Review: N76 - A Motorola RAZR wannabe?

[redbeacon]

Nokia phone attempts to be a Razr

by Wilson Wong

Digital Life (Straits Times)

 

http://i17.tinypic.com/6aoyohs.jpg http://i15.tinypic.com/6bwosj8.jpg

 

Seems like someone is mirroring someone. That was my first reaction when I saw the Nokia N76.

 

Black, thin, metallic trims, mirror-fininshed external screen, laser-etched key-pad -- all that is so reminiscent of the Motorola RAZR, but when you're talking about the Nokia N76, it simply misses the mark when compared side-by-side with the swanky looking RAZRs.

 

What concerns me most is the usability and the placement of the ports, screens and buttons and the design of the phone itself.

 

Take its laser-etched metallic keypad. Though the N76 tries to mimic the RAZR, which of course invented the metallic etched-out keypad first -- the layout looks stiff and the grooves are not as free-form as the RAZR's

 

The N76 has 2 screens -- the main LCD screen inside, as well as an external screen on its cover. The external screen is just 160 by 128 pixels in size -- smaller than a postage stamp. So small that I find limited use for it.

 

This phone has good features such as the easily accessible media buttons on the conver, a fairly loud speaker and a 3.5mm stereo phone jack for music listening pleasure.

 

But the placement of the phone jack, which is right on top of the phone, is a problem. The head phone bulg and wires do not allow me to fully flip the clamshell open -- only three-quarters of the way up. A huge design flaw it is!

 

The hinge is so tight that you might require weight training for your thumb just to flip the phone open. Worse, unless you have long fingernails or even a spoon, trying to dig your thumb in to open the clamshell phone is difficult, if not impossible.

 

The poor implementation of the miniSD card slot cover is the last nail in the N76's coffin: Made of plastic, it is ill-fitting, and sticks out its rear-end, ruining the sleek lines of the phone.

 

FINAL SAY

The Nokia N76 is one phone that cannot justify itself as one from Nokia

 

~ Wilson Wong, associate lecturer and gadget enthusiast

[guanjie]

n76 really cant make it..

my gf is holding to a prototype and the whole fone simply sucks

lousy design constructed with inferior materials

argh

[marvypower]

heard that Nokia made a recall...