14 DAY TRIAL // Windows Phone fans will have quite a difficult time ahead of them given the latest announcements coming from Microsoft and Nokia. Those who already own Windows Phone 8 devices are probably taking into consideration the option of ditching them in favor of one of the new Windows Phone 8.1 devices that will go on sale in the coming months.
Nokia Lumia 630, Lumia 635 and Lumia 930 will be the first smartphones to ship with the Windows Phone 8.1 operating system out of the box. The first will be available beginning May for only $160 / €115 outright.
The dual-SIM version of Lumia 630 has been confirmed to arrive around the same timeframe, but it will cost $170 / €125 off contract. The Lumia 635 has been priced at $190 / €140, but it won’t arrive on the market until July.
According to Microsoft, Windows Phone 8.1 will be pushed to all WP80-based smartphones via an update that will be available in late summer.
That puts Windows Phone into a huge dilemma: are users going to wait until Windows Phone 8.1 gets released and then update their current Windows Phone 8 devices, or are they going to buy one of the new smartphones mentioned earlier?
In order to make your decision a bit easier, Nokia has released a hands-on video for Lumia 630 and 635, which highlights some of the most important features offered by these budget-friendly handsets.
Although they are priced so low, the smartphones are packed with more than decent specs. They sport 4.5-inch ClearBlack capacitive touchscreen displays that support 480 x 854 pixels resolution and feature Corning Gorilla Glass 3 coating.
On the inside, Lumia 630 and 635 are equipped with 1.2GHz quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 400 processors, 512MB of RAM and 8GB of storage.
The only difference between the two Lumia smartphones powered by Windows Phone 8.1 is the fact that the Lumia 630 offers 3G HSPA (21Mbps) connectivity, whereas the Lumia 635 comes with LTE support.
Apart from that, both Lumia 630 and 635 are similar when it comes to specs, so expect them to be powered by the same 1830 mAh battery that should provide up to 16 hours of talk time, up to 27 days of standby time or up to 58 hours of music playback.
It is also worth mentioning that Lumia 630 and Lumia 635 can be personalized with the Nokia CC-3079 casings that come in Bright Green, Bright Orange and Bright Yellow color options.