It was last summer that I reviewed a device by Nokia India. Its been a long time and a tough journey for Nokia after the Feb11 handshake between two giant companies; Microsoft & Nokia. I have never been a great fan of Microsoft apart from their master product MS Office, but lately when Nokia announced their first WP7 device, I instantly fell in love with the work MS did in making this platform. Though this platform has suffered huge criticism in its complexity and certain aspects I am gonna review about, but who doesn't get a criticism for being unique? The introduction of TILES interface was new to this GRID layout world who has been seeing the same grid style since past 1 decade in almost all phones, right from Java to Symbian & Android to iOS.

Introduction of a new, stylish Tiles interface has been a challenging thing for Microsoft. MS had everything but great hardware which Nokia has been good at since the start (Remember 3315, N95 & N8?). Nokia has been very actively marketing for Lumia series and trying their best to make a revolutionary comeback in this smartphone competition. Flash Mobs, Chopper Rides, Concerts & 4D events, Nokia is doing everything to make it happen. I hope this Lumia series get a great success and WP7 proves to be an OS of the future.

I'll try to keep this review short and to the point. Hope you have a same verdict as mine after reading this

Hardware​ – 10/10

We have seen Nokia N9 and have heard alot about its polycarbonate plastic. Lumia 800 lives N9's life with the same hardware and the super tough polycarbonate plastic. Astonishing Gorilla Glass with Clear Black curved display and an exceptional body makes Lumia 800 perfect in the smartphone category. By far it has the best hardware in the current mobile era. It comes in three colors; Black, Cyan & Fuscia. Right now only black ones are available in store but other colors will be arriving very soon. Also with the 3.9" curved display with 3.7" for the OS makes it a complete pocket friendly and perfect in hands. I won't discuss the technical specifications over here, you can find them here on Nokia's official site. Here are some photos showing off its jaw dropping awesomeness:

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Software​ – 7/10

Coming to the software part, Microsoft's Windows Phone 7.5 Mango fits perfectly on Lumia800's display as Blacks of WP7.5 looks amazingly good on Curved glass of Lumia800. One carrying the phone in his/her hand will be amazed by the quality of CBD glass on the phone. The software fits perfectly on the phone with all the blacks on the OS getting mixed with the shining black glass on top. Typographical layout whole throughout makes the phone more amazing. To some people, WP7.5 has still proved to be complex as many finds a decade old Grid layout very easy; but trust me, this is different and will make you smile when you will see the beautiful Social integration with your contacts. Just a swipe and you see whatever your girlfriend has updated on facebook, and a second swipe to check out her new pics. The next WP7 update called "Tango" is scheduled for CES 2012 and it might be available on OTA by first quarter of 2012. It will not be just an update but an upgrade itself. But after Tango there is one more lined up; called "Apollo" which is the most anticipated update. "Tango" reports to bring some handy features like Serial mode and Bluetooth file transfer while Apollo promises deeper Nokia integration in the update. So its a great news for all WP7 lovers outta there.

Latest software release for Nokia Lumia 800 is 1600.2479.7740.11451

• Charging improvements
• Voicemail notification improvement
• Replying to mail improved for Microsoft Exchange 2003 users
• Improved audio quality
• Fixed screen issue after calls in bright light

Applications – 6/10

Windows Phone Platform is yet to be adopted by developers in a grand scale and there are not much apps available for it. But almost every developer is interested in making an app for this platform. Besides that, popular use apps like Angry Birds, Twitter/FB clients are already their in the marketplace and available for free. Also, the best thing about WP7 is the adaptable typographical interface with just some clicks. That is why it had proved to be easily adaptable by developers but the only problem as of now are the APIs and the libraries which are not yet opened to the third party developers. But we hope MS will provide the source code to the devs very soon so that we get more beautiful apps in future.

Performance/Battery - 7/10

With 1.4GHz Scorpion processor and Qualcomm MSM8255 Snapdragon chipset, Lumia800 is by far the best Windows Phone device in the market right now. It has dedicated Adreno 205 GPU for the graphics. The battery is Li-ion with 1450mAh (BV-5JW) power. Recently there has been few discussions over the abrupt battery performance and brick piece issues after full drain. Though I haven't faced such issue but some of the guys in UK have reported dead pieces. There has also been a diagnostic test performed with inbuilt Nokia Diagnostics application (Just dial ##634# for this) which reported some charging flaws. This has been taken very seriously by Nokia and they have also asked customers to rush to nearest care center if they find such problem. It had a least impact in Indian market as Lumia800 entered in Indian market a bit late. Also, Nokia had promised to come up with an update in the coming month which will fix all the battery issues. Here is the mail I received from Nokia regarding battery issues in Lumia800:

• India impact will be minimal since we just started shipping Nokia Lumia. And Incase any consumers in India are impacted we will do our best to delight the consumers to bring out the Nokia Lumia experience.
• Following GLOBAL reports of examples where the preloaded Diagnostics tool in the Nokia Lumia 800 was showing lower than expected levels of full battery charge capacity we immediately conducted extensive testing on the devices at a global level.
• Following the tests, we can now confirm that while the battery in the devices is fine, in some variants a software problem is preventing the phone from accessing the full battery capacity.
• The good news is that as it is a software problem it can be easily resolved and the planned early 2012 software update, as well as including some performance enhancements, will also include a fix that will enable the affected phones to access the total battery capacity. Once this update is applied customers should experience much better battery life.
• Any customer who needs further clarification is being asked to contact Nokia Care (Care contact details and locations can be found at www.Nokia.com/support)

With 8MP Carl Zeiss camera, dual LED flash and F/2.2 aperture, Lumia800 may not be as good as N8 but better than E7. It has a dedicated camera key on side. The images are decent in daylight and dark. Camera offers a nice combination of filters pre-built. But if you are a fan of 16:9 resolution then you wont be happy by this as Lumia800 offers 16:9 only in 7MP mode. The best thing about the camera is its shutter speed. It clicks photos very very fast. Thus, I will suggest you to click as many images as possible and then selects the best among them. It records 720p videos which is must for a good camera device these days.

Btw I advice all the new buyers to switch the focus mode to Normal which is weirdly set to Macro by default before clicking faraway pictures. Here are some random pics clicked by me with Lumia800 in a Cricket Match & later in Nokia Concert conducted by Nokia India at Mumbai: Lumia800 Picasa Gallery

Music - 8/10

​We have heard that after turning Ovi Music Unlimited down this year, Nokia is coming back with something called "Nokia Music" & "Mix Radio" with this phone. Though this update is not yet available in Indian versions but soon will be available. It offers a new Music Player and some tweaks to enhance the capability of music. Loudspeaker is really a turndown, as speaker is not too loud as compared to other phones in the market. But I'm happy with the fact that they have kept it on the bottom unlike N8 & Google's Nexus S. However, the sound via headphones is pretty great, so if you are a music fanatic, you gonna like its bass and equalizers. Also, we hope Nokia brings something like Google Music in coming months so that we can have all our music synced all the time on our phones.

Verdict – 7.5/10

Nokia Lumia800 scores  7.5/10 on an average. Thus making it to be very much likable device for all. I will suggest each of my friend to go for it if you like to try something new on something fantastic. It is the best of both worlds, MS & Nokia. Also, I want to make it clear that it doesn't have NFC or Front Facing Camera which is surely a turndown for a flagship device but both these technologies are hardly being used by anyone in India. But if you desperately need the two technologies then Lumia800 is not for you. May be you need to wait for next Nokia flagship for the same.

Nokia Lumia800 is available at Nokia Priority Stores from 14th Dec 2011. You can purchase the device on EMI basis as well, if you live in a metro city of India. Click Here for more details…