Nokia Lumia 830 – Unboxing and first impressions

Does the Lumia 830 live up to its proper noun and is it a worthy upgrade? The respond may surprise you.

Final calendar week I showed y'all in detail the Nokia Lumia 735 'selfie' phone, including my initial thoughts. While I brainstorm wrapping up a full review for that phone afterwards this week, the Lumia 830 arrived on my doorstep.

Dubbed 'the affordable flagship' by Microsoft, the Lumia 830 has a lot going for it, including a much sleeker design than its more powerful Lumia 930 sibling.

And then how practiced is the Lumia 830? Bank check out my unboxing video, hardware tour, and first impressions of the latest Lumia phone to hit the market place.

Lumia 830 Specifications

Windows Phone viii.1 Update (build 14157) with Lumia Denim
Memory: 1GB RAM, sixteen GB internal user memory; 15 GB OneDrive cloud storage, micro SD expandable upwardly to 128 GB
Display: v.0-inch ClearBlack IPS Hard disk (1280 10 720) display, Corning Gorilla Drinking glass 3, Curved Glass (two.25D), Lumia colour profile, wide viewing bending. Features double-tap to wake, Glance, Super Sensitive Bear upon, Sunlight readability mode.
Processor: i.ii GHz quad-core processor Qualcomm Snapdragon 400
Master camera: F/2.two ten MP PureView with ZEISS optics and optical paradigm stabilization (OIS), Video recording at 1080p thirty fps (Full Hard disk drive), Rich recording
Secondary camera: 0.ix MP, F/ii.4 720p video Nokia Camera, Nokia Storyteller, Nokia Artistic Studio
Size: 139.four ten 70.7 x viii.v (volumetric) mm, Weight: 150 g
Battery: Removable 2220 mAh battery, exchangeable shell, Qi wireless charging
Sound: 3 loftier-performance microphones (HAAC), Nokia Rich Recording with surround sound capture (Dolby 5.i), Uplink noise counterfoil for calls, three.5 mm AV connector

Those are some solid specs for a mid-range Windows Telephone in 2022.

Impressions

Afterwards unboxing the Lumia 830, I fiddled with the phone for nigh 90-minutes, taking some calls, shooting some photos, updating apps, and giving it a run downwardly. I take to admit I am impressed with it. The one.two GHz processor, while certainly not the fastest, feels buttery smooth when navigating the Bone. I have had the same feel with the Lumia 735, which I made my daily driver final week considering it is so fun to use.

The display being IPS LCD is non as saturated as the Lumia 730's AMOLED, but this all comes down to user preference equally each every bit its benefits and negatives. The display on the Lumia 830 is muted for colors, but it improves when ready to Vivid under the display settings. It very much reminds me of the Lumia 920'south screen.

Coming in at 150 grams, the Lumia 830 is significantly lighter than the Lumia 930/Lumia Icon (167 grams), and the venerable Lumia 920, which is a staggering 185 grams. The Lumia 830 is also thinner at just eight.five mm versus the 9.vii mm width of the Lumia 930. Although the difference on paper seems nominal, yous do feel the difference when holding the Lumia 830, and I prefer information technology.

The simply matter the Lumia 830 is lacking comes downward to 'Hey Cortana', the forthcoming passive-phonation feature for Microsoft'southward Cortana personal assistant which lets you use the service hands-free. Other than this, you are giving up a beefier processor. Does this matter? Well, I have a powerful and massive Lumia 1520 and Lumia Icon readily available for my carriers, and I had no complaints in using the Lumia 735 all week. This experience tells me for the boilerplate user, nope; this is non a problem.

My just gripe and so far is the front capacitive buttons, which accept weak haptic feedback and only low-cal upward under the darkest situations.

Camera

Optical paradigm stabilization? Check. 10 MP camera with decent F/2.two aperture? Roger. Six lens elements for sharpness? Verified. Dedicated photographic camera button? Here equally well.

The Lumia 830's camera is exactly where you would expect information technology to autumn on the Lumia spectrum. It is certainly beneath the Lumia 930's ability, which has xx MP, simply it is besides significantly better than the rear camera on the Lumia 735.

Photos are sharp equally a tack, and the colors are on the muted side. For the pro photographic camera people, this result is probably a practiced affair (it is easier to go brilliant in post).

The ane downside, at least for now, is the ten MP camera only shoots in JPEG. Therefore, even though this is PureView, it cannot shoot in DNG/RAW. However, the forthcoming update for Lumia Camera may nonetheless resurrect that feature, along with adding a few new abilities likewise. That app update is due later in Q4, and it is certainly 1 to watch.

Speed is surprisingly quick for a Lumia photographic camera. This annotate is not to say there is no delay as y'all practice have just under 2 seconds between taking a photo and saving, and it feels very comparable to the Lumia 1520's speed. Once again, this may improve with the Lumia Camera update, so nosotros will have to await and run into.

The forepart-facing camera is an economical 0.ix MP fixed focus job, which is not on the high end at all. Ii caveats though: it is sharp and alternatively, yous tin can use the Lumia Selfie app in Auto style and utilize the x MP rear camera, which works brilliantly. So long as you are not cropping the self-pic, the forepart-facing camera is what it is, but not equally bad as some people had feared.

When used for Skype, the front end-facing camera continued to look abrupt, and the other person noted that the video image expect groovy being clear and brilliant. Once once more, this camera was better than expected.

Wrapping it upward

I am using the Lumia 830 (RM-984 variant) on AT&T for the adjacent week. Similar the Lumia 735 I have (RM-1038), both devices perform well under HSPA and HSPA+ data speeds, with reliable reception.

So far, though, I am highly fascinated with the Lumia 830, and it is probable to be my go-to phone when the AT&T version hits the market early next month ( November 7). Let us just promise that AT&T does not completely hobble the Qi wireless charging.

Finally, does the Lumia 830 serve as a nice upgrade to the Lumia 920? My initial thought is yes, it does, but I shall follow upwardly on that in a separate article after comparing the two.