Nokia N95

Editor's rating (1-5):

Editor's Note: Also check out our review of the Nokia N95-3, released at the beginning of October 2007 for the US market with US 3G, more memory and other improvements.

Here's one variation of my dream Nokia NSeries device: combine the Nokia N73's excellent camera with autofocus lens and its larger display with the Nokia N80's WiFi, d-pad and compact slider design. Nokia did more than one better with their latest NSeries phone, the N95: it features a 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss autofocus lens, a 2.6" QVGA display and a two way slider. Oh yes, and there's an internal full GPS with free maps covering 100 countries. But let's not forget the Bluetooth 2.0 +EDR, full-featured music player, standard 3.5mm stereo headphone jack, VGA video camera, the excellent S60 Feature Pack 1 web browser based on Safari technology, Euro-only 3G, quad band GSM + EDGE, the usual super-strong Nokia reception and MS Office viewer applications.

Though the phone is clearly ripe with high end features, the 5MP camera is its most salient feature. Like the N73, it excels at still photography and like the N93, it does an excellent job of taking VGA resolution video. We'll cover photography in great detail in page 2 of this review.

In the Box

The Nokia comes with a good set of accessories including a 1 gig microSD card, mini USB to USB sync cable (gone are the specialized Nokia USB cables and Pop-Port, finally), world travel charger (the same charger used with most Nokia phones made from 2005 onward), Lithium Ion rechargeable battery BP-5F, a remote with detachable 3.5mm earbud stereo headphones (the remote controls music playback and has a mic for calls), 3.5mm to AV cables (RCA connectors for video, left and right audio), a software CD with PC Suite and LifeBlog and a manual. The Asia Pacific version of the phone adds a very nice leather case. When buying from importers or carrier-branded devices, you may not get the memory card or case, regardless of region.

Design and Ergonomics

The N95 is a mid-sized phone that's similar in size to the Nokia N80 but slimmer. It features a two-way slider design: slide the display up to reveal the number pad and slide it down to switch to landscape mode, access playback controls and see a palette of multimedia applications: video player, gallery, maps, the web browser, music player, FM radio, LifeBlog, and a 3D game called System

The slider feels spring loaded in each but we believe it actually uses plastic cams. We've had three N95's in house (two Euro and one Asian), and the front (display) section has a little side-to-side wobble at the screen end when closed but not when slid open in either direction on unit 1 (Euro) and no wobble on units 2 and 3 (one made in Finland for sale in the US and one made in Asia for sale in the APAC region). When you slide the phone to reveal the multimedia controls, it automatically switches to landscape mode and stays in that orientation until you slide it to reveal the number pad. The slider locks firmly in place, both open and closed and it hasn't accidentally slid open when in a pocket or bag. It looks and feels well made, imparting a sense that it will last some time. The phone's front face, top and bottom are silver and the back is plum ("sand" which is tan, is available as well). The plum is more noticeably plum colored compared to the Nokia N73 which looked nondescriptly dark unless it was held under bright sunlight. We received the plum colored version that's intended for sale in the US at Nokia Flagship stores and on NokiaUSA.com by the end of April. It's actually the European version and Nokia tells us there is no different in firmware, software or hardware between the two.