While it has been quite some time since Nokia bought its newest flagship – the all metallic Lumia 925 to India, yours truly really hadn’t had a chance to take a look at it. Earlier today though, the wait came to an end. Having extensively played around with its predecessor – the Lumia 920, here are my initial thoughts on what I think you should get if you are considering getting either if these phones. I would have ideally waited to conjure up an opinionated piece like this till I get my hands on a full review unit of the 925 – but then like I said, I think my experience with the Lumia 920 sort of makes me qualified enough to pass a judgement on the Lumia 925 with a few minutes of usage.
The Differences. Similarities
Right. So how different are these two devices anyway? If you are the kind who has the tendency to heavily research on the specifications of handsets you intend to buy, you might already know that both the phones are powered by the same Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 SoC and house the same Krait processor trundling along at 1.5 Ghz. The similarities extend to the amount of RAM (1GB) and the camera as well with both the devices having the “same old” 8.9 megapixel shooter at the back. This doesn’t end here. Both capture videos at 30 fps in full HD and also boast of Nokia’s awesome OIS technology that worked beautifully from my past experience. Even the display resolution remains the same and the Lumia 925 also gets the same old “PureMotion HD+ClearBlack Display” – as Nokia calls it. During the usage of the phone for the 40 odd minutes I had it in my hands, there was no noticeable performance “jump” on the Lumia 925 over the 920. This was expected because of the use of the same chips inside.
So, the Lumia 925 is basically a redesigned Lumia 920, you may say? Well, it is – and it isn’t.
Here’s why.
The Reality
One look at both these devices and you’d quickly realise that Nokia has tried hard (really hard) to make the Lumia 925 look different from the 920. The easiest way to do so was to endow the Lumia 925 with a metallic body. And then Nokia actually did something very awesome. They shrunk the innards of the Lumia 925. At just 139 grams and 8.5mm thick, this one makes the Lumia 920 (189 grams and 10.7 mm) look like a (bloated) supermodel from the yesteryears who is way past her prime. It also made me wonder – if Nokia could make the Lumia 925 this small, why was the Lumia 920 made this big in the first place?!
At first glance, both these phones are easily distinguishable – even to a novice. The lack of a polycarbonate body is sure to be welcomed by many who might have been bored with Nokia sticking to the same old design principle it started off with the N9. Yes, the Lumia 925 is one classy looking thing and if you ask me, I seem to prefer this metallic body to those older Nokia polycarbonate monoliths.
The differences extend to the displays as well. Yes, they are the same resolution and Nokia uses the same marketing mumbo-jumbo to promote either. However, both phones use different display technologies. While the Lumia 920 gets an IPS LCD panel, the Lumia 925 romps home with a totally different Super AMOLED panel. While I didn’t get the chance to put both these phones side by side, it was quite evident that colours look richer and brighter on the Lumia 925. The use of the AMOLED panel will also ensure marginally better battery life – with both the devices retaining similar capacity (2000 mAH) batteries. So if you are the kind who like your phone to have vibrant, oversaturated displays – you know what to go for.
The Camera
Now, now. Didn’t I just say a few paragraphs ago that both these phones have the “same” camera? Well, I did – but I was referring just to the image and sensor size. Now, let me be very clear. The Lumia 920 is one hell of a camera phone. The Lumia 925 is its successor and it is expected to do a better job than the Lumia 920 – and while I am yet to personally experience the differences in image qualities, some of my trustworthy friends do agree that the Lumia 925 is indeed slightly better off than the 920. Only slightly, mind you. This might have to do with the extra element added to the camera lens on the 925. Yes – on paper and in reality, the Lumia 925 does indeed take slightly better images- but the differences would be very difficult to judge. Also to be noted is the fact that on the 925, images will tend to look oversaturated and vibrant – thanks to its AMOLED lineage. Get to a PC and then compare I would recommend to you.
It’s easy, right? I should go buy the Lumia 925!
Well, not really. One major issue with all these unibody Lumias is the lack of support for memory expansion. Now, the Lumia 920 with its 32 GB of inbuilt memory made micro SD cards look (sort of) redundant. But for reasons best known to Nokia, they decided to cut the on-board storage on the Lumia 925 to half of that at just 16 GB! Right – so you have the worlds second best camera phone out there with less than half the storage capacity available compared to it’s predecessor!. The most audacious part of this story is that Nokia actually makes a 32 GB version of the 925. Exclusively for Vodafone.
Someone should sign a petition against this, I say!
Final Call
Moving on to the pricing – from what we saw over the past few days, the Lumia 920 still commands a good premium with its 28-29k price tag. The Lumia 925 on the other hand is (obviously) more expensive at Rs. 32,000 -ish. For the extra 3.5k, you get a (slightly) better camera, a much thinner and lighter phone, slightly better battery life and the constant fear of scratching that metallic body for the next year or so. For Rs. 3.5k lesser you get a similar camera, double the internal memory and a much more stable paperweight. The choice is clear. If you like your phone thin, compact and light and do not really bother much about the internal memory – the Lumia 925 it is! On the other hand, in case you are paranoid about running out of memory whilst recording videos and do not mind having a larger bulge in your pants – the good ol’ yesteryears’ supermodel still has some fight left in her!
I hope I made your decision a tad easier now, did I? 😛
