Apple iPhone vs. Nokia N78
Apple iPhone
VS.
Nokia N78

Comparing the Nokia N78 (running on Symbian OS S60) and the Apple iPhone 3G (running on Mac OS X) is an interesting revelation as each smartphone excels in a particular area, namely: display and power vs. feature set.

On the surface, one of the most glaring differences between either generation iPhone and the Nokia N78 is that the Nokia is not a touchscreen phone while the iPhone, of course, is. The Nokia N78 is controlled using a built-in QWERTY keypad, while the iPhone has an onscreen keyboard.

Almost everything about the Nokia N78 is smaller than the iPhone 3G. The screen on the Nokia N78 is considerably smaller than the iPhone's (2.4" vs. 3.5") with lower resolution (240 x 320 vs. 320 x 480). Both smartphones, however, provide 16 million colors.
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The internal memory on the Nokia N78 is also considerably smaller than that of the iPhone 3G (70 MB vs. 8 GB or GB). And the talk time on the Nokia N78 is less than half of that of the iPhone 3G (260 min. vs. 600 min.). Oddly enough, however, the Nokia N78 has a slightly greater standby time (320 hrs. vs. up to 300).

But the Nokia N78 is also smaller where being smaller is an advantage, namely in the way of dimensions and weight, at 113 mm x 49 mm x 15.1 mm and weighing in at 101.8 oz. as compared with the 115.5 mm x 62.1 mm x 12.3 mm and 133 oz. iPhone.

On the flip side, amateur photographers will delight in the Nokia N78's 3.2 megapixel built-in digital camera, while the iPhone 3G (the so-called King of multimedia smartphones) is only 2.0 megapixels. And the camera on the Nokia N78 has a built-in flash and 20x digital zoom, while the iPhone does not.

We can't totally discredit the iPhone's claim of being the ultimate multimedia smartphone as, beyond the larger screen with better resolution, it also allows for much faster and higher quality video playback.

Along those same lines, despite losing on the issues of screen size, resolution, and internal memory, the Nokia N78 exceeds even the proclaimed feature-rich iPhone on features. Because you can't make 3G video calls, send and receive MMS messages and instant messaging, expand memory with an external MicroSD card slot, or listen to FM radio on the iPhone, but you can do all of those on the Nokia N78. The Nokia N78 also lets you customize your smartphone with themes and personalize your profile ID, while the iPhone doesn't make such facility available.

Both the Nokia N78 and iPhone 3G are HSDPA and GSM smartphones with Bluetooth version 2.0 support, built-in MP3 player, SMS messaging, 802.11 WiFi, a USB port, and of course 3G network support. Both phones also have a built-in GPS, though they each use different programs for maximizing use of it, namely: GoogleMaps on the iPhone and geotagging on the Nokia.

You can't discount the iPhone too badly for its feature set, however, as the new iPhone SDK and App Store empowers iPhone users with far more features than those that come built in with the device, while with the Nokia N78, what you see is pretty much what you get.