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Nokia 7.1 Review: Not Your Father's Nokia

2018-10-27
HMT global or asset again making well-crafted straight forwards and affordable mobile devices the nokia 7 plus was undoubtedly one of the standout phones of last year with a very attractive and sturdy design the welcome implementation of Android one and a big screen it was no frills just a mid-range phone done really well the Nokia 7.1 is not the successor to that phone rather it's the successor to the Nokia 7 which is a much more budget device this is aimed a slightly more budget audience then but it still retains the same focus on affordable quality so has hmd done its again before we dive in and see what this device is actually like to use we first need to get the specs out of the way to which end the Nokia 7.1 is sporting a Snapdragon 636 chipset with either three or four gigabytes of RAM and 32 or 64 gigabytes of storage the latter is expandable up to 400 gigabytes via a microSD card it's running Android 8.1 out of the box the battery is average at 3060 milliamp hours but I'll see you through a day nonetheless the screen is a five-point 84 inch IPS LCD display with a 1080 by to 280 P resolution and a 19 by 9 aspect ratio one of the standout features of the device is that it has the ability to playback HDR 10 content and will even upscale non HDR video the Zeiss branded camera is a 12 megapixel shooter with an F 1.8 aperture and a secondary 5 megapixel depth sensor the front has 8 2 megapixels going for it and an F 2.0 aperture video recording is available up to to 160 P at 30fps is capable of all the usual tricks such as live bakka AR emojis google lens Pro Mode etc but unique to the Nokia is that 360-degree spatial audio which lets you record video with surround sound it's actually quite cool and the both e mode also makes a return here now it also lets you decide how you want to divide up your screen real estate so you can have more footage from the front or rear camera though it is significantly more low-key this time around and harder to find in the camera settings obviously hmd have to that it's not quite the unique selling point that they thought it was but what's more impressive about this device is it's designed from the front it's fairly standard with slim bezels and a bit of a chin around the back though it has a look that belies its 300 pound or 350 dollar price tag with an attractive glass panel and what really sets it apart is the chrome details around the central camera model and around the edges this is 6000 series aluminium and it contributes not only to the handsome look and feel but also to the sense that you could probably stamp on this thing without damaging it Nokia's have been known for their resilience since the 90s I remember kids bragging that they could shoot their Nokia 3310 with a gun so it's great that this is still a feature it's available in either midnight blue or steel the hardware also takes three very important boxes with NFC USB type-c and a headphone jack specs only tell half the story of course and what's more important is how the device is to use the nokia 7.1 is of course no workhorse or power users dreamed you should be able to play most things in the Play Store however when it comes to browsing through the UI there is the occasional hiccup apps take a little bit longer to load the keyboard can take a little bit longer to pop up at times this isn't a deal-breaker for a lot of people but it is noticeable and it does slightly marli overall experience especially as as we'll discuss in a moment there are several devices for the same price or less that don't have this problem actually more time I've spent with a Nokia 7.1 the more I've experienced apps crashing out and bugs to the point where it's actually quite annoying to use at times I rather think this isn't just down to performance but there's a few bugs in the implementation of Android one that HMV need to iron out they're actually generally pretty good with updates so hopefully that will get fixed but for now yes not ideal that performance is helped along though by the fact that of the device is running Android one this is your stripped down vanilla version of Android with no intrusive skin layered on top well some people like their colour os's and their me you eyes stock Android too generally performs better on lower specs devices I'm actually surprised that we don't see more phones using Android one consuming media is nice on here too of course thanks partly to that HDR support as for the camera this actually isn't bad focusing is good con trust looks good and images come out bright and saturated in fact perhaps a little too saturated for some tastes there's a loss of detail when you zoom right in and low-light performance predictably isn't the best when I reviewed the Nokia 7 plus I said that the camera is actually something of a letdown given the specs I was expecting more in this case I say the camera actually performs better than I was expecting my wife and I are actually expecting a baby in the next couple of weeks which is really exciting and of course that means are gonna be taking a lot of photos with your smartphone for that kind of thing a camera like this will do you just fine obviously on the other hand if you're a social media entrepreneur then you might need something a little bit more impressive but now for the million dollar question or the 350 dollar question should you buy this device is it good value on the face of it the Nokia 7.1 there's a lot of things right it's well-made and it's built like a tank an attractive tank in that regard it does manage to pull off the same trick as the Nokia 7 plus but at the same time even in the short amount of time since that devices debut the game has changed this category has become immensely competitive and you now need to do an awful lot more to stand out in such a saturated market perhaps the most obvious competition here in the UK comes from the Motorola one that device costs just a little less at 270 999 GBP but it does involve some significant downgrades the design is nice but not as sturdy the camera is somewhat inferior to this one it's only a snapdragon 6 to 5 and the screen is just 720p so between these two the nokia is a no brainer to me but then again we have stiffer competition from the likes of honor and to be honest the nokia can't really compete with the likes of the honor play the play is less expensive than the nokia but it has a Kirin 970 processor which until very recently was the company's flagship chipset that's in a whole different league in terms of performance and the play also comes with a very attractive metal design a bigger screen and pretty strong camera performance with a whole host of cool features like painting in my opinion beats both you mode then of course there's the highly disruptive poco phone f1 which will set you back even less at around 260 GBP if you order it online these devices make it almost unfair other manufacturers perhaps most damning of all though is the fact that the nokia 7 plus is now only 200 $39.99 unlocked and it's better in nearly every way that's from the same company but ignoring that the reassurance of getting Android 1 is going to be a big selling point for some users others will like this manufactured in Europe and the design is undeniably standout then there's the nostalgia of course that comes from the Nokia brand and many people like using a recognized name like that if this cost 200 quid or if it came out six months ago then I'd say absolutely go for it as it stands it's not the best value for money but let's wait and see what Nokia does with the plus I'm hoping it's going to be something really special so thanks a ton for watching guys hope France video useful and interesting if you did then please share around please leave a like comment down below all that stuff really helps us out if you want to see more like this then please subscribe to the channel hit the bell button for notifications if you want to read the full 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