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Anupam Saxena, TOI Tech Jan 24, 2014, 03.18PM IST
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NEW DELHI: Phones getting incremental hardware updates is not a new phenomenon. In the past, Nokia has upgraded some of its popular phones, including feature phones, with minor or cosmetic improvements. It was even criticized for coming up with new iterations with the 'i' suffix, shortly after launching phones, in the past.
But at times, minor changes can make a major impact on the user experience delivered by a phone and allow the device maker to fill the gap in the segment.
The Nokia Lumia 520 is without doubt Nokia's best selling smartphones in the recent past. It's also in a way the gateway to the Windows Phone platform, being one of the most affordable and 'usable' smartphones available in the market.
We know how Windows Phone runs smooth as silk even on phones with modest hardware, but one of the major constraints is the inability of graphics intensive apps and games to run on phones with less RAM (1GB is the threshold here).
This left many aspiring smartphone users high and dry, especially when their friends could run these on their low-priced Android phones. While a number of developers optimize their games for 512MB RAM devices, at times, it involves a long wait.
Nokia decided to introduce an iterative update and address mainly this pain point. We try to find out if the Lumia 525 takes Nokia's best selling smartphone to the next level in our review.
Build and design
As we mentioned, the Lumia 525 is an incremental update over the Lumia 520. This also holds true for the build and design, and it is almost impossible to tell the difference between the two in terms of appearance for there is none. The only distinguishing attribute is the Lumia 525's glossy back panel, in contrast to the Lumia 520's back panel that sports a matte finish. However, the panels are inter changeable. We prefer the matte finish panels as they're less prone to smudges.
The phone weighs 124 gram and feels durable despite its polycarbonate chassis.
Just like the Lumia 520, the 525 sports a 4-inch screen with a resolution of 800x480p and pixel density of 233ppi. Although the display is nothing to talk home about and you'll notice text and images getting a bit pixelated, the phone is one of the better ones among similarly priced devices.
Just below the screen, you'll find the usual Windows Phone capacitive keys (back, home and search). Unfortunately, even Lumia 525's keys are not backlit, just like the Lumia 520's capacitive keys.
On the right edge of the phone, you'll find the volume rocker, lock/power and camera keys, whereas the left edge is bare. On top you'll find the earphone jack, while the microUSB port is located at the bottom. The 5MP camera and speaker outlet are located at the back.
Overall, just like its predecessor, the Lumia 525 is one of the best economy smartphones in terms of build quality and finish.
Hardware
The device is powered by a 1GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor and features 1GB RAM, double than that of the Lumia 520. It comes with 8GB internal storage and you can also store data on a microSD card (up to 64GB supported) and on the cloud (7GB free SkyDrive storage).
Connectivity options include 2G, 3G, Wi-Fi, and Bluetooth 4.0.The phone is backed by a 1430mAh battery, which is removable.
Software
Nokia Lumia 525 comes with Windows Phone 8 topped with Nokia customizations, apps and services. These include apps like Cinemagraph, Here maps suite, Nokia Music and Smart Shoot, which do improve the user experience.
The phone runs the latest Black build of the OS, which is based on Windows Phone GDR 3 and offers new features such as the ability to lock the screen rotation and better multitasking. It offers 'double tap to wake up' but no Glance screen.You can read more about the Black update in our Lumia 1520 review.
The phone comes pre-loaded with apps such as the adidas miCoach, BigFlix, Flipkart eBooks, Your Movies and Zinio apps, and Rail Rush game. Nokia is also offering Gameloft games such as Modern Combat 4, Assassin's Creed, Shark Dash, Nova 3 and Asphalt 8 as free downloads.
More third party apps and games are now available for Windows Phone 8 and the Lumia 525 is capable of running most of them due to the bump in RAM. For someone who's buying his first smartphone, the app selection is pretty decent with most services covered, including India-specific ones. For instance, a number of major Indian banks offer their banking apps.
That said, the OS still pales in comparison to the app selection offered by Android and iOS.
We are looking forward to the Windows Phone 8.1 update that will fill more gaps and hopefully add a centralized notifications destination.
Performance
For a phone in this price segment, the Lumia 525 offers great performance. Windows Phone is not a very resource hungry operating system and we did not encounter any lag while navigating through the apps and menus, launching apps and games, and web browsing.
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