Nokia N79

The Nokia N-Series range of handsets are essentially multimedia devices that are designed for that specific purpose with of course as much of anything else tossed in. The N79 is quite well equipped with plenty of media and other features but here’s how well it actually fared.

Form Factor
The N79 is a good looking handset with sleek lines and curves that give it a touch of refinement and class. The 2.4-inch TFT LCD sports a 240 x 320 pixel, 16 million color resolution. The keypad is large enough for fingers of any size to operate with ease. Its five way nav-pad employs Nokia’s touch sensitive Navi-Wheel feature that seems to be more refined than any of the other handsets that it features on. To activate the media menu, a designated button is neatly placed on the side. What I didn’t like was the placement of the Menu and Cancel keys. Having them in between keys that are raised made it a bit difficult to access sometimes, especially the Cancel key when it came to erasing while typing a message or mail. Bad move Nokia.

Nevertheless, I still liked the handset’s overall design. A ‘key-lock’ slider, Power button and 3.5mm standard earphone socket are located on the top of the handset. On one side is a concealed flap that houses both the micro USB port as well as the microSD card slot. A small charging port is located on the same side at the bottom. The volume/zoom keys, camera key and a set of stereo speakers are located on the opposite side with a 5MP camera (with a smooth lens cover) and the dual LED flash at the rear.

The handset is also bundled with a set of changeable rear panels to add some color. All cables, including that for TV Out are provided as well.

Features and Performance
The N79 is no different from any other Symbian OS device with a Series 60 UI. With its ARM 11 369 MHz processor there’s no lag when it comes to navigation, screen rotation with the accelerometer or use of the Navi-Wheel operation. There’s nothing new that the N79 has to offer if it’s compared to the N85 that I reviewed just a couple of weeks ago.