Windows Phone

The following is a guest post from Mike at NokNok.tv – the place to tap into everything Nokia. 

The Nokia Lumia 800 has landed and while it’s not the first Windows Phone, it’s potentially the most significant. After all, it marks a shift in thinking and approach by Nokia and pushes its smartphone strategy away from Symbian and in a completely new direction.

This was backed up at Nokia World 2011 in London; when Nokia CEO, Stephen Elop, got on stage and announced that the Lumia 800 was the first ‘real’ Windows Phone device, he was talking about hardware and software working perfectly in sync.

At NokNok.tv we may be biased – we’re huge Nokia fans – but we think he was right. Straight from the box, the Nokia Lumia 800 simply works. It’s one of those devices that in some strange way just feels right as soon as you pick it up. It looks great too, which comes as no surprise with Nokia’s long history of design, but it’s the little details, such as the slight curve to the glass which helps the Windows Phone OS simply pop into view, or the slim shape of the device itself that really appeal.

It’s not just the hardware we’re impressed with, as we’ve found working with Windows Phone couldn’t be simpler. Setting up and personalising the device has proved incredibly easy – we were amazed, for example, at how simple getting email and synchronising Contacts and Calendars were.

If you’ve never used Windows Phone before you’ll notice the Live Tiles as soon as you pick up the phone, which are very intuitive and easy to navigate. The simple two-page interface allows you to pretty much instantly find what you’re after, while you can pin your favourite and most commonly used apps to the Windows Phone Start screen in an order that suits you, making it infinitely personable.

Dig a little deeper and you’ll find that Windows Phone is the perfect platform for anyone exploring the world of smartphones for the first time. It’s clearly the easiest to use, as Tiles just works – we particularly like that you can instantly see if any changes have occurred, with no need to push icons and drop into apps, like on most other platforms we could mention.

When it comes to apps, the Windows Phone Marketplace has also been something of a revelation, as it’s easy to navigate and use, so getting hold of apps like Spotify or Cool Tools has been easy. It’s also great for games, as the kids can attest to, with the likes of Kinectimals. Sure, it’s got some catching up to do in terms of variety and sheer volume of available apps, but it’s amazing to see new ones popping up almost every day!

It’s early days for the Nokia and Windows Phone partnership, but with the Nokia Lumia 800 hitting the ground running, and the Nokia Lumia 710 set to launch soon, it looks like the start of a beautiful relationship – not only one for Nokia and Microsoft, but also one for NokNok and Windows Phone!

If you’d like to know more about our thoughts on the Nokia Lumia 800, then check out our review at NokNok.tv