I had the opportunity to compare two of Nokia’s current flagship phones recently, namely the N97 and the N97 Mini. The N97 was launched first followed closely by the N97 Mini. Since there are already quite a few comparisons done on these two phones, I will attempt to concentrate more on the subjective aspects rather than the numbers.
As the name suggests, the Mini is the smaller of the two phones. In my opinion, the smaller size makes the Mini look sleeker and classier than its bigger brother. The Mini is also lighter at 138g instead of 150g. However, I felt that the N97 felt better in my hand than the Mini did. I constantly felt as though I might lose grip and drop the Mini whereas the N97 felt more secure. The bigger N97 also has a bigger screen at 3.5” instead of 3.2”. Again it may not sound like a lot but it does make a difference especially if you have middle aged eyesight.
The next difference you will notice is the keyboard. While the N97 has a D-pad, the Mini makes do with 4 arrow keys. I must say this is not as intuitive as the D-pad and takes a bit a getting used to.
Around the back of the phone, the first thing you will notice is the Mini has a metal battery cover while the N97 makes do with plastic. This again gives the Mini a classier feel and look. One omission on the back of the Mini is a camera lens cover. While some may say that like a cover to protect the lens, I personally don’t see much point in that and this may be due to the way I normally carry my phone around. Looking at it from another perspective, it avoids the N97 scratched camera lens problem.
Opening the battery cover reveals a smaller battery in the Mini at 1200mAh hours instead of 1500mAh in the N97. This did not result in a perceivable difference in the battery life with both phones lasting around 2 days per charge with moderate use. Both phones easily lasted 3 days over a quiet weekend.
Apart from the physical differences, the only other major difference between the two phones is the amount of memory. While the N97 has 32gb of internal memory, the Mini makes do with only 8gb. This may be a little low for users who like to store plenty of media files on their phones. However, in return, the Mini does get double the ram of the N97 at 256mb against the 128mb in the N97. This is pretty much the extent of the differences between the two phones. There is the small issue of the FM transmitter being omitted from the Mini, but I don’t think this is going to be a deal breaker for most.
I prefer the smaller size and feel of the Mini. The bigger screen and extra storage on the N97 is nice. In everyday use, the two phones are very similar as you would expect. They perform all the normal phone functions very competently. When it came to the smartphone functions, I expected dramatic differences in performance due to the differences in the ram but I did not notice any in normal use. The N97 match the Mini for speed and response in normal use. The only time I managed to coax the N97 into freezing momentarily was when I was browsing using Opera 10 Beta while running Skype, Facebook in the background. It froze for around 5 seconds following an out of memory warning. This could potentially be a problem for heavy users who may find the N97 freezing regularly as it runs out of memory.
In the time I ran the phones side by side, both worked as well as I would have expected and neither let me down at any stage. The only episodes were due to slow satellite fix but this is partly due to my refusal to enable agps and pay network data charges to use navigation. I did notice that the Mini was better in this respect and would get a fix noticeably quicker and was able to hold onto the satellite signal better as well.
In conclusion, if I had to give one back, it would be have to be the N97. I feel the Mini suits me better. I prefer the smaller size and extra ram over storage, not to mention the cheaper purchase price. However, if I had been 20 years younger and play plenty of music and take plenty of photos, I would probably have picked the N97 instead.
