Nokia N73 Review
Reviewed By Ernest Leong
External Look
I'll base this review mostly on my experiences with other phones,namely K750i and the last symbian phone I had, which is the 6630.
Mine's a silver and plum grey model. It looks quite nice, has the metallic feel about it and it doesn't feel cheap. The plum grey backing is made up of an
interesting material, on close examination, I realised it's similiar material that was used on the 6110, 6150 and 7110. There's this slight shimmering effect
depending on the angle you look. I'll try to capture this effect on camera, stay tuned.
The screen is big. Reminds me of the K800i where the screen is big and takes up more than half of the phone's real estate. The screen is very clear but I
haven't compared it side by side with a K800i yet or any of those phones with QVGA displays.
miniSD
The miniSD slot is at the bottom of the phone. People with short fingernails will find it hard to pull it out because it's quite secure.
The miniSD is hot swappable but it didn't work very well for me. It's good for you to stop the card before swapping it out. You can stop it by pressing the
Power button on top of the phone, and choosing 'Remove Mem Card'.
When I put it back, the phone didn't register the card, even after waiting for 10 secs. So I had to take it out, put it back in, still no luck. After trying
a few times, then the phone finally registered the card.Hmm.. not very cool nokia!
Anyway I think you should minimise the removal of the miniSD card by using either BT or the supplied data cable to transfer stuff.
Overall 'feeling' of the phone
The weight of the phone is evenly distributed, makes smsing feel 'normal' and not top heavy at all.
Buttons are pretty firm and not 'clicky' like the k750i. The joystick is firm too and needs some thumb power behind it, compared to the k750i.
One thing that I need to mention about the camera button, it's pretty set deep inside the phone, meaning you have to press pretty accurately and deeply in
order to take pictures. Sometimes I find it easier to use my nail to take pics. The good thing is that the button won't be accidentally pressed. The bad
thing is it's much harder to take pictures than the K750i.
Package
Comes with the standard stuff, CD, manual, data cable, charger, batt, the charger adaptor, 128mb miniSD (without adaptor) and some freebies like this Kodak
4R print vouchers. See the pic below. There is also a NSeries workshop too.
Earphones
The bundled earphones have built-in volume control so you can change volume of the music. But it doesn't change tracks in the mp3 player though.
Menu navigation is quite zippy for a symbian phone. My last symbian phone was a 6630 and it's definitely faster than it. Boot up took about 25 secs to reach
the 'Enter Pin Code' page. But due to the joystick's stiffness, I can't navigate the menu very fast. It seems faster to just use the shortcuts.
Display
As everyone knows, its QVGA res, an upgrade from the N70. Fonts are nice n sharp. The screen is visible even under bright sunlight.
There is a light sensor just like the 6630, but I really haven't figured out how it works yet, putting the set in dark places and shining a torch at the
sensor doesn't really do anything.. Hmm...
Anyway the light sensor has 5 levels of adjustment. The Power Saver time out can be from 1 min to 30 mins. Don't think you can choose any other values.
There's a Sleep mode. Presumably it turns off the display totally after awhile, so you need to rely on the blue blinking light to know your phone is still
'alive'.
Light time out is 5 secs to 60 secs, in 5 secs blocks. You can't choose any longer than 60 secs, but don't think you need to anyway..
Review Button
There is this 'Review' button that links to the Gallery. i don't think the button can be remapped though. It's the 2nd one from the left.
Messaging
Sms is standard stuff. The only difference is that you can view the Inbox in 1 line view or 2 line view.
1 line view |
2 line view |
But I did realise that Nokia has added a new feature, which is similiar to SE's interface. The most often used words are now 'pushed' to the top of the list
when you use T9 and are choosing word matches. like if you press the numbers 4 and 3, you'd get 'if','he', 'id' etc, so if you use 'he' more often than 'if',
then 'he' would be the first word match that appears. I'm not sure when this was implemented though, but definitely wasn't there on my old 6630.
After using the phone for a longer period of time, I realised that the feature where it remembers the most often used word and moves it to the top of the T9
list only works for the current message.
Once you close the current message, the order of the words are set back to default. unless you specially saved the word into the dictionary. For e.g. when I
press 2, 2, 6 for the word 'can', I get 'bao' instead. 'can' is the 2nd on the list. But if I keep pressing 2, 2, 6 and choosing 'Can', and do this 3 or 4
times, 'Can' will be moved to the top of the list. Then if I close the message and I open a new message, when I press 2, 2, 6, 'bao' is back on top of the
list again! So how? Only way is for me to press the ' * ' button to cycle through the available word suggestions until 'Spell' appears on the left soft key,
then I enter 'can' and save it, then the next time I start a new message and I press 2, 2, 6, 'can' appears by default.
So boys and girls, if you want the phone to remember your most-often used words and keep it on the top of the word suggestion list, then you have to force
save it into the phone.
Games
The phone comes with Snake and Sudoku. Snake gives me an arcade feel and the snake is in 3D too!
Tools Menu |
Applications Menu |
The usual suspects are here - IM, Help, Eng-Chi Dictionary, 3D Tones etc. What's new to me is the anti virus icon.
This is the F-Secure Anti Virus, but it's not the program itself, it's only a link for you to download the software. I didn't try it because I think anti
virus programs on a S60 phone is redundant. As long as you practise good habits like :
- installing software from verified and reputable sources,
- turning your BT to Off when you don't need it and turn the phone's visibility to Off when you are using BT,
- be mindful of programs that suddenly pop out of nowhere and asks you to authorise the installation. Don't be 'greedy' or too curious and allow it to
install just to see what it does. If it's a destructive virus and it deletes some system files that are essential to your phone's normal operation, then good
luck to you. You'll probably need to say goodbye to your data and do a hard reset / format.
So if you practise good habits, why do you need anti virus programs on your phone? Your phone is already slow compared to a S40 phone, so no point making it
slower with useless programs running in the background. Remember, prevention is better than cure!
Office Menu
In the Office Menu, there is the Quickoffice (ver 3.6.11.0) and the Adobe PDF reader, in addition to the usual stuff like Calculator, Note, Recorder etc.
Do note the Quickoffice consists of only the readers, you cannot perform any editing.
Network
Reception of the phone seems stable, no sudden dropped calls while walking around and talking on the phone. But I do see the reception bar moving up and down
pretty often, like from 4 bars to 7 bars (7 bars is the max) and then back to 4 bars again. This happens a couple of times in half an hour. It could be a
network thing though.
Call Quality
I do find the loudspeaker not as loud as I'd like. It's quite soft I feel. I usually have to put the volume to maximum before I can hear the other party
properly. I think if you were to talk while walking on the side of a busy road, you'll really be pressing the phone against your ear and concentrating on
what the other party is trying to say.
On the other end of the line, the level of my voice is acceptable to the other party
When using the loudspeaker, only the top speaker is active, meaning you don't get stereo speakers for your calls, not that you need it anyway because the
call is in mono sound. Loudness for the loudspeaker is acceptable, at max volume, it is loud enough until you can hear the sound is just about to get
distorted. Now to think of it, I think I know why the 2nd speaker is not utilised, it's because it's too near the mic and you'll get feedback and echos and
all that. Well, it is a pity though, i'm sure 2 speakers are better than 1, even if calls are in mono sound.
Video
It takes about 3 secs to toggle to Video mode. You have 2 Scene Modes in Video mode. Auto and Night. They are self-explanatory. There are the same White
Balance and Color Tone settings as the normal picture mode.
If you press Options, Settings,you can choose :
Audio - Choose if you want sound or not.
Video Quality - High quality gives me about 21 mins of recording, Normal gives me 60 mins of recording and Sharing is for mms, 35 secs only.
Interestingly, Normal recording is done on 3GP format and High Quality is done on Mp4 format. And if you turn off audio recording during video recording, the
recording time does not increase at all, at least the phone doesn't reflect any increases.
Here's a sample of the video taken in MP4.
http://www.savefile.com/files/3799757 (mirror 1)
http://www.content-type.com/1097352274/30072006.mp4.htm (mirror 2)
Here's a sample of the video taken in 3GP.
http://www.savefile.com/files/3978406 (mirror 1)
http://www.content-type.com/-210823...2006001.3gp.htm (mirror 2)
More Video samples taken in MP4
This is a video capture of a LCD TV showing a soccer match in High Definition format.
http://www.savefile.com/files/8074673 Mirror 1
http://www.content-type.com/1356587...ideo_HD.mp4.htm Mirror 2
This is the same program in SD format, can't really see the difference though because the video isn't detailed enough.
http://www.savefile.com/files/8420181 Mirror 1
http://www.content-type.com/-353349...ideo_SD.mp4.htm Mirror 2
3)Image Stabilisation - Hard to test if this works or not. But it's only available in Video mode.
Camera
Ok here's the interesting part. The cam application takes a couple of seconds to start from the moment u slide open the camera slider. There are quite a few
Scene Modes
Scene Modes
Auto is the default. Everything's done for u automatically
Close up mode. It's used for taking pics from 10cm to 50cm.
Portrait mode. Standard stuff. It's supposed to render the background blurry while the subject is sharp.
Landscape mode. AF doesn't seem to work in this case, the green rectangle doesn't appear when you press the shutter halfway. I guess it's set to Infinity
focus. It's supposed to help you focus through glass
Sports mode. The N73 has a mechanical shutter, so I think it's put to good use here. If you see the EXIF data, the speed is 1/999. The flash is disabled by
default. Doesn't seem to have AF for this mode. Same as Landscape Mode.
Night mode. The flash is disabled by default when you choose this mode. But you can force enable it too. Here are some pics. I'm comparing between N73, K750i
and Canon S2 IS I know they are all different res, but its just for comparison's sake. Click on the thumbnails to view
The pics below were taken in a totally dark toilet, 2MP res, using Night Mode with Flash. Click on the links to view.
N73
 | K750i
 |
Night Portrait. This is simply Night mode with flash.
Lastly there is the User Defined mode. This is the mode where you can save the settings you want. You can choose the Scene Mode you want, whether you want
Flash to be on or off, White Balance, Exposure Compensation, Color Tone, Light Sensitivity Value and lastly you can reset it to default. I found a bug in
this mode where you can't exit the mode except via the red Hang Up key, it doesn't happen all the time though.
Flash
Flash is by default turned to Auto mode, meaning the phone decides when it wants to fire the flash depending on light conditions. You can force it to turn
On, Red eye reduction or Off. Pity you can't set the led to turn on all the time and use it as a torch unless you're in Video mode and you use it as a Video
light. Anyway the Video Light is very weak, it's more to show that recording is taking place rather than lighting up the area.
Timer
There are several options here, Off, 2 secs, 10 secs and 20 secs. When you use timer, you don't even have to press the shutter button, you just need to press
the left soft key to activate the timer and the phone will auto focus for you and take the pic after X number of secs. You can even use Timer with Multi
Shot! According to the manual, timer with multi shot takes 6 pics.
Multi Shot
From the manual, it's supposed to take 6 shots per press of the shutter. And you can take till 100 shots, or until the mem runs out. I haven't tried this
personally yet though.
Exposure Compensation
You can choose from +2.0 to -2.0 in 0.5 steps.
White Balance
There's Automatic, Sunny, Cloudy, Incandescent, Fluorescent
Color Tone
There's Normal, Sepia, Black and White, Negative and Vivid. Vivid is definitely the way to go, pity the cam always defaults to Normal when you turn it off.
So the only way is to use the User Definied mode to force the cam to take vivid pics everytime. Here's a pic comparison between Normal and Vivid.
Normal:
Vivid:
Focusing Speed
Ok focusing speed is a mixed bag. At it's fastest, when you press the shutter halfway, the cam about the same time to focus as the k750i. At it's slowest, it
might take 1 sec more to focus properly.
Again it's down to the design of the shutter button. It's being set in too deep into the body of the phone. And during focusing, the flash led will come on,
presumably to help the cam to focus better. Even if you turn off the flash, the led still comes on. So if you're thinking of taking voyeur pics, you better
think twice if you wana get this phone. Ok, there are 2 modes that I know of which won't turn on the flash led during focusing, Sports and Landscape.
Camera Sound
You can't turn off the sound. There are 4 sounds to choose from. As usual, sound number 4 is the most discrete.
Some pics to judge it's macro taking ability and text capture ability.
k750i
 | N73
 |
Comparison Pics
So far I have the k750i to compare with, so have to make do with what I have. At least the K750i is a known standard, so there's some level of comparison to
see how good or bad N73's pics are.
K750i Fluorescent Mode
 | N73 Fluorescent Mode
 |
K750i Normal Mode
 | N73 Normal Mode
 |
K750i Outdoor
 | N73 Outdoor
 |
Radio
The N73 has Visual Radio, which is incorporated into quite a few of nokia's phones.
Anyway, I doing a comparison test between the K750i and N73. I'll be using the default sound settings,i.e. no Mega Bass, no equaliser settings or anything
like that. I'll also be using the stock earphones for both handphones.
From my basic testing at the same volume, the K750i has a better sound. Reception wise, both are similiar.
Music Player
Ok this music player is definitely improved from my previous 6630. There are a lot of settings and menus to play with.
Firstly there is the Music Library. In the Music Library the music is automatically categorised for you. You have sub-categories like: All tracks, Artists,
Albums, Playlists, Genres and Composers.
All tracks - This shows you all the music files you have in your phone.
Artists, Albums, Genres, Composers - Your music is sorted according to this category. Nothing special here.
Playlists - In the Playlists menu, you have Most played tracks, Recent tracks and Recent Additions. New playlists that you create will be added in this sub-
menu. You can even send playlists to your friends using email, BT, IR, Web Upload and MMS. Presumably this needs a compatible phone to work.You can also sort
the songs in the playlist, so you can choose which songs you want to be played first.
Equaliser - There are several default equaliser settings. There is Default, Bass Booster, Classical, Jazz, Pop and Rock. You can edit the current presets or
you can create your own Presets too. I tried creating 2 more presets and the phone still allows me to create more, so I think you can probably create quite a
lot of presets.
Using the stock earphones to test, the K750i came out tops. The sound is more rich, and the bass is more pronounced. Plus you get Mega Bass on the K750i too!
So for the bass lovers, I think you should definitely upgrade the N73 earphones.
Comparing the loudspeaker, the N73 is better because it has stereo sound and it's way louder than the K750i. At the K750i's max volume, the N73 was only at
50%. Comparing quality of the sound, I'd say both are about the same.
Stereo Speakers / 3D Ringing Tone Effects
Ok stereo sound on a mobile is not something new to me. I've used the first phone with stereo speakers, which was the Motorola E398. The distance between the
speakers wasn't that big, so the stereo effect wasn't that obvious. You had to really strain to hear the left and right separation.
So for the N73, Nokia decided to put the left speaker on top and the right speaker on the bottom. Ok there are some pros n cons.
Pros
The stereo effect is definitely more pronouced and more obvious that phones that have the speakers at each side of the phone.
I haven't tried it yet, but I think if you watch videos which have stereo sound, the stereo speakers should come in handy and give you a better experience.
Cons
You have to tilt the phone to the side, as if you're taking pictures, in order to listen to the full stereo effect. I personally think this is just a nice-
to-have function because 80% of the time, the phone is going to be in your pocket, in your bag and probably the phone will be in the portrait orientation,
i.e. in the vertical mode. So the stereo effect is useless most of the time.
3D Ringing Tones Effect
3D sounds for your mobile! Interesting huh! Most importantly, does it work? It's a YES! Does it work WELL? Err, it's OK, doesn't work that great though.
I'll explain later, let me show you the menus first.
Over here, it controls the 3D effects, whether you want it on or off. The setting is global, meaning you can have it ON for all profiles, or OFF for all
profiles.
The current ringtone for the current profile will be listed here. If you change the ringtone here, the changes will be reflected and saved in the current
profile. So far it supports aac, mid and mp3 tones. But I'm not sure if it supports ALL aac, mid and mp3 files though..
Sound Trajectory is the so-called 3D effect.
I won't explain all the effects here .Circular means the sound goes round and round your head, Fly by effect is like an aeroplane flying past you.. the sound
goes from one side to the other. Its all simple stuff really.
Take Circular for example, when I put the phone in front of me and I close my eyes, I can tell that the sound is going 'round' me, but I can't really tell is
it anti-clockwise or clockwise. It's not that obvious but the 3D effect is there. Anyway, this is a mobile phone, not a $200 Creative soundcard with EAX 2.0
so we shouldn't expect too much yah? But it's a step in the right direction definitely.
If you decide to enable the Sound Trajectory, you can actually set the speed. So if you take Circular for example , you can set how fast the sound moves
around your head..
Next setting is the Reverb. This is a bit like the EAX Enviromental settings..where the phone tries to replicate the sound that's supposed to be played in a
particular environment. To me, I can tell no difference between them. I'm no audiophile, but I don't think I'm tone deaf either. When I choose 'Underwater',
I was expecting the sound to be muffled, but it wasn't. Hmm..
Pros and Cons
Ok I'm going end the review by listing down the pros and cons.
Pros
Great screen, clear even under sunlight
Feature packed. It has a lot of built in apps for the mobile warrior
Improvement in SMS typing where it remembers the most often used words and puts it at the top of the words suggestions list.
Good cam, has quite a lot of manual settings for you to play with and it has AF
It's one of the fastest S60 phones at the moment
Relatively good battery life
Cons
Stability is still an issue. The phone is definitely not stable enough, hope Nokia releases new bug fixes asap.
Certain apps are still slow to load, like the Application Manager
Camera app is also buggy, it hung on me several times
Switching modes between video and image could be faster
Smsing is a bit tricky because of the small keypad
Joystick is a little too firm for my liking.
Conclusion
The N73 is a great phone. It's a vast improvement from it's predecessor, the N70. It's faster, looks good, has better speakers, takes better pics. What more can you ask for?
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