First impression: Nokia Lumia 1520

The device comes for Rs 46,999 with a six-inch screen, a 20MP PureView camera and it runs on Windows Phone 8 operating system

The advent of Samsung Galaxy Note 3 and HTC One Max seems to have changed the nature of the smartphone war. It has moved on from build quality and processors to screen size and pixel density. The size counts as much as the functions now.

Lumia 1520, the six-inch flagship product of Nokia, exemplifies that change.

The specifications are impressive. This is the first Windows Phone 8 device with a full high-definition 1,080-pixel display. It's also Nokia's first to run on a quad-core processor. Sounds good but never did I expect it to be something so insanely great. The 1,920-by-1,080-pixel IPS LCD screen with 367 pixels an inch renders crystal-clear images, even outdoors.

Since we are talking of images, I must let you know the phone's 20MP PureView camera excels even in poor lighting. The phone's Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 chip, clocked at 2.2GHz and aided by a 2GB RAM, is the most powerful quad-core chip currently available. Though Indians seem obsessed with the screen size, I felt Lumia 1520 is probably too big and is difficult to handle. Besides, at 206g it is also too heavy. The phone has comes with some new applications, such as the Storyteller that integrates clicked images and recorded videos with HERE maps and the Pro Camera UI that lets you take a large number of snaps in one go.

Nokia is probably the only smartphone maker that can compete with Apple on build quality. But the choice often boils down to the price: Lumia 1520 comes for Rs 46,999. You will have to shell out Rs 3,000 more if you want the flip cover. No doubt Lumia 1520 is a brilliant smartphone but who would spend so much for a Nokia when one could buy an iPhone 5S (32GB) for Rs 5,000 more?