Nokia Lumia 710 Review - T-Mobile's Nokia WP7
by Brian Klug on January 5, 2012 12:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Nokia
- Mobile
- WP7
- Lumia 710
Cellular
Like all MSM8255 devices, the Lumia 710 uses Qualcomm’s onboard combination GSM/EDGE/WCDMA HSPA+ baseband for cellular connectivity. That means HSDPA category 10 on the downlink and HSUPA category 6 on the uplink. Of course, the fact that these HSDPA/HSUPA categories are nothing special at all right now for WCDMA means nothing to T-Mobile, who gladly replaces the “3G” indicator with “4G”.
| Nokia Lumia 710 - Network Support | |||||
| GSM/EDGE Support | 850 / 900 / 1800 / 1900 MHz | ||||
| RM-803 (Europe) WCDMA Support | 900 / 1900 / 2100 MHz (I, II, VIII) | ||||
| RM-809 (T-Mobile USA) WCDMA Support | 850 / 1700 / 1900 / 2100 MHz (I, II, IV, V) | ||||
| Baseband Hardware | QCT MDM8255 w/QTR8615 | ||||
| HSPA+ Categories | HSDPA 14.4 (Cat.10) / HSUPA 5.76 (Cat.6) | ||||
The other noteworthy thing is that the Lumia 710 is also subdivided into two different revisions which carry different WCDMA bands - we were sampled the RM-809 which includes T-Mobile AWS (1700/2100) support. What’s interesting about the RM-809 is that the device also has support for PCS 1900 and Cellular 850, which which means it would work on AT&T, though our device wasn’t unlocked and thus we weren’t able to try. The FCC approval is in place, however. The other Lumia 710 is geared for international support with bands 1, 2, and 8.
I had no issues at all with the Lumia 710 on cellular - connectivity is excellent. Unfortunately I couldn’t get Field Test on the 710 working to read out dBm and check for deathgrip (for some reason it loads indefinitely), however I didn’t see anything odd in my time with the device. In addition I ran speedtests and saw throughput on par with what I expect out of T-Mobile’s HSPA+, though none of the speedtest applications on WP7 allow me to export data and make a nice histogram or two.
WiFi
WLAN connectivity on the Lumia 710 is the standard fare for almost all smartphones these days - 802.11b/g/n (2.4 GHz) single stream. On 20 MHz WLAN channels, that means a physical rate of 72 Mbps, which is precisely what I saw the Lumia 710 authenticate as. I wasn’t able to completely verify, but it seems like a safe bet that BCM4329 is lurking inside. In addition, range signal performance are spot on with where they should be, I saw no issues in my testing.
In our throughput test I saw speeds that almost matched the Lumia 800 (which isn’t surprising at all).
Speakerphone
I spoke a lot about how the Lumia 800’s speakerphone was way too quiet. If the Lumia 800 is one side of the spectrum, the 710 is on the complete other side, as its speakerphone is eardrum-shatteringly loud. In our sound datalogger test, the Lumia 710 placed literally at the top of the ranks for volume, so if you absolutely need speakerphone volume the 710 is an excellent pick. Earpiece volume is also subjectively top notch.
In the call quality department I did the usual thing and recorded samples from the 710 on line in, placed a few calls, and tested noise rejection. The 710, like all WCDMA devices, sounds great to me, though GSM call quality is a bit reduced.
The Lumia 710 does do noise rejection, which has worked its way down from the $200 “superphone” category all the way to the $50 category over the last year or so. The device does common mode noise rejection and some fancy DSP to isolate and cancel noise, and though I’m not sure what IP is in place here (possibly Qualcomm’s Fluence since I don’t see a discrete solution on the board) it does a good job in our test.
GPS
The Lumia 710 unsurprisingly uses the GPS/GLONASS (GNSS) system onboard MSM8255 and accompanied by QTR8615 which we’ve seen numerous times before. Though WP7 doesn’t have API access to NMEA data so we can see SNR from individual satellites, the Lumia 710 does seem to get a GPS lock speedily enough even in some tough environments. In both the maps application and Nokia Drive I had no issues getting a GPS lock in under 5 seconds and keeping the lock for the duration of navigation.
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KTGiang - Thursday, January 5, 2012 - link
HTC Arrive on Sprint. I use one. Or also known as the HTC HD7 Pro in the rest of the world I believe.Spivonious - Thursday, January 5, 2012 - link
LG Quantum has one.3lackdeath - Friday, January 6, 2012 - link
The LG C900 also has a physical keyboard.RollingCamel - Thursday, January 5, 2012 - link
In a previous review you had a Mi-One on your benchmarks and , iiirc, you said that you'll post a review of it soon.kavanoz - Thursday, January 5, 2012 - link
I live in a European country where the carriers are not subsidizing cell phones. Monthly data+voice cost over a period of time is lower compared to a smartphone price so it makes sense to choose between a cheap and expensive phone. There is no 2 year commitment so you should decide if you want to buy a cheap phone and replace it sooner or an expensive one for longer term.In the US the price over a 2 year contract (with a data plan) is substantial compared to the subsidized smartphone price. Usually high end phones sell for $200 and the cheapest ones are $50 or less. I don't think $150-$200 is much enough compared to the overall cost over 2 years (less than $10/mo) so I would only buy the high end smartphones. Carriers should introduce discounted monthly data+voice plans for cheaper smartphones.
DanNeely - Thursday, January 5, 2012 - link
The same long term myopia that results in Joe Luser prefering to end up paying more for his phone in higher monthly rates if he doesn't upgrade it every 24 mo on the spot makes paying anything upfront for the phone unattractive. The cash cow of people not upgrading immediately is also why excepting T-Mobile none of the major US carriers offer discounts once your longterm contract is expired and you're no longer paying down a device subsidy.shompa - Thursday, January 5, 2012 - link
" Microsoft has a great hardware partner in Nokia (arguably one of the best in the business)"Nokia does not built these windows phones. Their insane CEO have outsourced it to South Korean companies (probably HTC). At the same time Nokia's own factories are empty. Nokia's strength were that they could build phones cheaper then anybody else. Now they are locked to a predetermined platform by MSFT and outsource the manufacturing. Since they don't even do the OS, what exactly does Nokia do on their phones today?
BTW. From my knowledge Windows mobile 7.5 is not multi threaded. That is the reason why we only have single core processors. The whole windows platform is played by non/poor multithreading since Windows inception. Google/Apple use *nix. Something that have been multithreaded since late 1960s.
The fact is that MSFT never have been successful in any business there they have had competition. Still today 94% of MSFT profit comes from Windows/Office. Its only in monopoly business that people accept poor products and insane prices. Somehow Office costs 300 dollars on Windows, while MSFT Office for mac can be bought for 30 dollar. The difference is that MSFT have competition on mac. Even at 30 dollars people don't buy it.
Only way for MSFT to make Windows Mobile successful is that they do like they did with Xbox. MSFT have to eat huge losses for almost 10 years. MSFT have already started this strategy by giving free Xbox360 consoles to people who buys Lumia phones and spending hundreds of millions of dollars on advertising.
I have worked for Nokia. They have a special place in my heart. They will not survive with this insane CEO they have. He needs to be fired as soon as possible and Nokia needs to make good Android phones. MSFT mobile won't be successful.
a5cent - Thursday, January 5, 2012 - link
It sounds like you have personal grievances with Elop, and you're allowing that to cloud your objectivity. Most of your post is ill informed blathering...1)
Yes, the Lumia 800 is manufactured by Compal, based in Taipei City (not HTC). However, I can't understand that this surprises you. Consumer electronics aren't manufactured anywhere outside of Asia these days. Nokia themselves have factories all over the world, including China, and Vietnam. Anyhow, welcome back to planet earth.
2)
It is not called Windows Mobile. It is called Windows Phone. These are two completely different product lines with no relationship to each other, other than both of them being mobile device operating systems.
3)
Windows Phone is multi-threaded and always has been. The OS itself is heavily multi-threaded. Windows Phone 7.5 is based on Windows CE 6.5 R3 (real-time OS optimized for low resource environments), which doesn't support multiple CPU cores, which isn't the same thing.
4)
If MS had never competed successfully against others, they wouldn't exist today. Go ask IBM.
The rest of your post is either speculation or similarly ridiculously. If you have no idea what you are talking about, then it might be better to remain quiet and not make a fool of yourself.
Penti - Friday, January 6, 2012 - link
While I might not agree with his gripes, Nokia is different from all other handset manufacturers / brands since they own and operate major manufacturing facilities employing tens of thousands themselves. Thus if they choose to continue to outsource the product it effectively means the end of Nokia altogether. It's simply not relating or having anything to do with todays company if all they will do is use a couple of thousand engineers and a couple of thousands sales and support-people and outsource the production of the few million Windows Phone units they will be able to sell.Microsoft-thinking has destroyed or set back many companies, it is not some new hate. We are talking about effectively killing and downsizing a company before turning any losses. We are talking about killing the only mobile OS developed outside North America. We are talking about closing production sites. We are talking about a mindset which goes against any European or really any engineering company. Downsizing, and not having long term plans doesn't go well together with engineering. Companies need some direction. Other Scandinavian companies has had similar problems with North Americans or others coming in and simply not giving the tools to do the job. Simply changing to that direction and expecting the company to live on even older S40 tech is wrong for Nokia. We will see when the Finns name Elop the worst person in history. How Microsoft runs their business doesn't translate to all other companies of the world and when ex-Microsoft people believes that there is usually disastrous consequences. It's clearly some kind of coup in some sense and a dramatic change and a decisions not made for the companies welfare. They already had an environment built on Qt/QtMobility on either Symbian or MeeGo which is every bit as powerful as Windows Phone if not more. It's API-complete and a competent C++ framework. Fits better in terms of hardware and software. The core of Nokia shouldn't be trying to sell S40 in smartphone space. But it is turning to that until they realize it isn't possible any how. Nokia will be left as a company that is not good at anything if they go through with it in the direction they seem to have chosen. It will not be an engineering and manufacturing company any way, and what good will a much smaller reminiscence do to their owner? It's truly a much more dramatic shift then say the finish government which approved it would have expected any how. It's not really about Windows Phone being useless it certainly isn't, but Nokia needs to sell hundreds of millions of phones. They will certianly need something others hasn't and target wider array of the market and different markets (countries).
Android and outsourcing to Android ODM's will lead to the same depletion. Companies need some core competence otherwise they are just selling someone else's product and that doesn't really work that well most disappear in those conditions and the brands consolidate and merge and the market converge. It's why Kindle Fire has more sales then every other android-tablet combined, they bring something of their own to the table. Simply bringing a nameless OEM-product doesn't do much. Many try. It's nothing new that companies give up but most do after major changes to their operations and years of losses.
a5cent - Friday, January 6, 2012 - link
I understand your point (American and European business culture differs and the two are rarely compatible... although they aren't totally incompatible either). I can agree with that.I also agree that it isn't a good move for Nokia to outsource production to Compal. But do we know for a fact, that this is intended as a long term solution? I expect that Nokia will move that back in-house again at some point... right now I suspect they aren't selling enough WP devices to make that worthwhile.
Apart from those two things I rather tend to disagree:
1)
Samsung has become Asia's most valuable company selling other peoples products (Android devices). Nokia has the same potential.
2)
Symbian has been failing for a long time. Long before anyone even knew Elop. Nokia never competed in the high-end smartphone space, and their low-end offerings are taking a brutal beating from cheap Android devices. This is what set the stage for Nokia's current situation. Elop is just the guy that was chosen to clean up the mess.
3)
Making good software and high-end Smartphones was never one of Nokia's/Symbian's core competencies, or at least the worlds markets never thought so. Their engineers are very competent, but they were not developing the right things. MeeGo is also in that category. Neither MeeGo nor WP have a killer-feature (the average Joe couldn't care less who has the best Multitasking). However, WP has the much higher potential to develop such a killer-feature (very tight integration between W8 and WP8 for example)
I am also a European and would have preferred OS development to stay in Europe. Yet I agree with Elop's decision. I think he is taking a very big risk, but that is still better than staying with MeeGo where I see no route to success at all, and would have lead to Nokia as a whole becoming irrelevant.
Anyway, all the mistakes leading to this inflection point were made long ago. Now Nokia has no choice but to accept drastic change, and that always hurts.