Nokia Lumia 920

Available now
5th September 2012

The Nokia Lumia 920 is one of a pair of Windows 8 smartphones from Nokia, and will probably be among the very first Windows 8 handsets to market.

Nokia scored a moderate success with the Lumia 900 running Windows Phone 7.5, but the new Lumia 920 is a much improved device all around and Nokia must be hoping for greater success.

One thing that you might immediately notice is that the 920 uses a similar design styling to the Lumia 900, Lumia 800 and the N9 with quite square corners that make it look distinctive. Nokia have also added a couple of new colours, yellow and red, to make the handset stand out even more. The display (more of which later) is a subtly curved panel as seen on earlier Lumia handsets, and there are some ceramic elements for strength and durability. Overall it makes it one of the best looking smartphones on the market in our opinion.

The display is a 5.5" 768 x 1280 pixel panel using something Nokia call "PureMotion HD+" which they claim is the brightest smartphone LCD panel on the market and it also has the fastest refresh times, making it ideal for gaming and media playback. The Lumia 920 is also intelligent enough to figure out if you are using it with your finger or a glove, which makes it ideal for those Finnish winters.

The Lumia 920 uses some of Nokia's PureView imaging technology and Carl Zeiss optics, however if you were expecting the awesome 41 megapixel sensor from the Nokia 808 PureView then you will be disappointed. However, the 8.7 megapixel unit in the Lumia 920 has several tricks of its own.. one of the biggest ones is that Nokia have managed to float the camera assembly on springs to help to counteract vibration. This means that the 920 can take smoother videos, and it also means that the phone can take longer exposures leading to clearer photographs.

The clever imaging hardware is supplemented with some clever software, including Smart Shoot that can help to remove unwanted elements (such as passers-by) when taking photographs, a multishot camera and of course you can add more applications from the Windows marketplace. The Lumia 920 can also capture 1080p HD video at 30 frames per second.

Nokia says that wireless charging will be integrated from launch, using the Qi system. This means that you can charge the Lumia 920 easily using a compatible charging plate, media dock or stand and keep the large 2000 mAh battery topped up with ease.

The operating system is Windows Phone 8 with some Nokia enhancements such as free streaming music (with Nokia Music) and turn-by-turn navigation (with Nokia Drive). Internet Explorer 10 and a version of Microsoft Office are included, and the Lumia 920 uses the similar tile-based interface found in version 7. 7GB of cloud storage using Microsoft SkyDrive is also included, and the Lumia 920 also has augmented reality capabilities with City Lens. A special version of Angry Birds will be available from Rovio, called Angry Birds Roost.

Inside is a 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor with 1GB of RAM and 32GB of flash memory. The Lumia 920 measures 130 x 71 x 10.7mm and is reported to weigh a hefty 185 grams. Talktime is quoted as being up to 10 hours on 3G with 16 days standby time.

The Lumia 920 supports WiFi a, b, g and n networks, Bluetooth 3.1 and USB connectivity and also supports GPS and GLONASS positioning systems. Quad-band UMTS (and HSPA+) or pentaband LTE data means that the Lumia 920 will support a wide range of carriers and allows cellular data speeds of up to 100 Mbps where supported.

We don't know how much the Lumia 920 will cost, but it will probably be very competitive with other high-end smartphones. Alternatively, the lower cost Nokia Lumia 820 also has many of the same features but with a significantly cheaper price tag.

The downsides are that Windows Phone 8 is a complete reboot of Microsoft's operating system, and most developers will have to re-work their applications going forward.. and this also means that there won't be a huge number of applications at launch. However, corporate customers may well be interested in the new operating system as it should be possible to manage Windows 8 devices with corporate tools and Active Directory policies.

This is a good looking smartphone, it is also a powerful smartphone and it is distinctly different from Apple and Android rivals. The quality of the screen, camera and the overall construction of the Lumia 920 should attract wavering customers from other platforms.. and both Nokia and Microsoft are certainly in need of a significant sales boost.