Nokia Lumia 610 Review:

Agreed, that Nokia missed the smartphone bus, and all of us can probably go on and on about it. But with the Lumia series, I believe that the Finnish giant has just taken a cab after missing the bus and is trying to get there before the party ends. And by pitching one Lumia device in almost every price segment, Nokia might just be playing the smartphone roulette.

Amid the brouhaha over juicy Apples and endless Android Galaxies, Windows Phone lay forgotten, until Nokia revived it (to an extent). We loved the interface of Windows Phone on the Lumia 800 and the Lumia 710, but missed some of the apps and features that we frequently use on Android devices.

A few days ago, the entry level model, the Lumia 610 landed on Smartbuy’s test bench, and I’ve been taking some time off the Android smarties to explore a budget (almost!) Windows Phone.

DESIGN

The Lumia 610 looks a like one from the old Nokia C-series touchscreen tribe, and nothing like its Lumia brethren. Although the form-factor is that of a bar-touchscreen, it does not have the poly-carbonate unibody shell like the 800 or the 900. This wasn’t really a surprise as the 710 also did not conform to the higher Lumia’s design traits. It’s not exactly very slim – at 11.9 mm, it exits slim zone. But at 132 grams, it isn’t very heavy and doesn’t sit like a rock in pockets.

The front panel is very simple and neat. The 3.7-inch screen is encased in a metallic bezel (the material is actually plastic), and has the Nokia badging on top and three capacitive navigation keys for Start menu, back and search functions at the bottom. The top panel has a 3.5mm headset jack and a micro-USB port. The power/sleep button, however, is placed between the volume rocker and the shutter/camera-launch button on the right-hand side of the phone. I am used to finding the power/sleep button either on the top of the device or at least near the top on any side; hence this was an odd placement for me.

The rear sports a 5-megapixel shooter with an LED-flash, which performs decently in bright daylight and averagely-lit indoor conditions. The display was a bit of a letdown, as it neither had Nokia’s Clear Black technology, nor had an AMOLED display. Thankfully, Nokia has decided to put Corning Gorilla Glass to protect the display from scratches. The same can’t be said for the detachable back panel – the rubberized matte panel retains fingerprints from the slightest usage. Dropping the front camera for this price tag is somewhat justified, but I really wanted to see an LED-notification indicator on the front.

TECH AND PERFORMANCE

The entry-level Lumia is powered by an 800MHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor, which has enough and more power to run the Windows Phone 7.5 Mango operating system. The phone never froze during the entire testing period. It became slow during some operations, but never unresponsive.

The Lumia 610 comes with an onboard storage option of 8GB, of which 6.21GB is accessible by the user. Although there is no option for expanding the memory through a microSD card, being a Windows Phone, there is an option for stowing your data away in the SkyDrive. The RAM, however, is a major disappointment. With just 256MB of RAM, the phone is incapable of supporting many apps and features. I really couldn’t understand why a Windows-based phone should have such low memory. Windows has a reputation for not having enough apps, why then the low-compatibility-factor to add to the woes?

The interface of the Lumia 610 is just as good as any Windows Phone. Big, clear fonts, along with the live tiles of the Metro interface are always a welcome change from the icon-based home-screens of iOS and Android. The neat spacing and the clean lines of the tiles make this Windows Phone not just very pretty to look at, but also a delight to use. The Lumia 610 has two customisable screens – one is the Start menu with the tile interface, and the other is an itemized list of all the apps and features. Switching between menus requires a horizontal swipe on the screen, while in-menu navigation is vertically-oriented.

Come what may, it’s what the phone can do with apps that gives it the smartphone tag. The Lumia 610 offers all the features that a high-end Nokia/Windows Phone smartphone would have – Nokia Drive, Nokia Maps, Xbox Live, Zune and Microsoft Office. The addition of these apps (which work too) enables a lot of mobile productivity. I could access my Word files on the phone which I had saved in the SkyDrive with ease.

But some features on this phone came across as quirky (to the point of annoying) to me. For instance, there is no direct way to call a contact. One has to go through a minimum of 2 steps to call a contact from the call log or People (Windows Phone’s contact app). The live tiles are a good changeover from the usual notification menus, but there are only so many times that one can switch the screen on and check for notification on the tiles – I sorely missed a front notification-LED.

The “Me” tile, however is a very useful little square as I could check my FB notifications and update status for FB and Live Messenger. Windows Phone 7.5 ensures good social media integration with other apps too, like pictures and music.

One thing that impressed me a lot was the battery life. This little package came across as a surprise, for the 1300mAh battery had enough juice to keep going on for about a day and a half under our standard test parameters. Other smartphones that we have reviewed in this segment have shown us a battery life of 8-10 hours.

WE SAY

The Lumia 610 can prove to be a good first smartphone for many, but because of the inadequate memory, it might not be able to keep the user hooked on for long. Also, app-happy users will not only miss many of their favourite apps, but also features of apps that are compatible with Windows Phone. Also, if Microsoft needs to draw some part of the Android customer base towards Windows Phone, it needs to work on better Google integration (I couldn’t access huge parts of my address book, which I save as Google contacts). But for an entry-level smartphone, the Lumia 610 offers a very good battery life coupled with a very smooth user interface and a very user-friendly experience.

Love – Good battery life, Metro interface

Hate – Bad notification options, inadequate RAM

Rs 12,099