BIOS: Technology Means Business

Part of Nokia's N Series high-performance multimedia range, the N90 (around £445 ex. VAT without contract) brings Carl Zeiss optics into the mobile arena. The black-and-silver phone is big, bulky and relatively heavy (112x51x24mm, 173g), but its advanced digital camera features will be lapped up by technology enthusiasts who value the ultimate in connected mobile photography. The N90 sports a 2-Megapixel digital camera with autofocus, integrated flash (on, off, automatic and anti red-eye), macro mode for sharp close-ups, and basic video capture with on-phone editing capabilities.

The reason for the N90's existence is that Nokia predicts the cameraphone market will grow to be over four times the size of the digital camera market. There's no denying that the market is growing at an enormous pace, but mobile phone cameras are still way behind dedicated digital cameras in terms of features and performance. The N90 is all about convergence however, and is set to raise the bar with its pioneering multi-hinge twist-and-shoot design and impressive feature set.

Based on the Series 60 platform, the Nokia N90 is a tri-band phone for GSM 900/1800/1900MHz, EDGE (3G) and WCDMA networks. Facilitated by its two screens, the Nokia N90 features two ergonomic modes for quick photo and video capture. Simply twist the rotating camera barrel at the top of the phone and the 2-Megapixel camera (1600x1200 pixels) is ready to shoot high-quality still photos. A dedicated capture key makes snapping relatively easy, and the external 128x128-pixel display (up to 65536 colours) can be used as a viewfinder. Conveniently, the display automatically switches from landscape to portrait mode depending on how you hold the phone.

If you want more control and customisable options, simply unfold and twist the main 352x416-pixel display (up to 262,114 colours) and the N90 is ready to shoot as a digital video camera. It can capture up to 1 hour of MPEG-4 video up to 352x288 pixels and AAC-LC audio. The screen can be used as a viewfinder and dedicated record and zoom keys, including up to 8x digital zoom for video capture, provide for one-hand operation. The downside it that the screens are not touchscreen (navigation is done using a 5-way navigation dial and 5-way joystick), so it's quite easy to get lost within the menu system and not realise how to toggle between still and video camera modes.

With autofocus, pressing the shutter key halfway automatically focuses in on the target, and pressing the key all the way captures the image. Furthermore, the macro mode lets you take close-up images, and Nokia's XpressPrint printing solution lets you select from a range of mobile printing options. For instance, you can print directly using PictBridge, where the phone is connected directly to a compatible photo printer with a USB cable, wireless printing over Bluetooth, or by extracting the Reduced Size Dual Voltage MultiMediaCard (RS-MMC) from the side of the phone and inserting it into a compatible printer.

Photos and video clips taken with the N90 can stored on the phone's rather paltry 31MB of internal memory or the bundled 64MB RS-MMC card. You can then store captured content at full resolution using Nokia's PC Suite Image Store, which, when connected, automatically saves images and video clips to your PC. Images and video clips can also be shared via MMS, e-mail or by uploading them to Web albums directly from the improved rotating Gallery application, which also allows basic on-handset editing of captured images and video clips. In addition, video clips can be trimmed further on a PC with Adobe's Mobile Video Editor software.

If you've got a 3G contract, 3G-enabled features include two-way video calling, video sharing and push e-mail. Every user has access to an organiser, video streaming, Internet browser, clock, alarm, and add-on software (including downloadle Java games). Less impressive is a talktime of just 3 hours, standby time of up to 12 days, and lack of infrared port.

Nokia's N90 offers lots of creative imaging features and is a decent smartphone to boot. It takes high quality pictures, even in low light conditions, and its video camera functions are well above average for a mobile phone. Although ideal for those who like to take pictures and short movies and also want the flexibility of a mobile phone, the N90 is let down by its size and poor operating life from the 760mAh Lithium-Ion battery.

If you take around 20 pictures and a movie clip, you can pretty much bet that the battery will not last a day, which is poor. At the time of writing Nokia has no plans for an increased-life battery, which it really needs. It's doesn't vibrate either, the proprietary headphone jack is a real pain, the integrated memory is restrictive, and there are no stereo speakers. MP3/AAC audio playback capabilities courtesy of RealPlayer should be appreciated (one less device to carry), but video clips were choppy, like stop-motion photography, probably due to their limited 15fps frame rate.

At the end of the day it really comes down to what you really want from a mobile phone, but the N90 is an impressive step forward in terms of convergence. It's quite clear that in the near future we'll only have to carry one type of device - and we can't wait! [7]