Nokia 7900 Prism review

Nokia 7900 Prism Review

Reviewed by: Andrew Lim

Reviewed on: 21 January 2008

Features
If only the keypad was better -- then you could really appreciate what the Nokia 7900 Prism has to offer, and it has a fair amount, considering it's only 11mm thin. You can browse the Web relatively quickly with 3G and there's a 2-megapixel camera on the back for MMS photos and the odd snapshot.

On the back of the the phone, you'll find a 2-megapixel camera

There's an MP3 player and FM radio but you'll need to use the provided headphones to listen to either, which is a shame. You can store all your media on the 1GB of onboard memory, although there's no expandable microSD card slot, so that's it. Unusually, the feature that had us most fascinated was the keypad backlight.

Normally, keypad backlights aren't that exciting. That's primarily because they don't do much but the 7900's keypad has a trick up its sleeve. That's right, you can change the colour of the backlight and when the phone rings it can display effects. OK, so it's a gimmick but it is different and some people will really like it.

Performance
Audio quality during calls is loud and clear with no noticeable distortion or muffling. The loudspeaker works as expected and Bluetooth and Stereo Bluetooth also provided little surprise in performance, with no noticeable issues.

For a 2-megapixel camera picture quality was good but it did take a long time to actually save the picture once it had been taken. It's perfectly suitable for MMS messaging and small prints but don't expect great shots in low light.

Battery life is quoted three hours talk time and 300 hours on standby. It lasted for over two days with moderate use and just under a day if we used 3G intensively. Battery life will of course vary depending on use.

Conclusion
The Nokia 7900 Prism is an attractive phone and while it won't be to everyone's tastes, it does possess design features that differentiate it from the rest of the crowd. Unfortunately, one of those features happens to be a rather awkward to use keypad and while we'd like to give this phone a great review, its keypad really lets it down.

Edited by Jason Jenkins
Additional editing by Shannon Doubleday