean you can easily dial without looking at the keypad.

Battery Life

Unfortunately, battery life on the Nokia N95 is just fair, so don’t stray too far without your charger. Heavy texters, Web surfers, message addicts, constant callers, and shutterbugs will likely need to charge the cell phone every other day. But if you use the cell phone to send/receive a few text messages and e-mails, snap some pics, or make a couple of calls, you’ll need to charge it every two to three days. We should note that the biggest drain on battery life comes from viewing slide shows set to music and from using the GPS feature. Thankfully, when the Wi-Fi feature is activated, it’s not nearly as draining, and we can still last an entire day with the feature activated.