Nokia Lumia 2520 reviews roundup
Following on from its recent launch, the first reviews of the Nokia Lumia 2520 have been trickling in, and we’ve been taking a look to see what the reviewers are saying.
A solid display…
Engadget’s Dana Wollman is impressed by the screen, writing:
“Much has been made of the 2520’s design – that it’s basically a Lumia phone, writ large. In fact, it’s received so much attention for its colorful design that you might not be aware of what a gorgeous display it has.”
“What makes this screen such a stunner is its brightness and also its color accuracy. For starters, the brightness here is rated at 665 nits, versus 400 on the Surface 2. In particular, Nokia’s touting its ‘5 percent reflectance,’ which means the tablet should be easy to read both indoors and out.”
“In addition, the screen makes use of Nokia’s ClearBlack technology, ensuring that — yep, you guessed it — the blacks are deep black and the whites are white…if you put the 2520 side by side against the Surface 2, the difference is obvious. Startling, even: It didn’t even occur to me the Surface 2 had a dull display until we played with the 2520. Now I don’t want to go back.”
Impressive performance
Arstechnica’s Lee Hutchinson turned out to be equally impressed by the Lumia 2520’s performance, pointing out:
“In the days we were able to spend with the device for our hands-on, we found Windows RT on the Lumia 2520 to be snappy and responsive throughout. Full benchmarks are coming in our review, but as a ‘second screen’ on my desk with e-mail and music playing, the 2520 worked great.”
“Adding a half-dozen browser windows to the mix didn’t slow it down at all, nor did opening the supplied Windows RT version of Word to take notes. Pairing the tablet form factor up with LTE is also smart, since Wi-Fi is not available everywhere. Plus, the Lumia’s relatively small 32GB internal storage means that it’s really only able to fully function when it has access to all of its various cloud services.”
Larry Magid, from Forbes, writes:
“There’s a lot to like about the new Nokia. It’s fast and responsive, the screen is beautiful and even though there are far fewer RT apps than there are for iOS or Android, the ones I tried worked extremely well.”
Larry does highlight the Windows RT operating system as a negative, however, adding:
“I’m just not ready to jump into the Windows RT eco-system. Sure, there are lots of apps available including the ones that I’m most likely to use, but there are hundreds of thousands more apps for both Android and iOS and even though I don’t plan to use even a tiny fraction of them, I want all those options.”
Top-notch connectivity and battery life
The Verge’s Dan Seifert tells readers:
“The Finnish manufacturer’s first tablet, a direct competitor to Microsoft’s Surface 2, has a big trick up its sleeve: it’s only available with built-in LTE, which isn’t even yet an option on the Surface line.”
“Windows RT isn’t that great when you don’t have an internet connection, but when you can have internet anywhere, it’s not that bad. As a result, the 2520 is a significantly more portable device than the Surface 2 or any other Wi-Fi only tablet, and I don’t think it was a mistake for Nokia to only offer LTE versions.”
“Using the tablet virtually all day to play games, browse the web, email, and write still left me with plenty of gas in the tank. On our rundown test, the battery lasted 10 hours and 47 minutes on Wi-Fi, well beyond the Surface 2 and right up there with the best tablets on the market, including the iPad Air.”
The epitome of Nokia design
Readwrite’s Dan Rowinski points out:
“The Nokia Lumia 2520 is stunning. It has a 10.1-inch screen and it’s incredibly thin, light and comes in one of four colors (glossy red or white and black or cyan matte). I got a glossy red one and – like many Nokia products – it’s a joy to hold.”
“With a few notable exceptions, Nokia makes really attractive and ergonomically-inclined hardware. The Lumia 2520 is a perhaps the epitome of Nokia design since it adopted the Windows operating system several years ago.”
A complete package
Pocket Lint’s Elyse Betters explains:
“We like the Nokia Lumia 2520. Its colourful looks are great and it performs well: there’s that really bright screen, built-in LTE for on-the-go connectivity and an affordable price tag out in the States. How that will translate into UK pricing we’re yet to see, but fingers crossed it’s competitive compared to the Surface 2. Overall, this is a quality widescreen tablet; it looks and feels excellent. Kudos, Nokia. Kudos.”
Rounding up the reviews, Übergizmo’s Daniel Perez writes:
“Windows 8 tablets have yet to officially take off as we’ve seen a number of them pop up in the market, but none that have completely wowed us. The Lumia 2520 has certainly wowed us as it brings Nokia’s years of experience as a handset maker to the tablet market, and the result is a Windows 8 tablet that has nearly everything we could have ever wanted in this kind of tablet.
If you’re in the market for a powerful Windows 8 machine that will probably last much longer than a typical work day, then the Lumia 2520 is what you’ve been looking for.