Good phone spoiled by build-quality issues (Nokia N73)

Member Name: plango

Product:	Nokia N73
Date:	05/09/07 (393 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Tonnes of features, brilliant camera, good web browsing, simple texting.

Disadvantages: Poor build quality, sometimes over-complicated, can be slow.

I have been using this phone for a year now, so I'll take you through my experiences with the features I really use.

By far and away the best feature of the phone is its camera - 3 megapixels and it takes excellent, clear, vibrant pictures. The phone features a flash, which is very bright, though pictures taken with the flash or in low light conditions tend to be much lower quality than those taken in daylight. The gallery for browsing through pictures you've taken is easy to use, and with its slideshow, zoom functions and transition, also pretty cool!

Texting is easy, predictive text is good, and the phone can store well over a thousand texts. However, this can cause major problems with the phone. The more texts you have, the slower the phone seems to operate, and it can get very, very slow indeed.

Calling is generally pretty reliable, though sometimes phone calls can be dropped whilst dialling, despite good signal, and with no explanation from the phone.

Internet browsing is generally good (for a phone). You can view real web pages, which are reformatted to fit on the screen with the phone's inbuilt browser. This usually works quite well, though sites with high media content can be slow and/or fail to work properly on the browser.

Battery life is very good. With light call usage, it can go a few days between charges. It also charges up very quickly (around 30 minutes).

The phone is attractive, light and slim enough to easily fit in your pocket. It feels good to hold, but the buttons are a bit plasticy and clicky for me.

The phone is not the easiest to use that I've had. I had previously switched to other makes, but came back to Nokia expecting the intuitive, easy-to-use interface I had enjoyed before. This phone, however, can be confusing, fiddley and obscure at times, and sometimes you have to go through several menus to find what you want. Not a major problem, but things certainly could be more streamlined.

The main problem with this phone is the build quality. The paintwork on my phone seemed to start to get worn very quickly, and the joystick (essential to controlling the phone) fell off after a couple of months. I had to take it into a shop to be repaired, which took a few days Dirt also seems to get trapped under the screen very easily, and there is no way to get rid of it, which can make reading the screen difficult. If purchasing this phone, a good quality case is a must buy.

From my own experience speaking to other people with the same phone, many other users experience similar problems with build quality, or errors developing with the phone.

It's a shame, because the phone itself works well, but these quality problems make it hard to recommend, especially given that it has now been superceded in terms of camera quality. If you are offered it as a free upgrade, consider it, but if you are planning to pay for it, I'd look into other, newer models.

Summary: If you're getting it free, consider it. Otherwise, keep looking!