The Nokia N9 is the new jewel in the N Series crown, and it really does have the full package of looks, power and performance, with liberal helpings of innovation too. Want to know what you have to look forward to? Then read on for our Nokia N9 hands-On preview.
Nokia N9: Full tech specs, plus hands-on video
It's a point that's already been widely made, but the Nokia N9 really is a stunning looking piece of kit. We know because we recently got to spend some time with it at a special briefing in London. Little touches like the way the subtly curved glass display blends into the unibody shell on the sides and the unbroken lines of the button-free front work in harmony to create a phone you won't get tired of looking at in a hurry.
And you probably won't get tired of holding it, either. The Nokia N9 strikes a good balance between heavyweight smartphone features and pocketable portability, and not only does it feel strong and comfortable in the hand thanks to the grippy polycarbonate shell, it also manages to feel lighter than its 135g weight.
Take a quick look at out hands-on photos below and you'll see how compact and slim it is. Nokia has opted for a 3.9-inch AMOLED display running at a resolution of 480 x 854 pixels, and thanks to the button-free hardware, this dominates the majority of the front surface of the Nokia N9. The display itself sits flush with the Gorilla Glass protecting it, which makes it look like icons and the like are floating on the surface.
Nokia hasn't quite finalised the Nokia N9's camera at this point, so we can't judge it too closely. The doubters will suggest that 8-Megapixels isn't enough but this is shaping up to be a must-have. What we can say is, if ever there was proof that pixels are just a number, the Nokia N9 is it. In real-world shooting situations we'd much rather have the Nokia N9 camera's f/2.2 aperture, stunning wide-angle Carl Zeiss optics and most importantly its speed and agility over all the megapixels in the world.
Switching our attention to the software side of things, the most notable point here is of course that the Nokia N9 runs MeeGo, the mobile OS Nokia was working on with Intel before it decided to switch to Microsoft's Windows Phone platform back in February.
The three homescreen approach, with one screen each devoted to apps, notifications and multitasking, is a simple system that works well, and navigating your way around quickly becomes second nature, despite the lack of any physical buttons to fall back on.
The Nokia N9 is all about the swipe – that's how you get between homescreens, for instance, and that's how you get back there: a single swipe inwards from any edge of the phone inwards automatically minimises what you're doing and returns you the homescreen, a simple idea that works well.
Multitasking is equally well executed. Regardless of where you are, you can get to the multitasking screen with a single swipe up or down on the screen, and once you get there you can quickly go straight to any given app by tapping on the screenshot icon, or close it by tapping and holding.
All the way through, the 1GHz ARM Cortex processor zips along merrily regardless of what you're doing, and without the slightest hint that it is taking any serious strain.
Our time with the Nokia N9 was soon over but it showed us a neat glimpse of what's to come. The hardware innovation is nothing like anything else out there and on this evidence alone, the future of Nokia is looking, and feeling, fantastic.
Check out our Nokia N9 Hands-on Preview photo gallery:
