Nokia N8 Vs Google Nexus S - Review

[geemcruze]

How do the Nokia N8 and the Google Nexus S compare? More importantly, which one of these super-handsets would win out in a big phone fight?

Size & Weight:
How do our fighters measure up to each other? Well, the Nexus S is the thinner of the two phones, measuring 10.88mm to the N8's 12.9mm. Put the two phones on the scales and the Nokia N8 weighs 135g, while the Nexus S is a shade lighter at 129g.

Connectivity:
Let's consider the wireless options. The technology-crammed N8 boasts 3G/HSDPA (10.2 Mbps), 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 3.0 with A2DP. Google has stuffed its phone with 3G/HSDPA (7.2Mbps), 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR.

Camera:
The N8's 12.0 MP lens features an array of goodies such as: Carl Zeiss optics, Xenon flash, autofocus, geo-tagging, face/smile detection, plus 720p HD video capture and editing. Photos taken with the camera will have a resolution of 4290 x 2800 pixels. For video calls, there's also a second, front-mounted camera.

Even with Autofocus, LED flash, geo-tagging, touch focus and 720p video recording, the Nexus S's 5.0 MP camera underwhelms compared to the N8. It does, however, boast an additional camera on the front, which is ideal for video calling.

Screen/keyboard:
The design of Nokia's N8 features a 3.5-inch touch-sensitive AMOLED screen, with a resolution of 360 by 640 pixels. The pixels per inch (PPI) measurement here is 209.714.

In contrast, the 4.0-inch touch-sensitive Super AMOLED display on Google's phone is bigger, measuring 4.0 inches. The resolution (480 x 800 pixels) means that the comparative PPI is 233.25.

Software:
The N8 runs the much-improved, but underwhelming Symbian 3.0 software, while the Google Nexus S uses a pure Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) build.