Wireless Info has put together one of the most extensive and comprehensive reviews of the Nokia N82 to date. While the camera isn't quite up to par with the N95, the N82 camera is still pretty darn good. They were also fairly impressed with audio quality, battery life, and GPS/FM functionality. On the downside, the keypad is "fiddly" and the lack of US-friendly 3G is a bit of a downer. Priced at $550, the Nokia N82 certainly isn't the cheapest phone on the block, but its feature set (5 megapixel auto-focus camera with true xenon flash, GPS, and Wi-Fi with support for UPnP and VoIP) and build quality make it worth the asking price.

The Nokia N82 is not an upgrade to any specific device in Nokia's lineup. It can be thought of as the Nokia N72 on steroids or the Nokia N95 in a candybar form factor. Either way it will probably represent the sweet spot in Nokia's N-Series lineup as the N70 and N73 did before. The N82 is a multimedia powerhouse, sporting a very good five megapixel auto-focus camera and excellent video recording capabilities. In addition it ups the ante over other high end Nokia camera phones by adding a much better Xenon flash. Under the hood the N82 runs the Symbian smart phone operating system with Nokia's Series 60 interface. This gives users a large amount of flexibility and power, with the ability to install a wide variety of native third party applications. On the hardware side you have built in Wi-Fi and GPS capabilities.

On the surface the N82 seems like close to the perfect all-in-one device, but it does have its flaws, mostly on the hardware side. We found the old timey calculator style keypad to be very annoying to use and the button layout is hindered by the overly prominent multimedia key. The D-Pad also leaves something to be desired as it is prone to errors because of an overly prominent center select button. Finally it lacks support for U.S. 3G frequencies, so if you're out of Wi-Fi range you'll be stuck with the slower EDGE connection.

If you can get past these usability issues, though, the N82 should be on your short list for a multimedia powerhouse phone. As the N82 isn't available from any U.S. carriers you will be paying for the privilege. Nokia USA has not yet released the N82 for sale in the U.S. but you will pay around $550 from importers and we don't expect Nokia's price to be much better. If you're not a media maven you can save a lot of money by looking at other devices like the AT&T Tilt or BlackBerry Pearl 8130 that provide many of the N82's same features at a much lower price. If you do want a multimedia device the N82 is probably going make you salivate, just be prepared to dig deep into your pockets