The N81 8GB is a really good looking device and its one of the best from Nokia. The build quality is really good. The slider is very solid and does not wobble like the initial N95s. The phone is also quite heavy at 140g which is more than the N95 and N95 8GB which weigh at 120g and 128g respectively. But this is good as the phone feels more real. It feels better to hold than he N95 which is a bit too light. The phone has a glossy finish and it has a really good feel. Some people say that it’s a fingerprint magnet but the fingerprints are not much visible.
DisplayThe display shows up to 16million colors and has a resolution of 320*240. The pictures are crisp. But the screen size is a bit small as it is a Media Player.
The screen size should have been at least 2.6' instead of 2.4'. The UI is quite good. It’s the same as the N95 8GB. It’s easy even for beginners to navigate through the menus.
Music and Video
The music player is the same as on the N95 8GB. As usual, there is support for a huge number of audio formats including MP3, AAC, eAAC+ and WMA.
Tracks can easily be transferred to the phone via Bluetooth, USB or by simply downloading them from the internet. Upon completing a USB transfer, the phone automatically prompts scanning for new music tracks and, if allowed to do so, adds the new ones to the music library.
The quality of music through the speakers and the headphones is really good. The music player has five equalizer presets. The music player of Nokia N81 cannot be switched off once it is started. This is bad as this consumes more RAM. the phone also has a support for the A2DP Bluetooth profile. This means that you are able to play your favorite tracks on stereo Bluetooth headphones.
The Bose headphones are really good. The clarity through them is really amazing. Once you listen to music through them, nothing else around you can be heard. The N81 8GB has Real Player and a flash player. The phone automatically adjusts the orientation of the video. The clarity of videos are really great. But the screen is not useful for watching long videos or films.
Connectivity
N81 has a vast variety of connectivity features. It has a micro USB port. It has Wi-Fi and Bluetooth. Other connectivity features are GPRS, EDGE and UMTS.
Camera
The camera on the N81 is only 2MP. I wish they would have put at least a3MP camera or at least made the picture quality better. The interface is the same as other new NSeries devices such as the N95. The picture quality is bad. There is a front camera for video calls also. The videos can be taken at a maximum of 15fps at QVGA resolution.
Web Browsing
Web Browsing is really good on the N81 and with a wide variety of connectivity options, it just makes the experience better.
Telephony and Messaging
The signal reception is high on the handset. Call quality is really god. There are no disturbances. There are virtually no limits to the number of phonebook entries. Messaging is just fine. But some may complain about the keypad as it is embedded into the phone.
Conclusion
The N81 is certainly a device aimed for the Multimedia Minded people. So if you want an N95 8GB but can’t afford one and still want the special feature then the N81 is the device to buy.This is a device with less disadvantages. I would surely recommend this device to anyone who wants a Media cenered device but can do without a good camera.
The N81 comes with three pre-installed games. All are N-Gage games. The N81 also has two dedicated gaming buttons. Gaming is quite fun on it. The N-Gage platform however has not been officially launched.
