OK. So this the blog post where I pretend that 360east is Engadget and where I provide you with a full review of Nokia’s latest and greatest: the N97.

🙂

Not really. I don’t think the world needs another late review of the N97. And no. This is not engadget.

Instead, I will provide you with my narrow, personal perspective on the week I spent with the N97, which was provided to me by Nokia’s Levant people.

What I did with the N97 as soon as it was out of its box was to immediately transfer all my contacts and calendar entries on to it from my current Nokia XpressMusic 5800, which was easy with the Switch application. Essentially, I made the N97 my actual phone for a few days and I carried the device around with me everywhere (partially to impress co-workers too

On the emotional level, every major phone release these days comes loaded with expectations of an “amazing experience”. Nokia’s promotional videos show the the N97’s keyboard elegantly popping out, via a super cool hinge. We also see the customizable home screen with cool social networking and media component whizzing across it. All of this happens on a background of loud techno music.

So when I had the phone in my hand, I wanted it to “wow” me. The hinge that pops out the keyboard is cool. But the minute you start interacting with the phone, the wow factor is muted.

Don’t get me wrong. This is a fully loaded device. Nice screen. Great industrial design. Decent QWERTY Keyboard. 5 MP camera and front camera too. GPS with compass. 32 GB of memory. This is a frightening beast.

But what Nokia is still failing to deliver is the software experience. Symbian S60, even in its touch incarnation, just feels clunky and old. Not even the Ovi-styled icons save the interface from looking dated. And then you have those constantly annoying pop ups asking you questions or notifying you of stuff. Do you want to connect. Do you want to use this or that access point? It just goes on and on!

For sure, the customizable 4 widget area on the home screen is a great idea. The interface of Symbian S60 is functionally sound. The issue is that it’s just wow-factor free.

The Apple iPhone has simply created this benchmarks of how phone interfaces should feel in the 21st Century. Then the Palm Pre came along with its own interface wow factors. Nokia still doesn’t have it. And this goes beyond their phones. I recently installed and played around with the Ovi store. Not impressive at all.

As a user of Nokia touch interface on the 5800, I was totally familiar with the N97 immediately. The only major difference was the customizable home screen, where I managed to add a Facebook widget, a Bloomberg widget and the Accuweather widget. Now that I have give the phone back, I am wondering: why doesn’t Nokia make this homescreen functionality available on the very similar XpressMusic 5800 (both are touch devices, both have the same screen resolution, so there should be nothing stopping Nokia from introducing the homescreen concept on the 5800). In fact, I found that numerous blogs and discussion forums are asking this question too.

The major thing about this phone, seems to be the physical keyboard. I am sure that this will be a big selling point for some people. But I simply don’t see the point. On my 5800 I am actually pretty happy with the virtual on-screen keyboard. I am not really the “executive” type who has to hammer out emails and messages all the time. So this keyboard is simply additional weight for me. In fact, I once typed a 600 word article on the screen keyboard of the 5800 on an airplane. I just don’t need a keyboard.

In fact I was annoyed that Nokia decided to kill the on-screen QWERTY keyboard on the N97. It seems that if you want to use QWERTY you HAVE to use the physical keyboard!

Nokia also seems to insist on those resistive screens (which need more of a fingernail click and not a light touch of the finger). Another factor taking the shine of the N97.

The best thing for me personally about the N97 was the 5 MP camera. Much better than the 3.2 MP camera on the 5800. Quite responsive and fast, not to mention better photo quality in lower light conditions. This is one of those areas where Nokia still manages to wipe the floor with the iPhone.

Another aspect of the N97 (or S60 in general) where Nokia still beats Apple, is multitasking. I recently read an interesting post on Engadget that basically destroyed the iPhone when it comes to its use as a productivity or “work” environment. The problem with the iPhone is that it only runs one application at a time, making switching between apps rather annoying. On S60 devices there is no such limitation.

But I want to avoid further iPhone comparisons (don’t get me started again. the iPhone already has over 50,000 apps for example). My personal comparison is with the 5800.

I bought the 5800 as soon as it came out because I wanted to text via a QWERTY keyboard and because I wanted an easier to use browser to interact with than the one on my older N95. I also appreciate Nokia’s maps for the region. So do I have regrets now? should I have waited for the slicker N97?

Not really. Yes a better camera would be nice on the 5800. But I don’t care about physical keyboards. I also feel that the JD 255 price tag on the XM 5800 is amazing compared to the JD 450 of the N97 (which is more than the price of a typical netbook!).

Interface chunkiness. Lack of interaction wow factor. Lack of an easy software and content offering. These are the curses that Nokia has to live with these days.

Still, the N97 might be a viable choice if you want a device that crosses over from media consumption/creation to social networking/web life to heavy business texting and if you are ready to shell out JD 450 for a phone. And if you don’t care about easy to get apps and games.

As for me, I am sticking with the 5800 for now.

Read these related posts on 360east:

• Nokia 5800 XpressMusic ships in the UAE, Jordan and Saudi Arabia in December ‘08
• Hey Nokia Levant people: I STILL can’t get Ovi to work on Zain Jordan
• Nokia launches war of openness against the iPhone
• The funniest phone problem: Nokia 5800 Xpressmusic screen goes fuzzy when cold!
• Win Nokia Nseries devices with Ikbis in Ramadan