Nokia N95 Cell Phone Review - Software

Alfredo Padilla
Published on May 08, 2007 Comment on this

OS (8.0)

The Nokia N95 runs Symbian Series 60, a smart phone operating system. The version of Series 60 that runs on the N95 is updated over previous versions found on phones like the N73. The updates are fairly minor, adding support for high speed data and stereo bluetooth and a couple of interface changes. The most obvious software change is the multimedia menu, which has changed from a set of four applications to a carousel that holds 9 applications by default. You can add additional applications and you can also add bookmarks from your browser or a radio station.

Apart from these minor changes the N95 will be familiar to anyone who has used a Series 60 device. The active standby screen is still here, as is the familiar menu button, which takes you to a menu of applications. You can easily reorganize these to meet your needs. The pencil button is used to manage your text input options and to make use of the clip board functions. As with previous Series 60 phones we found that it can take awhile to launch applications, but once launched they are very responsive.

The only fly in the ointment is that for some reason Nokia has chosen not to upgrade the RAM on the Nokia N95 over previous Series 60 handsets. This means that when running RAM intensive programs like the web browser, camera and gallery you may find that other applications are shut down in the background, and occasionally everything will be shut down. We wish that Nokia would stop penny pinching with their RAM and up it to a more reasonable 64 MB as found on Windows Mobile devices.

Home Screen Score (7.0)

The home screen on the Nokia N95 is the familiar Active Standby screen found on all modern Series 60 devices. This screen provides indicators at the top of the screen for things like time/date, battery life and signal. Below these is a line of six application shortcuts that are user customizable. Below the shortcuts are plugins for various programs, including the calendar, music (when playing) and Wi-Fi. At the bottom of the screen are two soft keys that are assigned to messaging and clock by default, but can be changed by the user. Overall we found the active standby screen a very well organized, customizable and useful home screen.

Extensibility (8.0)
As a Symbian Series 60 handset you can install any of literally hundreds of native software program on the Nokia N95. In addition the N95 can handle java applications, which run transparently as an application rather than through a java emulator as in Windows Mobile devices. This is one of the major selling points for any smart phone as any deficiencies in the built in software can usually be addressed by installing an alternative third party application. Regular phones like the Sprint Upstage or Sanyo M1 are not capable of this.

Customizability (7.0)
The Symbian Series 60 platform that the Nokia N95 runs is very customizable. In addition to changing the shortcuts on the home screen and media menu, you can also reorganize the applications menu to meet your specific needs. You can change the background image on the home screen to any that you choose, and there are themes available to change the overall look and feel of the device. Font size can also be set to small, medium or large from the settings. We were very pleased with the options to customize the look and feel of the N95.

OS Responsiveness (5.0)
Despite the software and hardware updates on the Nokia N95 compared to the N73 we still found the interface to be a little slow when launching programs. We also still have an ongoing concern about the limited amount of RAM loaded onto this incredibly powerful phone. Especially when running several RAM hungry applications in parallel you will find that applications are shut down in the background. We wish that Nokia would bump the RAM from 48 MB to a more reasonable 64 MB, as found in Windows Mobile devices. Apart from these issues we found the interface to be fairly responsive.

Gaming (6.67)
The Nokia N95 comes loaded with two very good games. Snakes is the standard game found on most Series 60 devices, and is a 3-D version of the classic Snakes game. System Rush Evolution is a more advanced racing game that takes advantage of the Nokia N95's GPU, which is not found on lower end Series 60 devices like the N73. We wish that the controls on the N95 were better for gaming, we especially found the directional pad small and pront to mistaken presses due to the overly prominent central select button. We liked playing games in landscape orientation, as this places the controls on the right side of the device and makes the N95 feel more like a dedicated game play device. We also liked the TV out feature that allowed us to play games using the TV as a big screen. You can add both native games to the N95 or java based games. Overall we were very pleased with the N95's gaming capability, we just wish the controls were better.

Browser Features (11)

The web browser found on Series 60 devices is one of the best on any mobile device. The version loaded on the N95 is updated over previous versions found on phones like the N73. The biggest additions to the browser have been added support for WAP pages and the inclusion of a password manager. It also now supports Atom feeds in addition to the RSS feeds that the original browser supported. The rest is the same, with support for HTML, javascript, flash , images, frames, encryption and cookies. It should be noted that flash support is not complete, for instance you can't watch flash video on Youtube, but flashed based sites like homestarrunner.com works. This makes it one of the most fully featured browser found on any phone.

Browsing Interface (9.5)

The browsing interface on the Series 60 web browser will amaze many who use it for the first time. Pages are displayed just as they would be on a desktop browser. Of course the whole page doesn't fit on the pages, but you can easily get around by using the mini map, which gives you an overview of the page and allows you to quickly move to the section you want. You can zoom in and out of the page, but there is no option to fit a website to your screen. There is also support for rotating the screen built into the browser itself, another new feature, as well as opening links in a new window.

History and bookmarks are as good as ever, with a visual history that shows you a thumbnail of all the sites you've visited previously. As you enter web addresses suggestions from your previous history automatically pop up, as well as suggestions from your bookmarks. You can edit bookmarks after they are created, and there is support for organizing them in user created folders. The menu system on the browser is a little complicated, with several sub menus, finding what you want can often take quite awhile. There are shortcut keys available for the most common functions like switching between windows or viewing the mini map. There is no support for tabbed browsing, nor can you open a new window manually, instead you have to open a link in a new window.

Overall we were very pleased with the web browser on the N95. The feature upgrades in the newer version are generally minor, but do provide some value and the overall experience is excellent.

Browser Access (5.71)
To test how easy it is to access the web browser we count the number of steps it takes to go from the home screen to our website. We use steps instead of a timed test here to take network issues out of the equation. We count entering the web address as a single step. The Nokia N95 took 7 steps to complete this process. This is two steps more than the N73, which is due to an additional step to open the device for text entry and the fact that the web shortcut on the home screen is placed differently.

Calculator (5.0)
The calculator on the Nokia N95 is the same as that found on other Series 60 devices. The functions available are basic addition, subtraction, multiplication and division. There are also commands for +/-, percentages and square roots. The commands are listed on the right side of the screen and you use the directional pad to move to the item you want and select it. The number keys of course enter the numbers you want. Sufficient for calculating tips, if you want a more powerful calculator you will need to install a third party one.

Alarm (1.0)
Unfortunately Nokia has not updated alarms on the Nokia N95, which are part of the clock application. You can still only set a single alarm to go off at the same time every day. Even regular phones have better alarm clocks than this, and it is unfortunate that Nokia doesn't provide a more fully featured tool for users.

Document Software (4.0)
The Nokia N95 ships with a read only version of Quickoffice for viewing Word, Excel and Powerpoint. You will need to pay for the full version in order to edit such files. It also includes a viewer for PDF files from Adobe.

Other Software (2.0)
In addition to the software we have discussed above the Nokia N95 ships with a wide range of additional software. Items that we felt were significant include a file browser and the lifeblog program for blogging from your handset.

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