Nokia has launched new Windows Smartphone, Nokia Lumia 630, in India. This is the first Lumia series Windows phone loaded with Windows Phone 8.1 OS. Slated to be successor to Lumia 520 (2013), ‘630’ comes in two variants of Single SIM & dual SIM, at different prices. The company has positioned the phone in lower-mid (10-15k) phone segment.
Nokia is the only company in market, offering Windows 8/8.1 & Android OS Smartphone in lower & mid-range category. In terms of SoC, 2014 marks new SoC for Lumia devices launched. In year 2013, where mid-range Nokia Windows Smartphone came equipped with Qualcomm’s S4 Plus SoC (Krait CPU) & Qualcomm Adreno 305 GPU, this year Lumia ‘630’, the first of Lumia series Smartphone, is equipped with Qualcomm 400 Series SoC (ARM A7 CPU) & Adreno 305 GPU. The shift in choice of SoC indicates some requirement on performance from Windows 8.1 OS. For obvious reasons, GPU/Graphics experience on ‘630’ might be similar to its predecessor.
Nokia 630, loaded with Windows 8.1, marks some minor updates from earlier 8.0 version. Nokia, now part of Microsoft, has charted the Phone OS upgrade path for future devices, leading to upgrade of Phone OS to 9.0 in 2015. We do see, some interesting features including Word flow & improved HERE maps for better navigation incorporated with Lumia ‘630’ devices. There’s also support for BeiDou navigation added. But otherwise, apart from these minor upgrades, ‘630’ doesn’t have much fan-fare to its disposal.
Going forward, every Smartphone, especially in lower mid-range (10-15k), has started looking very similar & it’s hard to choose the better one by just going through feature lists. And really speaking, as an end user, you really don’t bother if the phone has Qualcomm or MediaTek SoC. Most often you would find all OEMs do have same SoC, Processor & other hardware parts integrated inside their devices. Forget hardware, almost most of them run on latest Android OS platform. So unless you own a very high end Smartphone or have iPhone, things would be same to good extent, despite OEMs far cry on claims of better devices than their competitors.
To simplify things, we can really think from user’s perspective. We have shortlisted five major parameters, on basis of which, you can compare any device in market, especially in lower & mid-range segment. And on the basis of that we can rate or even tell which device performs better overall.
Most often you would find choice of SoC dictates the performance of the phone to great extent. RAM size or even internal storage becomes important in some cases. Displays, be it IPS, LCD or AMOLED, although different in their capability, have become less important. Phone sizes & weight could be important, if you are looking to use Smartphone for particular application like HD Movie streaming, Gaming or even reading. Certification for Water/Dust/Heat proofing looks good, but you really don’t choose phones on basis of that.
There’re other subtle parameters, including position of internal antennas, speaker-mic location, position of camera- flash & its availability, position of capacitive buttons on screen & phone build material-quality which you can think about before evaluating devices. But overall, these five parameters would guide the evaluation. And in end, it boils down to individual users, who value something over other in devices before making choices.
The five parameters are device’s performance for Connectivity, SoC/GPU/HD experience, Camera performance, Battery life & Phone’s build quality. We have evaluated two Smartphones, namely Moto ‘G’ & Nokia ‘630’ on basis of that. Here it goes:
| Moto ‘G’ | Nokia ‘630’ | |
| System on Chip/GPU/RAM-Storage | Performance’s little better due to higher ‘RAM’ but has fixed storage. | Performance would similar to ‘G’, but some Apps running issues due to low RAM. Storage expandable. |
| Connectivity (Cellular/Wi-Fi/NFC/GPS/BT) | Perform equally ‘Good’ | Perform equally ‘Good’ |
| Build Quality + Display/Size | Equally ‘Good’ | Equally ‘Good’ |
| Battery Life | Little Better compared to ‘630’ | Reasonably ‘Good’ |
| Camera Experience | Equally ‘Good’ | Equally ‘Good’ but no Front Camera. |
Apart from above list, Moto ‘G’ comes with much powerful Android Jelly Bean (4.3) OS, which can be upgraded to Android Kitkat (4.4). Nokia ‘630’ is loaded with new Windows 8.1 OS and there’s no clarity of future upgrade path for ‘630’ devices, which is often the case with Windows phones. Also some of key apps, in various categories, are still missing from Window’s marketplace, while Android offers universal appeal when it comes to APP store. If you go by sheer number, Android has better OS Ecosystem as compared to Windows Phone.
Moto ‘G’, priced at Rs 13999 (Ex-Flipkart), offers little better performance & some better features, but priced higher as compared to Nokia ‘630’, which is priced at Rs 11,490 (DUAL SIM Ex-Flipkart).
With opening of doors by Microsoft, for sub 9 inch category devices, where any OEM can use Windows Mobile OS on their devices for free, I believe more & more OEMs could challenge Nokia in its own game. Days are not far, where you would see Micromax and others, launching devices on Windows 8.X platform. Nokia, when positioned ‘630’ (At Rs 11500 Dual SIM), surely understand the fact that, OS differentiation might not work in longer run.
Nokia ‘630’ seems to be better choice at given price, but let me remind you that we have yet to see performance of Window Mobile 8.1, especially on given hardware. We often see challenges of new OS with first launch devices, which are often fixed in later patches/upgrades.
If you are not keen on Windows experience, go with relatively better Android device at little higher price. But if you are looking to try latest Windows mobile experience and low on budget, surely Nokia ‘630’ offers value for money.
