Josh Topolsky Reviews the Nokia Lumia 900

He loves the hardware build quality and found battery life to be good, even with LTE, but:

Let me just put this bluntly: I think it’s time to stop giving Windows Phone a pass. I think it’s time to stop talking about how beautifully designed it is, and what a departure it’s been for Microsoft, and how hard the company is working to add features. I am very aware of the hard work and dedication Microsoft has put into this platform, but at the end of the day, Windows Phone is just not as competitive with iOS and Android as it should be right now.

Before you cry foul, keep in mind that I went into this review wanting to fall madly in love with this phone. But like a book with a beautiful jacket and a plot full of holes, I found myself wanting more. A lot more.

I’ve been trying a Lumia 800 on and off for a few months, and I couldn’t say it better myself — especially regarding third-party app design and performance, and the quality of IE compared to Mobile Safari and Chrome for Android. It’s like Topolsky took the words right out of my mouth.

(As for the hardware, I haven’t tried the 900, but I strongly suspect I’d prefer the 800. The physically-bigger 900 seems like the worst of both worlds: a 4.3-inch display that’s too big to traverse corner-to-corner with your thumb while holding the phone one-handed, but with the same exact 800 × 480 pixel count as all other Windows Phone devices to date. At least with cutting-edge big-ass Android phones, you get more pixels, up to 1280 × 720. The 900 offers two advantages over the 800 — LTE and a front-facing camera. I think I’d rather have the smaller form factor and superior battery life of the 800, if I were in the market for a Windows Phone.)

★ Tuesday, 3 April 2012