A week with the Nokia Lumia 520, or a review of Windows Phone 8 from a simple user

Exactly a week ago, I acquired this miracle of Finnish-American smartphone construction, and now I am ready to share my first impressions of both the smartphone and the new mobile OS from Microsoft. Anyone who is thinking about buying phones on Windows Phone or just wondering - please under the cat.

Also, who is not very interested in the article, may be interested in several polls on Windows Phone. Do not pass by;)


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Doing a review of the phone, stupidly listing its technical characteristics is a very stupid thing, as for me, because at first I’ll better tell you how I moved to buy this device.

Initially, I really wanted to imagine the 720th model. But, one day, leaving the store in the evening with my family, I once again went to the mobile phone salon to see if my long-awaited lyumia had not arrived yet. Unfortunately, she did not come, but another one arrived - the 520th. In yellow. Since I am very interested in VinPhone, I immediately asked the manager to get it from the display case and to give it a twist, touch, touch. Frankly, I did not find the slightest sense of budget in the phone. A couple of photos on a modest camera - and in my head the question clearly arose: why pay more? 520 is 1800 UAH. ($ 225), while the 720th is worth an average of 3000 UAH. ($ 370). I really liked the phone, and I immediately took it (by the way, the phone was the only one in that color, and one of the two available in the cabin in general).

Externally, the phone looks very stylish and fresh. To bring a cloud of pictures I do not see the point.
They are here . Examples of photos and videos taken on the camera, here . With the Qualcomm Snap processor ................... and other technical characteristics that do not mean anything to me as a user, I will not tire you, but rather tell you about the impressions of using the system on a smartphone, the price of which cannot even be called average. Let me just say about the screen size: 4 inches, 800x480, and a few screenshots:



First of all, the phone is amazing smoothness and speed of their work. And the truth is - 512 MB of RAM for “Vind” is not a problem. Everything flies, and everything that does not fly takes off after a few seconds loading. The desktop, the tiles - this is all cool, but it was the speed of work that struck me first. At the same time, a small amount of memory does not affect heavy applications. The browser opens almost any pages lightly (and it works very well through our, to put it mildly, absolutely no GPRS / EDGE), and on Wi-Fi it will give odds to my chrome on a very weak laptop. Asphalt 7 (the last time I stuck in the race during the time of the second NFS: Underground) does not have any problems with graphics performance. What difference does it make to me then - how much memory is there and gigahertz in the processor?

Yes, Windows was incredibly quick. Already then I joined the tiles, brought all 4 mailboxes (GMail works fine) to the main screen and began to contemplate how cool the headers of letters, SMS and others appear right on the main screen, without opening any applications. It is a pity that Gismeteo does not plow live tile. And it would be nice (if there are representatives here - please hear!). I also found a cool program for monitoring battery charge. The tile shows the current charge, how much time has passed since the last charge, and an estimate of the remaining time in the current usage mode. It is in the current mode - and not a simple extrapolation - that is skipped, jumped, jumped. When rubilov in Asphalt shows 3 hours, after 10 minutes in standby mode - 2 days. Everything is as it should :)

Speaking of applications. Windows Phone Marketplace, of course, cannot be called empty, but if you open Google Play next to it, you immediately realize that the store is still growing and growing. I have found almost all the main software (so far only the normal FB2 / PDF / Djvu reader is questionable). However, there is often no particular choice, and for my purposes there is often only one program, but for the most part, these programs turn out to be quite good, so the smartphone will not remain without software stuff anyway.

Bluetooth - is. Works fine on my headset. File transfer - did not try. In 2013 - why? I used bluetooth on Android only for the headset.

There is a light and proximity sensor (well, as without it). And the light sensor works just amazing - the reaction rate is higher than the Iphone 4s. And most importantly - for sure. Feelings are very pleasant. The display in the sun, of course, flashes, but the brightness is enough to read the basic information. PPI? What is it? Some kind of garbage, no more. If exactly - 233. Subjectively - with the head. Any small text reads perfectly. Has washed off to be measured by body parts - a zero. Why do I need 500 PPI, if that's enough? Only in vain we will eat the battery, torment the poor mobile video and save up the brakes.

File system - closed by 200%. Even at 300. When you connect your phone to a computer, it is defined as a USB flash drive, but only a few folders are available a la "Music", "Video", etc. You can’t even talk about full-fledged file system surfing - even third-party There is no software. Apparently, this functionality is simply blocked at the system level. On the one hand, it seems to be security, but on the other, it’s still overkill.

The camera is like a camera. Removes. In memory, you can sfotkat something by speed. The text, by the way, is excellent. For everything else, I have a SLR. I don’t like cheap photos - they haven’t invented phones for which I’m ready to overpay for a camera. Live photos are here too. In general, the pictures are obtained normally - as long as the lighting was good. I will not give examples of photos - I almost didn’t do them, and on the Internet they probably already wrote a lot of reviews.

Office. The great and mighty modest mobile office is here out of the box. What he does beautifully is opening documents. Fast and beautiful. More from him and is not required (except that a trifle to fix something - on a 4-inch screen and it quickly annoys). OneNote deserves a special praise. Together with the free metro version for Windows 8, the killer linker is obtained. Shopping - right on the laptop scribbled a list with checkmarks - and went to the store - everything is already in the phone. The number of insurance and every little thing is perfectly stored - the perfect notebook with backup in the cloud. Why do I need Evernote?

Naturally, the phone has integration with all the major social services - Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn ... All birthdays are now on the calendar, contacts are combined themselves - if the names are the same. Generally, lyapota. True, I personally do not sit in social networks, but I stuck it for a tick - let it be.

Another real feature of the phone is HERE Maps and HERE Drive. Maps of Ukraine simply unreal quality. Plus, everything from the crust is quietly loaded and works offline - just download them via WaiFay (full map of Ukraine - 375 MB). The avtonavigator is notified of speeds and warns about speeding - and he knows when you are driving in the city (60 limit), and when between houses, in a residential area (10 limit). Beeps immediately if you exceed by 5-7 kilometers or within 10 seconds, if you exceed by a couple. If you recall the Yandex Navigator, which only squeaks when there are “cops with a hairdryer” in front of you, it’s immediately clear where the program comes from. I, as a person accustomed to ride observing traffic rules, prefer the Nokia navigator. But there is another killer feature in this phone and navigator. The time spent satellites - 2-3 seconds. How he does it - I don’t know, but after 2-3 seconds my location is determined with an accuracy of 10 meters and even with the right direction (and this is generally mystic - there’s no compass in the phone - because of this, Nokia City Lens doesn’t work, by the way ). Moreover, it determines even when I stand still, not when I go. In general, here are the wonders.

The memory in the phone is 8 gigabytes (in fact - 7.2). Where Delhi 800 meters - is unclear. Perhaps - the image of restoring the system in case of a nuclear war (I don’t imagine any other options - the system, in my opinion, is not killed at all). Plus a memory card. You can add music, video to the card, but you can put applications. And the internal memory is burning very quickly. Where - it is not clear. With the purchase it was available 3.9 gigabytes (out of 8 !!!). Now it's 2 gig. 1.9 GB is occupied by the system, 1.7 - applications, 380 MB of card, 451 MB of temporary files (can be deleted), and the mystical “Other” on the floor gig. What kind of other - I have no idea. 2 free gigas - it seems like a lot, but still it’s not so easy.



Batteries last for 1 day of intensive use (call, email, toys, Internet, a pack of live tiles, Skype forever in the background and 10 times an hour to turn on the screen to admire). If the phone is used to complete without stopping - hours 5-6 of its limit.

A separate conversation is a holivar topic of multitasking. I have always said that full-fledged multitasking on a smartphone is an evil, tormenting the already poor resources of mobile chipsets, but in Windows there is a bias in the other direction - multitasking is provided in the system, but blocked more abruptly than the file system. Background processes can work quietly — downloading mail, music, downloading and installing applications (!) —And not a bit slowing down the system, background services ... But here’s how the application works in the background — if you please. Even native Skype. His tile regularly broadcasts new messages, but Skype collapses as dead as a mammoth when rolled up. And the process of resurrection takes a few seconds - and this is annoying. Of course, this provides unreal responsiveness of the system, but, as it seems to me, in this case in Microsoft, we are a little too smart - and we hope that this “feature” is considered untenable and will be done as it should. Let them take an example from the same iOS - there is a freezing bun, but the applications do not die for good.

A couple of words about the phone itself: with external styling, they still saved on everything they could. I have already spoken about the compass. So, there is no flash at the camera (like a flash - it is not needed, but as a flashlight - not enough :), cheap ... no, very, very, very super-cheap headset headphones and the same charge (the wire is thin and all the time winds), and even the data cable is 20 centimeters long ... 20! CENTIMETERS! That's really - the phone as a flash drive :) Not the most powerful battery (count on the day of work, not more). But if you remember the price - this phone can not be forgiven so much - its silicon and iron filling is first-class. And the sound in the headphones is good. Here, believe me - I have headphones at the price of this phone, and my ears are growing from where I must (and have heard a lot) - they told me everything.

And now let's summarize. I think I was able to tell enough for everyone to understand for themselves whether he should communicate with Windows Phone or not. For myself, I will answer: yes, it is. Let the system have some shortcomings, even if not everything is finished and some features of the OS are puzzling, but, nevertheless, Nokia and Microsoft have managed to create a wonderful product that has its undeniable advantages. Let not everyone like the new tiled design, but a big and fat plus should be put only for what it is - for the first time in almost 30 years, someone had the courage to invent something really new in the design of interfaces. And who does not like it - no one forces to use.

Personally, I wish good luck to Nokia and Microsoft, and let there be competition! We, the users, from her only better :)

PS We kindly ask you to avoid holivars in the style of Android VS Windows Phone and Nokia, why are you not on Android . Better quietly vote.

And at the end of a few polls.