Review: Nokia N-Gage QD Snap-on Speaker
Version Reviewed: n/a
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A lot of the time I praise games and products that "do exactly what they say on the tin". In the case of Nokia's N-Gage QD Snap-On Speaker extension unit, if that was the only criteria, then it would be a pretty superb product. Unfortunately it's more a missed opportunity that leaves a bad taste of unfinished business.
The speaker snaps on over the top of your QD (there isn't a variant for the classic N-Gage). Lifting up the plastic tab, it connects into the power and headphones socket, and the plastic moulding fits around the rubber edge. Here's the first thing that has me worried - the QD Rubber ring is notorious for breaking away from the body of the QD at both the top and bottom... where the covers are hinged. Will the snap-on speaker increase the chance of this happening? Only time will tell, but when the speaker is fitted, the flap is left in the open position.
The colour of the unit, black, is designed to match the QD Silver edition. Which makes for stylish PR pictures, but the majority of people will have regular slate grey units. Lets hope they're not compulsive in colour matching.
By using the top jack plugs, the speaker has a good solid fit in the unit, but this means that you lose access to the sockets, and have to rely on some engineering to power your unit. There is a pass through socket for your AC charger to plug in, so the speaker can stay attached while you charge, but what's infuriating is that the speaker requires a AAA battery to work. There's no built in rechargeable battery that could use the AC power, neither does the QD power the unit when it's plugged in.
More disastrously, you can't use the QD as a phone when the speaker is attached. It uses the hands free/headphone socket, the QD then thinks a microphone is plugged in as well as a speaker (this is how the bundled hands-free headset works). With the microphone connection going nowhere in the snap-on speaker circuitry, you can hear who's calling you, but there's no way to have a conversation with them.
With a microphone in the speaker unit, this could have made a powerful and loud speaker-phone attachment, as well as a good games enhancement. At the very least, I would have expected a pass-through hands-free socket in a similar way to the AC power.
All these faults represent a shame - the speaker itself, with on/off and volume controls, is a good sized package and games on the QD do sound all the better for it. But there's very little to recommend the snap-on speaker to anyone - you'd be better off with a good set of headphones... which will be a lot more discrete when you're out and about.
Reviewed by Ewan Spence at