The “Amazing” Industrial Design for your “Everyday” – Nokia Lumia 800 Design Review

If you remember we have stated – “The only design of its kind” – for Nokia N9 when reviewed about that great design from the Finnish firm. Nokia Lumia 800 is not mostly different in design from Nokia N9. But the statement said above still suites to Nokia N9 as the curved glass design actually interacts with the MeeGo/Harmattan’s Swipe User Interface of Nokia N9. However that lovely design on Nokia Lumia 800 also adds help for most swipy parts in Windows Phone OS which made us state some thing fancier for it like –

“The ‘Amazing’ Industrial Design for ‘Everyday'”

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

First impressions of any smartphone just turn into your mind right once you unbox it from its package. We did it the same way as we always did. That was no surprise to see the beautiful Lumia 800 residing on top of everything in the box because we knew it’s the same design as we have seen and experienced with Nokia N9. But it’s to believe that this stunning industrial design left no boring impression – in fact it delivered the pretty same impression (we had with Nokia N9) when it came back into our hands bundling with another OS “Windows Phone 7.5” from Microsoft.

When talking about design of Lumia 800, it’s clear that the design is (not completely but) mostly based on the original design of Nokia N9 with a few displacements of components, additions of components and subtractions of some.

Uni body:

The same uni body outfit of Nokia Lumia 800 is made of premium quality plastic called “Polycarbonate”. Alike original design of N9 there is no joints of parts on the Lumia 800 else than the screen itself and other components including hardware buttons. 116.5 x 61.2 x 12.1mm sized Lumia 800 weighs 142 grams – it’s is little bit more than Nokia N9 that weighs 135 grams. This doesn’t actually make difference in hands.

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

Screen and Display:

Lumia 800, where sharing most of the components with N9, on the screen and display part it differs in various aspects. With regard to the physical size and resolution it, sure is lower than N9, featuring 3.7 inch screen with 800 pixels horizontally and 480 pixels vertically. The most important part (as I liked) on this Windows Phone is that the operating system with its interface floats onto the screen.

like many other have their opinions about the display of Lumia 800. It really is true and I can state it as – “Like Nokia N9, the display and touch responsiveness of Lumia 800 lets you feel the real interaction of your touch with the objects on the screen.” –

I am not just saying it. “The objects do not float under the screen, they really do float on the screen”

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

 

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

With AMOLED ClearBlack display, Lumia 800 performed well when outdoors but it did not as up to what Nokia N9 showed us. We’ll have a comparison soon. Though the fingerprints are easily captured by the screen and the body.

Unlike Nokia N9’s completely plain screen – other than the “Nokia” branding of course, down there on the screen Lumia 800 features the standard Windows Phone soft keys Back, Start and Search. These are also touch sensitive and lighten up with screen.

On top there is the earpiece, a proximity sensor (to detect when you bring it near your face while a call in progress) and an ambient light sensor for brightness control.

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

Camera and Flash:

The single body of Lumia 800 has a camera with Carl-Zeiss optics that really is worth mentioning on the silver strip. f/2.2 aperture and 28mm focal length are same as in Nokia N9. Macro still photos can be taken at least distance of 10 cm. The sensor supports maximum resolution 8 Mega pixels at aspect ratio of 4:3 (1.33:1) (regular photography) and 7.1 Mega pixel at aspect ratio of 16:9 (1.78:1) (wide mode).

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

As mentioned about some displacements of the components on Lumia 800, dual-LED flash is the one which has been placed upside of the silver strip with camera, where as on N9 it was placed aside of the strip levelling the camera.

Apparently and as per the specifications both the cameras on Lumia 800 and on N9 are pretty same. But they do result differently – due to the software which operates them? – we’ll see later in a camera review.

What’s not present in Lumia 800 is the secondary front-facing camera. Well yes! you can’t do video call, nor video chat on Lumia 800. This is what a biggest lacking feature on Lumia 800. That is actually something to tell in BOLDER letters. Wait! you can’t do video call via your network carrier as the OS doesn’t support it on Dialer on Lumia 800. But video chat or internet video call can be made if supported by the applications like “Tango” which use primary camera on the back if front-facing camera is not present.

Profile:

Lumia 800 is mostly the flat design with curves on borders and with less joints of components just like N9 but one hardware button on right side of the device is additional that is the camera shutter key. It was not present in Nokia N9. Other three buttons are the “power button” and the “volume rocker”. With buttons, that’s it.

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

On the top it serves with 3.5mm audio jack sided left. Then to right of it, there’s the micro USB port and then the SIM card slot at most right. It only supports micro SIM card and it’s not hot-swappable (a reboot of the device is required).

Micro SIM card slot is removable and is securely designed to be locked with the micro USB port cover. You need to open the USB port cover first to release and remove the SIM card slot. But we again have our reservations against this design for the USB port cover as it’s very odd to leave it open while using the USB port. In fact it doesn’t seem to be secure and always fears to be broken as well as it does well in disturbing.

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

Bottom side is featuring the loudspeaker covered with a grill of circular wholes in the body. Though microphone is not visible anywhere on the body. We suppose it should be under the same grill. However left side of the phone is completely plain with no features on it.

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

Soft Rubber Case:

It’s actually not a design part of the phone itself but I found no where else to give some words about it but this seems more appropriate post for it so here it goes. The rubber made soft case was also included in the package. It’s same quality case as I mentioned about the one came with Nokia N9. Once again I’ll like to add that I don’t like covers on my phones but this one, like the one with N9, doesn’t make the usability of the phone uncomfortable. Rather it helps more with your grip and doesn’t make the phone look bulky. It’s Good!

Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design Nokia Lumia 800 - The Amazing Everyday Design

Design Gallery:

An amazing photos gallery showing Nokia Lumia 800 design is on flickr. Check them out below.

[flickr-gallery mode=”photoset” photoset=”72157628964846373″ size=”small”]