Disappointing N96 from Nokia
The last couple of days I’ve been testing the new Nokia N96. It hit the streets in Norway a week ago. So far I’m pretty disappointed when it comes to video and still image quality. Since a part of my job is to educate journalist in mobile journalism, I spend a lot of time testing new phones. I will not dig into all sorts of technical specifications about the new model from Nokia, but I have made a little comparison with Nokia N82.
I put the two phones side by side on tripods. The lightning conditions were not the best, and I had some sharp light coming from behind. These are not unusual conditions and represent working conditions for MOJOs.
You can check out the difference between the two cameras for yourself. One thing to make a note of is that the video files from N96 are much larger than the files from N82. They actually use different codecs. The original file from N82 was 17 MB and the file from N96 was 36 MB. They both where 640×480 pixels with 30 FPS.
Video N82
Video N96
The sound recording on the N96 is also not as good as the one on the N82. When it comes to still images, I think the N82 is much better than the N96.
The biggest advantage with the N96 is the two LED lamps. You can actually use them in a completely dark room, and they will help you record a video that is usable. The N96 also comes with a 16GB storage built in. You can even choose to expand with a Micro SD. This is a very good solution if you use a sound recorder or video recorder on the side with SD card. You can then use the N96 as a modem without having to shut down programs on the memory card.
In my opinion Nokia has produced the N96 for playing music and watching videos. Not so much producing stilling images and videos, witch in my opinion is a pity. It’s been about a year since N82 hit the street, I find it very odd that Nokia isn’t able to up the quality of the video recording. It’s actually lower quality than before. I would not recommend buying the Nokia N96 if you intend using it as a mobile journalist. You get a much better result with the Nokia N82 or N95 8GB.
