Nokia 808 PureView Sim Free Mobile Phone - Black

The Nokia 808 is a fantastic phone. Unfortunalely, this review can't be about the Nokia 808.
In september, I decided to buy the 808 after reading about it's outstanding camera. After going to Nokia's UK official web page, I was redirected from there to Amazon UK. The default Amazon page showed a Nokia 808 sold through a company called TF Tradefs & DGS Group, UK Sim-Free Phone. Amazon claims this on it's page: "What is a UK Sim-Free Phone? The product will come fully sealed with a UK plug/plug adapter inside the box. It will have a manufacturer's warranty that is valid in the UK. It will not have a network logo or have previously been locked to any network. It will be the manufacturer's specification for the UK; e.g. it will have a UK keyboard/touchscreen keyboard". I went ahead and ordered the Nokia, which was delivered on due time. Once I switched on the phone for the first time, I had to go through the normal language, time and location settings. It showed a choice of various Asian languages plus English, which is the one I needed. The maps loaded by default were Asian too, so I downloaded the United Kingdom one. I never thought there was anything wrong about these settings, perhaps the phone is manufactured in Asia and shipped by nokia to the UK with an English keyboard and UK warranty. In fact, didn't I follow from beginning to end the official channels: Nokia GB to Amazon UK? Well, I was mistaken, only I realized that weeks later.
My SIM card holder came off, so I went to a Nokia Care Center in London. Once there, the engineer checked my warranty using the IMEI code, and discovered the phone had a Malaysian warranty, so Nokia couldn't service the phone in the UK. Even after I offered paying for the repair. Thereafter, the phone has been returned to the seller and I have contacted Amazon several times asking them for a replacement honouring the price I paid originally, as the seller has decided to process a refund, which I'm still waiting to receive after over two weeks. I believe Amazon holds some responsability for advertising a Malaysian phone as a UK phone in their default page, making it look official and trustworthy. Even though this phone wasn't sold by Amazon, the marketplace seller is given the main display page that appears as a link from Nokia UK. I think this is utterly misleading.
Currently, the seller seems to be a different company. If you intend to buy this phone through Amazon, be aware it might not be what you expect.

I have been using this phone for the last three months so though I would share my opinion.

This phone does exactly what I need it to pretty much flawlessly.

As a camera which I will always have with me it has allowed me to capture photos and videos with quite amazing sound which I would have otherwise missed since I don't walk around with my Dslr.

If you want a gaming machine or a general app consumer, this phone is not for you, personally I have a tablet for doing those things. If you want the ability to be truly creative with your photos (not using strange retro filters) then this is the phone you want.

I am incredibly pleased with my purchase and would only consider buying a phone which had a better camera than this.

When I read about the phone way back in Feb I was very interested in it, but at the same time dismissive because of the name: Nokia.

However, the more I read about it and the more I learnt about Belle, I thought I would give it a go. And boy am I glad that I did.

Although when I first took it out the box and turned it on my heart sank, because I had an awful sense of deja vu, that somehow I was stepping back into the past.

But very quickly these concerns vanished. For example, synching my contacts was the easiest I experienced either on the Android platform or the IOS. Within about 3 mins of un-boxing the phone I had all my contacts synched and my email set up. Now bear in my mind,my last Symbian phone was the 'Matrix' style one. Very impressive, without having to read the user guide.

Equally easy was setting up a wi-fi connection and transferring my songs. I kid you not it was hassle free as doing the same process on the other two platforms (and I have owned both)

Overall I am impressed with the OS. No it dosen't have the slickness of IOS4 or ICS but I would put it on par of say Gingerbread or the first IOS. It has proved very, very stable and I don't really have any complaints with it. I have all my basic apps covered off. Evernote (tick), Podcast (tick), OneNote (tick), Shazam (tick) and I could go on but you get the drift. No it dosen't have 100 versions of fart apps like Android or IOS but what it does have will get you most of the way there. I do miss my Movies app and one or two other things, but they are things that I can live without.

So how does it better an iphone or S3? Okay here are a few ways. The battery lasts forever. I can play my music in my car through the FM transmitter without getting tangled in cables. I can play video and music from my phone straight to my tv or stereo (no set up required), Nokia Drive is better than Googles offering, Sound quality is amazing (proper sound and not a tinny noise), phone call quality is better, GPS lock happens in seconds. And of course, last but not least an AMAZING CAMERA.

So there you have it. I could have bought an S3 or iphone(or waited for the new one to come out) but I did not want to be a sheeple. Everybody is like lemmings and they repeat bad things about Symbian when they haven't used it or because it dosen't have the latest fart app. I could go, but I think you get the gist that I am a very happy customer at the moment. I live in a house where my family has 2 iphones, S3 and the latest HTC and I do NOT FOR A MINUTE feel that I am missing out. I have a proper phone/convergence device and not some cheapo plastic toy running a gizzillion processors for no good reason other than for marketing purposes.

If only Nokia had the balls to believe in themselves, they would not be in the mess they are in.

In conclusion I would say that the latest crop of Androids and no doubt the next gen iphone are like Russian glamour girls. All pretty and will take your breath away at first sight. But get past that and the novelty soon wears off. The 808 is like Ugly Betty. No oil painting, but you know that every evening you can come home to a cooked dinner and a clean house and she may surprise you just how well she 'scrubs' up. The question is which type of woman do you want in your life?