The American tech giant has shrewdly targeted the low- to mid-range smartphone category with the Lumia 535 Dual Sim, which offers great value for Dh499.
The 535 stays loyal to the cheery colourful aesthetic developed when Lumia was still a Nokia-branded upstart. Choose from lime green, baby blue, highlighter orange or three other vibrant — if slightly gaudy — shades for the back cover, which manages to tread the line between a snug fit and ease-of-removal expertly. The 535 never feels delicate, nor does changing the cover has one fearing they may need a screwdriver.
As is expected of any Lumia, the 535 offers exceptional readability in sunlight, better than most Android or iOS devices. While the respectable 220ppi won’t quite match that of the highly rated — and very expensive — iPhone 6 Plus or LG G3, the qHD TrueColour 960x540 display might be one of the best things about the phone, and Lumia fonts are some of the best in the business. Microsoft has also done well to give stock programs Word, PowerPoint and Excel a fair degree of functionality — I was able to make tracked edits to a document that the recipient was able to make out with ease on their PC.
A 5MP wide-angle front-facing camera ensures you will selflessly supply stunning selfies to Instagram. And a massive variety of filters veers towards borderline creepy when you can make your eyes larger and shinier, clean up teeth and broaden a smile with just a few taps. The 5MP main camera will do the job in a pinch, but don’t expect crystal-clear clarity with snaps taken on the go.
Live Tiles, which are the visually defining feature of this Windows Phone OS, offer a preview into an app’s content from the outside. The effect is slicker than your typical Android widget, though the trade-off is lower functionality — there are few ways to interact with a tile outside of simply clicking a picture you like.
Flicking through the app list and multitasking do cause a bit of lag, although app performance itself doesn’t raise any issues. Oddly, YouTube seems to work quicker on Lumia devices than some high-end Android gizmos using the same Wi-Fi.
Many are disappointed that Lumia couldn’t make more of a dent in Apple and Android’s market dominance, with less than 3 per cent of smartphones shipped globally in the third quarter of last year, according to research firm IDC. It was wise of Microsoft to start small and work its way up the smartphone ladder — possibly indicating tacit approval of the strategies employed by the likes of China’s Huawei and Xiaomi.
