Review: Microsoft Lumia 830

Microsoft's Lumia 830 delivers a high-end experience without the high price tag attached, epitomising the concept of value for money.  

However, there are a few chinks in the armour which take away from the overall positive aspects of the phone. 

Let's have a look at the main aspects of the Lumia 830 experience.  

Look and feel 

The Lumia 830 is a good-looking phone - not too big and unique enough to be distinguished from other brands. It also has a tapered Gorilla Glass screen giving the phone a slicker appearance.  

There are a variety of colours available for the back panel of your phone - mine was green, my favourite colour, so naturally I liked this aspect of the phone.  

At 150g, it's lightweight, while also fitting comfortably in your hand. 

When it comes to colours and display, the Lumia 830 is not as crisp as certain high-end phones, but the level of detail and vividness remains impressive.  

The phone comes with an HD 720p display, which is more than adequate when looking at the phone's price.  

This makes the phone great for viewing pictures and watching videos - but not to the extent that I would rank it as the selling point of the phone. 

Despite being a mid-range phone, it really does deliver when it comes to colours. Colours are bright and vivid and you won't feel disappointed.

Operating system 

While I usually don't focus much on the operating system of the phones I review, much of the high-end feel of the Lumia 830 comes from the presence of the Windows Phone 8.1 OS.  

At first it took me a while to get used to the feel of the OS as I'm personally an Android lover, but the OS seems to definitely work in the Lumia 830's favour.  

The Lumia 830 comes with a host of pre-installed apps - you can even get the Cortana voice assistant if you set your region to the US.  

Even though Cortana doesn't have a version specifically tailored for South Africa, the digital personal assistant is pretty good at interpreting voice commands and our accents (with only the occasional "You thought I said walrus?" moments). 

Any apps that are missing can easily be downloaded from the Windows Phone Store. But otherwise, there is already a great variety present.  

Something I will miss about the phone is the health and fitness app, which made the 830 feel like a high-end phone. The platform comes with the perks and feel you'd expect from operating systems of high-end phones, but at a far lower price. 

There are also cutting-edge apps like LiveSight present on the phone which delve into the realm of augmented reality. 

Another aspect I liked is the way the apps worked together - LiveSight drew on HERE Maps to signal points of interest around me, and Nokia Camera could use OneDrive to backup my pictures.  

The OS is also aesthetically pleasing, adding to the overall high-end look and feel of the phone by being sleek and minimalistic.

So if you are looking into taking the leap and trading in your Android, iOS or some other phone, the Lumia 830 definitely delivers a good impression.