Nokia 8800 Arte and Sapphire Arte handsets

Verdict
When you head into luxury product territory, the usual value formoney benchmark becomes less significant to the buyer than thedesirability factor. Does the 8800 Arte or Sapphire Arte justify such ahefty price tag? Unquestionably, Nokia has used premium materials thatgive a reassuringly expensive, high quality – and weighty - feel tothese devices. The design is understatedly elegant too.
The under-the-bonnet features run-down wouldn’t convince us to spankour credit card, however. They have a reasonable set of functions, butmost of these you can get on other Nokia Series 40 phones at half theprice. Sure, they have 3G, a 3.2-megapixel camera and 1GB of memory -but as we found, you don’t get the latest cutting edge mobiletechnology despite the expensive price tag. And there’s no HSDPAhigh-speed 3G, face-to-face video calling nor expandable memory - andthe camera is limited. Socketry and earphone arrangements aren’tconvincing either if you want to play music.

There are two web browsers to utilise the 3G capability, the Nokianative one, and the impressive Opera Mini browser Java application,which also provides Yahoo! search and Wikipedia plus Dictionary.comquick search options. Web browsing is swift with 3G and downloadingcontent is speedy too, even without a HSDPA boost.
Nokia’s WidSets application comes pre-loaded, enabling you to getRSS-based updates on a set of onscreen widgets. This enables you to getweb-based updates from your favourite blogs and websites without havingto actively browse each time you want to check.

That's a real sapphire in the Sapphire

Nokia’s usual organiser functions are included – calendar, to-dolists, notes, calculator and various timer and clock functions – plusconvertor and translator apps. A voice memo function, speakerindependent dialling, voice commands and a text-to-speech convertor areincluded too. Naturally, the email facility includes support forregular attachments.
A Golf Tour game is loaded up for downtime amusement, while Nokia’susual Download! app also offers a range of other games and content youcan download for free or for a fee.
Top marks for the Nokia 8800 Arte’s call performance – it producedexcellent quality sound and maintained signal levels commendably well.Estimated battery life is quoted by Nokia as giving up to 300 hoursstandby, or talktime of 3 hours 20 minutes on GSM networks or up to 2hours 45 minutes on 3G WCDMA 2100 networks. That’s a typicalperformance for this spec level. In practice, we found ourselvesreaching for the charger after two days with moderate usage. Thatdesktop charger should come in handy, then, for heavyweight phone users.
Product
Nokia 8800 Arte and Sapphire Arte

Verdict
Credit crunch - what credit crunch? Nokia aims for the hearts and wallets of the money-no-object mobile buyer

Rating
80%

Suggested Price
Nokia 8800 Arte: contract: £200-£400 handset only: £680, Nokia 8800 Sapphire Arte: handset only: £1050