HTC is always on the cutting edge of new technologies. They made the first Android phone. They were the first to use a high resolution front facing camera. In fact, they were the first to use a reasonable resolution in the front camera. They were the first to use a flash on the front camera. They were the first to put speakers on the front of the phone.
Both the HTC Desire 820 and the Nokia Lumia 830 are mid-range devices, although the Nokia Lumia 830 uses a Snapdragon 400, which straddles the low end of the mid-range and the HTC Desire 820 uses the 64 bit Snapdragon 615, which holds the high end of the mid-range. They both have fantastic cameras. Read on.
It would appear that it’s Nokia Lumia 830 day. Currently, I am reviewing three phones: the Amazon Fire Phone, the Microsoft Lumia 535, and the HTC Desire 820. Unfortunately, I am being forced to bump up the Nokia Lumia 830 in the comparison rotation because Microsoft wants their phone back.
Both of these phones have pretty great cameras. In fact, the Nokia Lumia 830’s Pureview camera is phenomenal. I have noticed that the Amazon Fire Phone has a little trouble focusing on smaller objects that are further away and there are no manual controls to focus, but we’ll get to all that.
We know how this comparison is going to turn out, right? Well, not necessarily. I have seen some really amazing stuff come from Nokia cameras, even ones that are not Pureview. When I first got the Microsoft Lumia 535, I compared it to the Lumia 530 and thought that after that, I would move on to the 520, 635, and then maybe the 830. Then, Microsoft threw a wrench in my plans. They need their review unit back, so for those that I promises that I would compare the Lumia 830 to the Lumia 735, I apologize but it’s just not going to work out.
Now, the Microsoft Lumia 535 is Microsoft’s first Lumia after shedding the Nokia branding and it’s a pretty decent phone. The Nokia Lumia 830 was the mid-range phone that they billed as an “affordable flagship”. Let’s check it out.
HTC’s Desire line of phones has typically been their mid-range brand. The HTC Desire Eye is in every respect a flagship phone; however, many reviewers are calling it mid-range. Whether you want to call it flagship or mid-range, it certainly has a high end camera.
The Nokia Lumia 830 is just the opposite. It is being labeled as an affordable flagship but it is in all respects a mid-range phone; however, it does have a flagship camera. HTC has traditionally used the ultrapixel effect, saturating the images for more vibrant colors. Nokia uses Pureview. Both cameras are fantastic, but completely opposite. It really depends on what you want from a camera and what type of photos you think look good.
The cameras on the HTC One M8 and the Nokia Lumia 830 couldn’t be more different. Nokia uses a Pureview camera with a Carl Zeiss lens while HTC uses their ultrapixel approach, using a mere 4 MP sensor and using software to saturate the images.
Both of these phones take beautiful photos but in completely different ways. It has been rumored that the HTC One M8 will be HTC’s last ultrapixel phone. After all, it is only 4 MP. There is no room to crop the images at all.
Anyone who knows me knows that I am a very big fan of the Nokia Lumia 930. I feel that it is the best Windows Phone that exists and that it is a shame that it isn’t sold by carriers in the United States. The Nokia Lumia 830 shares a design language as the Nokia Lumia 930. In fact, many reviewers have called it a lower end Lumia 930.
When Nokia was sending me a review unit of the Nokia Lumia 830, I requested a Nokia Lumia 930 as well, for a comparison with the Lumia 830 as well as others, such as the Sony Xperia Z3 Compact, which also has a 20 MP camera. They didn’t have any Lumia 930s on hand but they did have a Lumia Icon available, which is the CDMA variant of the Lumia 930; however, as any Verizon Windows Phone users know, it does not have Lumia Cyan yet, which will affect camera performance.
When Microsoft first announced Nokia’s first ever affordable flagship, I was skeptical. After all, it uses the same Snapdragon 400 processor as the Nokia Lumia 635. In case you don’t know much about smart phone processors, Snapdragon 400 is the low end of the mid-range; however, the more I use the Nokia Lumia 830, the more impressed I am with it.
As with all new review units that come in, I’ve been doing lots of camera comparisons. The first camera I compared the Nokia Lumia 830 to was the Nokia Lumia 635. When the Lumia 830 did so well., I compared it to the Lumia 1020. Being as impressed as I was with the camera on the Nokia Lumia 830, I then compared it to the OnePlus One and the iPhone 6. The 10 MP Pureview camera more than gets the job done. Possibly the best smart phone camera on the market comes from the Sony Xperia Z3, so this will be something of a gold standard test.
This is a camera comparison that I have been looking forward to doing. When Microsoft announced the first ever “affordable flagship”, I was skeptical. This so-called affordable flagship used the same processor as the Nokia Lumia 635. It is mid-range at best.
When I finally got my review unit from Microsoft, I was very impressed. When I did some camera tests, I was even more impressed. The Nokia Lumia 830 blew away the OnePlus One and the Nokia Lumia 635 in camera comparisons and it even beat the Nokia Lumia 1020 in some situations. The iPhone 6 is widely known as the best smart phone camera on the market. It will be interesting to see how the Nokia Lumia 830 compares.
AT&T announced six new devices that they were selling as of last Friday. One of those is Nokia’s first “affordable flagship”, the Nokia Lumia 830. Of course, if you’re a OnePlus One user, you don’t care about any of this because you have an unlocked flagship phone.
As always when we get a new review unit, we do camera comparisons across the board. So far, I have compared the Nokia Lumia 830 to the Nokia Lumia 635 and the Nokia Lumia 1020. The scope of this comparison will be to compare the Nokia Lumia 830 to the OnePlus One.
The Nokia Lumia 830 is billed as Nokia’s first ever affordable flagship. In fact, it is the highest end Nokia phone to come to the United States since Windows Phone 8.1 happened. While the guts of the Nokia Lumia 830 are mid-range at best, the camera is certainly high end. That being said, it seems fair to compare the 10 MP Pureview camera of the Nokia Lumia 830 to the 41 MP Pureview camera of the Nokia Lumia 1020.
While the Nokia Lumia 1020 was released in July 2013, it remains relevant to this day. The Nokia Lumia 1020 is widely known as having the best smart phone camera. Because of that, any time a new flagship comes in, the comparison to the Nokia Lumia 1020 is the gold standard test.
