Hey thanks Sid! First off, I owe my gratitude to my 2 colleagues who own the HD7 and the Lumia 710 without whom I would have never had the chance to play around with this platform and of course you, who had (well, started this thread
) and strengthened my chances of getting a WP device. After the announcement of the iPhone 5, I was almost certain it was between these 2 devices or rather platforms (iOS or WP). But there were no new features that the iPhone 5 offered so I was skeptical to spend as much as 45k. And then, the Lumia 920 was announced as the flagship WP 8 phone by Nokia. I was sold and knew what my next phone would be! Let me just put down some quick impressions after a few hours of usage with this amazing device - please bear the lengthy post!
Like I mentioned before, the wait was well worth it. I am beginning to discover something new each time I fiddle around with the device. And the interface is so damn slick! I just love the tile based home screen and this time with WP 8, they have introduced tiles of different sizes that can be customized by the user. Almost anything can be pinned to the home screen but I prefer to keep it simple and those tiles that I tend to use more often. Contacts were synced automatically after signing into my Facebook account so those who’ve entered their contact numbers on their FB profile, showed up automatically including their birthdays and email IDs along with some other details. Saved me some time from transferring the contacts! Of course, unnecessary contacts also show up but that’s okay.
The best part (that does not seem to be mentioned in many reviews I had read online) is the
Nokia Music store with the online radio. I was able to find 99% of the tracks online and here’s the best part - for FREE! Registered on the Nokia website using the email and I was good to go. Simply searched the music using the album name or the artist or the name of the track, it shows up - preview it for a few seconds and download it by a single tap (downloads in less than 5~10 seconds using a 2 mbps WiFi connection!) and it is saved in My Music. The quality of the tracks are very much acceptable although I haven’t checked what is the bitrate of the tracks - shall connect it to the PC tonight and check them anyway. I did not bother using the bundled Nokia headset (IEM plus mic) since I own a pair of Brainwavz Pro Alpha - the SQ was decent. There is an option of setting the equalizer with various presets (including custom) and enabling Dolby Headphone (which essentially boosts the bass a bit). I prefer neutral settings anyway.
Tested
Nokia Maps and
Nokia Drive over WiFi. Maps can be downloaded region wise for offline support. The whole of India’s map is available for some 522 MB or so but I don’t need the entire map anyway so Gujarat and Kerala was for some 60~70 MB each. I am yet to download them (it was already 1 AM by then!). Nokia Drive prompted me to update the app to the recent beta+ version and it showed up. This is one of the best GPS apps. available for Nokia (irrespective of the OS - I’ve used them on my boss’ Symbian based E71 before) and works extremely well. I shall know more about this when I head home next weekend. I will be roaming around with my friend in our car around the coastal Kerala, so this app. should come in handy. Both the apps were able to pinpoint to my location (i.e. my home) with near perfect accuracy. Even the tiny lane (can’t even call it a road!) which leads to our apartment was indicated! Even the Google maps did not indicate this street before - I had tested it with my roomie’s Spice MI-410 Android device.
Next the
camera - it is told that this is the first smartphone which has the image stabilization is built into the lens of the camera. To test how well it captures the image while reducing the jitter, I enabled the video camera while riding pillion on my friend’s bike while returning back from the store. I was shocked to see the result! There was absolutely no jitter - it was as if the video was recorded by a digital camera. It left my friends in shock as well. Amazing camera this device packs. Will click some random snaps and upload them shortly.
Well that’s about it. I shall keep updating this thread with any further findings.
TLDR (as someone asked me before): The Lumia 920 is an amazing phone. For a retail pricing of 36.5k, it is well worth the price. But it should have retailed around the 30k’ish mark which could have attracted a whole lot of customers despite a delayed launch in the country.
