Nokia Lumia 900 priced

The Philippine price for the Nokia Lumia 900 was announced at Nokia's Lumianation event held yesterday at Php27,990. Given that it's smaller sibling, the Nokia Lumia 800 is priced at Php23,500, the suggested retail price of the Nokia Lumua 900.

The Php28K price pits the Nokia Lumia with head to head with high end Android phone like the HTC One X and the Sony Xperia S. These are quad and dual core Android phones with 720p displays, better still camera's, 1080p video recording and 32 GB of internal storage. 

The Nokia Lumia 900 comes with a very nice 4.3-inch clear black display, but with a low WVGA (480 x 800) resolution. This would have been good technology in 2011, but it really falls far behind the curve in 2012. The reason for the low resolution display is that Windows Phone 7 only supports the 480 x 800 resolution. While Nokia has excellent camera's in its Symbian power phones, it seems to still be tweaking their performance in Windows Phone 7.  Being single core, it can only shoot 720p video. Maybe most disappointing is that its internal storage is a non-expandable 16 GB, while its competition offers twice that much. 

One thing pointed out at the Lumianation even was that by using single core processors, the Lumia's were more power efficient that the dual core and quad core phones. This claim is questionable. Phones like the HTC One X and Samsung Galaxy S III implement more modern chipsets that more modern power efficient chipsets. While GSM Arena has not posted any battery life test for the Nokia Lumia 900, it does have tests for the AT&T version of the phone and it does far well against modern Android phones like the HTC One X. The monster 4.7-inch HTC One X beats has slightly better battery life than the smaller 3.7-inch Nokia Lumia 800. The soon to be launch Samsung Galaxy S III has even better battery life than the HTC One X.

So, on the hardware front, suffice it to say that the Nokia Lumia 900 is expensive for what it offers.

But it does have some advantages in software. The Windows Phone 7.5 operating system in the phone is tightly integrated to Facebook. So Facebook users should give this phone a look. Nokia's NDrive is also the best free voice guided turn-by-turn navigation app for the Philippines. With iOS or Android, you do get Google Maps with turn-by-turn guidance, but no voice guidance. Buying third party voice guided turn-by-turn navigation can cost you two to four thousand pesos. 

Another plus, is that the the Nokia Lumia 900 will be bundled with the Monster Purity Stereo Headset. At least for the phones initially sold.

If these features and accessories matter to you, the Nokia Lumia 900 could be worth its rather premium price. 

Normally, you expect the top of the line device to be replace after one year. In 5 to 6 months we expect to see a new set of Windows Phone 8 devices with dual core processors, HD displays and 1080p video recording, and we expect them to cost as much as a Nokia Lumia 900 will cost today. I expect to the the Nokia Lumia 910, sooner, rather than later.

Expect to see the Nokia Lumia 900 hit the store shelve early June.