Nokia N81 8GB review: Black Beauty? (See all reviews)

Designed for Nokia’s new online portal called Ovi, the N81 8GB comes packed up with brand new spectacular features for our media entertainment, Symbian 9.2 OS with N-Gage platform, all in a beautiful slider design.

Similar to other handsets from the N series, the Nokia N81 is quite a large and heavy phone, but at a closer look you will realize this is a gorgeous phone with a stylish design.

Main Features:

- Symbian OS 9.2 S60 3.1 UI
- Massive storage space
- New N-Gage platform with dedicated gaming keys
- Brilliant 2.4" 16M-color QVGA display
- Wi-Fi support 
- 2 megapixel camera 
- Touch sensitive Navi wheel - 3G for video calls

Disadvantages:

- Uncomfortable keypad
- Mediocre camera
- 140 g weight
- No HSDPA

As you all have heard by now, Nokia has released two versions of the N81 handset. The standard version features a microSD card slot, while the version we will be analyzing in this review, comes with 8GB onboard memory.

We should mention from the beginning that Nokia has built the N81 on the concept of a new gaming experience.
Much of the front top half of the handset is taken up by the large color screen. It's very crisp and sharp with brilliant colors, making the N81 ideal for playing games or viewing videos.

The handset is of solid build, with high-quality sturdy materials used on the casing and the slider construction also seems very reliable though it somewhat lacks smoothness.

On the top right corner of the front panel we have the video call camera while in the middle top we have the gaming keys on each side of the ear speaker.

The central element of the front panel is the Navi Scroll, framed within a pad with four dedicated music keys. Beneath this frame we have the Menu and Clear keys, while at the side of the D-pad we can find the keys for Call and End, placed on the phone’s edges. Except for the Multimedia key all the other buttons are completely flat.

On the left and right side of the handset we have both stereo speakers, symmetrically placed at the top in order to have a better sound quality when the device is held in hand.

On the phone’s top we can see the lock switch, replacing the old key combination locking system and the 3.5 mm standard audio jack for regular headphones, while on the bottom side we have the mouthpiece, charger plug, microUSB slot and the wrist strap eyelet.

Both volume controller and dedicated camera key are located on the right side of the device.

The numeric keypad is completely flat and has very thin lines for separating each row of keys. Even though the keys are quite large we had real problems getting used to it and typing texts.

Under the phone’s back panel there is a Li-Ion 1050 mAh BP-6MT Nokia battery. During the tests we have performed with the N81, the battery lasted about four days. The Finnish manufacturer is promising up to 410 hours of standby time, 4 hours of talk time, 11 hours of music playback and gaming close to 6 hours.

The SIM card was placed right under the battery, which makes it quite difficult to remove.

Thanks to its size, 102 x 50 x 17.9 mm, the Nokia N81 feels nice to hold and is easy to handle both with one and two hands at a time.