At today's event with Microsoft in New York, Nokia announced its new top-of-the-line Windows Phone 8 device, the Lumia 920.
A cut above the Lumia 900 (Nokia's current top-end Windows phone) in just about every way, the 920 looks to be competitive with the rest of the US smartphone market, not just other Windows phones. So before we get into the details here's the bottom line: if you're looking for a Windows Phone 8 handset this fall, then (pending a price announcement, and maybe HTC's Sept. 19 hail-mary) the Lumia 920 should make your decision easy.
Nokia has packed the 920 with a bevy of novel, exciting features; but first let's talk about speed. With a dual-core 1.5GHz Snapdragon S4 processor and 1GB of RAM, the 920 leaves previous Lumia generations in the dust. More importantly though, it's as fast as the Samsung Galaxy S III and HTC One X, at least according to Gizmodo's hands-on report. And unless the rumor mill has been underestimating Apple, it's not unlikely the Lumia 920 will be able to keep up with the iPhone 5 too. All that power requires, well, power, but Nokia assures us the 920's beefy 2,000mAh battery is up to the task.
The Lumia 920's NFC chip and Qi-standard wireless charging support should make for some pretty awesome accessories, and ought to keep the device (foreseeable-)future-proof as mobile payment infrastructures expand and wireless charging becomes more commonplace.
The phone's 4.5-inch screen, which boasts a resolution of 1,280 x 768 pixels, is super responsive in more ways than one. Hands-on reports are reporting no detectable touch latency, and Nokia's Kevin Shields demonstrated the 920 this morning while wearing a pair of fuzzy mittens.
The 8.7-megapixel PureView camera will likely be one of the Lumia 920's top selling-points. Integrated image-stabilization and 1080p video is all well and good (okay, it's awesome), but what got us most excited is the Cinemagraph app, which promises to make it just as easy to waste entire days making your own animated gifs as it's always been to waste entire days looking at gifs.
For the smartphone mortals among us, Nokia has also updated its mid-range Lumia 800. The Lumia 820 looks to be the 920's scrappy younger brother. A slightly smaller (4.3-inch) display with half the pixel-count and no PureView upgrade for the camera are the chief differences, though on the 820 wireless charging becomes an optional feature.
When the time comes to make calls from your Lumia 920 or 820, both phones will support HSPA+ or LTE, presumably depending on carrier availability.
Whether you love the Windows Phone 8 UI or hate it, there's no denying that the current state of the Windows Phone marketplace will probably be the Lumia 820 and 920's main shortcoming. This is the catch-22 of device adoption: developers won't make Windows Phone 8 apps until everybody buys Windows phones; but lots of folks won't buy them until the app selection improves. Preloaded apps like Nokia Maps and Nokia's ESPN app are great; but Apple's App Store and Android's Google Play store will definitely have a leg up for a while.
Can sweet hardware compensate for a limited app market? Let us know in the comments.
Jon Fox is a Seattle hipster who loves polar bears and climbing trees. You can follow him on Twitter and IGN.
Source : feeds[dot]ign[dot]com
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