Thanks to WOMWorld’s Trial Program, I now have a shiny red N76 at my command, at least for the next 2 weeks anyway.
If you’re a blogger (or a pretty well-known forum power user), you can sign up for the program and get the chance to test out/trial some newer Nseries phones. Check it out.
And now for my initial impressions of the Nokia N76. Full review coming soon.
My first impressions of the Nokia N76 phone: sleek and sweet.
- The N76 is definitely much thinner than expected. It’s a tad bit slimmer than your typical RAZR V3 phone. It’s also noticeably longer than the RAZR.
- I like the weight. It’s heavy enough that it feels solid and has a nice heft, but light enough so that it’s not a burden in your pocket. (the N80 is almost .7 ounces heavier)
- Build quality is excellent. The N76 feels like a million bucks – you don’t get that plastic feel associated with cheaper phones.
- I’d have to call this Nokia’s “densest” phone ever created – removing the back cover exposes the entire back housing, which is so tightly packed that Nokia barely found space to insert a SIM card.
- Speaking of which, the process of removing the SIM card is a little odd – you have to pull a yellow tag which is connected to a small piece that holds the SIM card. Problem is the piece is completely removable (it’s not connected to the phone in any way). Losing one of these would not be fun.
- The flip opens and closes with a firm click. It’s also pretty tight in terms of movement – you can’t flip open the N76 with one hand very easily.
- Music sound quality is good, but the stereo speakers are not quite on par with the N95′s.
- There’s almost zero lag (post-processing?) after taking a picture. Wow. That’s unheard of on any other Nokia phone I’ve used.
- You can’t exit the Music Player. This has got to be a bug.
- The N76 keypad is responsive and provides pretty good feedback even though the buttons aren’t raised. On the flip side, it’s also easily smudged and covered with fingerprints. Can’t win ‘em all.
- That idle mode blinking blue light is inobtrusively hidden by the mirrored surface (front flip), in contrast to the N80 where it was in-your-face and just flat out annoying.
- The dedicated music buttons are actually useful, since they also control the camera options as well as the music player when the flip’s closed.