Design Critique: Products For People

Tobby Smith returns to help Tim provide a longitudinal review of Nokia's Lumia 710 Windows phone. After over eight months of use, the Lumia 710 proved itself a terrific value in smart phone quality, including* Convenient, portable size with grippy back cover that can be switched with other colors to personalize the phone* Hardware buttons for the three standard Windows Phone buttons, instead of the soft buttons so often found on other models. We find dedicated hardware buttons much more usable.* Clear and bright screen with high contrast.* Good video recording.* Superior applications specific to Nokia phones, such as Nokia Drive.Problems included* Tim's phone broke after only five months without any abuse or dropping.* Still camera images are average at best.* Volume of speaker is not loud enough to hear nav instructions above road noise or  stereo playing.Despite the dislikes, the Lumia 710 is a great value-priced smart phone. As Windows 8 phones roll out, it may become even cheaper to buy and thus an even b