NOKIA LUMIA 830

The Last Product of the Nokia Legacy

I’ve been playing around with the Lumia 830 for a while now, so here is my breezy review of the final smartphone to bear the legendary Nokia name. A brief background of the smartphone; Before the Lumia Icon/930 was released, this 830 was Microsoft’s ‘affordable flagship’ for the Lumia range. Even though the 830 has since lost its prestigious status, it is still worth checking out. Now let’s jump into the device.

Glancing back at the term ‘affordable flagship’, one surely wonders why the unusual pairing of words since flagships are usually beyond what a consumer would deem affordable. Well the Nokia Lumia 830 comes with the PureView stamp on its 10 megapixel camera, wrapped in its solid and classy casing, all with the price tag of just RM1,399; Definitely an enticing package indeed.

The Looks Department
Alright so when I mentioned solid and classy casing, I have to admit that I was looking at the screen and the top half of the device. I did a double-take the moment I flipped it over because instead of the silver or black I was expecting, I got orange. The 830 is carrying on the Lumia’s range of bright and fun colours but as much as I loved the previous iterations, this one does not go well. The orange clashed rather horribly and looking at pictures of the green back cover also made me cringe. I suppose colours are very personal, but I would definitely go for the white/black back covers which just ooze elegance. I then reminded myself not to judge a product based on its looks, and closed my eyes and held it in my eyes, turning it over and over. After using it for a while, I’m confident everyone will find the smartphone to be top in ergonomics. It feels good in the hand and every button is placed just right. The only slightly out-of-place port was the USB port which is along the top of the Lumia 830.

Display
You’ll find a 5 inch screen with 1280x720 resolution and a pixel density of 226ppi on this Lumia. Being used to numbers in the higher region for flagships, I had my doubts, but the IPS-LCD panel carries out its duties wonderfully and the lack of Full HD was not felt throughout. Having said that though, users might wish for a Full HD display considering the fact that they have a 10 megapixel PureView camera for use.

Windows Phone 8.1, Quad-core Snapdragon 400 Processor
Preloaded with Microsoft Windows Phone 8.1 Denim, the phone is supposed to have a range of updates like Nokia Camera experiencing a name change to Lumia Camera, and instant video recording when long-pressing the camera button. I say ‘supposed’ because although the phone claims to be running on 8.1, none of those changes were found. But as always, Windows Phone feels pretty great. It now features a notification bar (nicknamed Action Centre) which allows the input of background images to your Live Tiles, as well as resizing.
I have always been a fan of the light and nippy OS. This time around though, I experienced significant lag in certain places. Like booting up the camera can take up to 2 seconds. Huge disappointment for me as the camera is the main selling point after all. This brings me to the Snapdragon 400 processor running with 4 cores clocked at 1.2GHz. Microsoft opted for an older processor so the ‘affordable flapship’ suffers a little bit in terms of processing power. As I said, the camera takes a while to load, but the rest of the apps ran without a hitch.

10 Megapixel PureView
The huge sensor found here finds itself packaged with Optical Image Stabilisation and Carl Zeiss optics. To top it off, Nokia threw in a dedicated camera button, complete with the capability to focus when half-pressed. That really deserves a huge clap on the back. The Lumia 830 has Smart Sequence, so you can take a series of photos and then later on edit them by removing unnecessary objects, or even going through and changing faces in a group shot to make sure everyone is in their best form. For the Selfie-crazed people, you might want to give this device a miss as the front camera is only equipped with a 0.9 megapixel sensor. The Lumia 735 would be better suited for that task as its marketing point is the 5 megapixel front camera. On the subject of video recording, the Lumia 830 is better than the majority of smartphones thanks to its 3 mic Rich Recording.

Others of Importance
The Nokia Lumia 830 has 16GB of internal memory, a microSD card slot which can support 128GB cards and also 15GB of free cloud storage. The 2200mAh battery might seem small on paper, but performs admirably in reality, with credit going to a light OS. It also has wireless charging but you need to buy the additional accessory, slightly defeating the purpose of an affordable mid-range device.

Verdict
After taking everything into account, I have to say the Nokia Lumia 830 is a decent final phone from Nokia. Not the big bang many expected, but certainly above average. You’ve got a superb camera for RM1,399, maybe even lower by now, so it is hard to see you really going wrong with this purchase if you have been a long-time Nokia fan.