Thanks, Spence, I recently was gifted my first Smartphone and I quite like the idea now I actually have one.  I wasn't too interested before, just needing a phone to make calls or send texts, but now I have Win 8 installed on my main PC, and I've had time to play with a Smartphone, the idea of a Win 8 phone has become somewhat more appealing... and Nokia certainly do make good phones.  

My current phone is an Android and connects with my PC using 'Join Me' software that came with it, which is fine and quite usable, but a Win 8 phone would sync with my PC so much better, I think.  I don't know that I'd go with a plan/contract, though.  While my current landline/ISP provider could bundle it into my current package, I think I'd rather have a PAYG that costs me only when I make a call, send a text or download data.

That's another advantage!  Apart for being easier on the eyes, I have big hands and prefer something I can get a decent hold of, not to mention something that's not too fiddly.  One of the reasons I didn't like mobile phones in the first place was the fiddly buttons all being too close together.  My current Smartphone has aleviated that problem, and with its bigger screen, the Lumina 920 with Win 8v sounds perfect.

My wife and I have had our Lumia 920's for about 2 weeks now and I can't say enough positive things about it.  I used to believe I would never leave my beloved Blackberry (nothing in the world does email like BB imo......and of course BBM is just sexy!) but here I am a Lumia 920 owner and couldn't be happier.

As you said ID, the best smart-phone I've ever owned as well.  Live-tiles truly is innovation over the standard icon-grid from droid or iOs devices and I'm finding it actually is a rather large time-saver as well.

The fact that my wife can use the touch-screen with her gloves on and not freeze her pretty little fingers (it gets cold up here in Canuckistan!) is also a plus.  MS Office on my phone.........HUGE plus.  Skydrive, about as seamless and painless as "the cloud" gets.

Hands-down the best phone UI in existence......period.  The screen on the lumia (considered to be HD+ with its "better than HD" res of 1280x768) is FAST!  There is absolutely NO lag on that screen.....ever.  This makes browsing and scrolling around in IE 10 a dream, especailly when you can take advantage of the superfast LTE network speeds.

The phone itself is PENTABAND which means it works on more carriers/networks and my wife and I were lucky enough to get phones of the first batch shipped to our carrier which ended up being carrier-UN-locked.   Now when I travel I simply pop another SIM-card from a different carrier into the phone and boom I have a phone to use in another country.  Bonus! 

Nokia also has (better than most) free apps including Nokia Maps (which is on par with google maps in my opinion) and Nokia Drive (great turn-by-turn GPS software).  For both of those apps you can download maps so the apps can be used in your more frequented areas without incurring higher data costs.  There are quite a few very useful free Nokia apps (I won't go into them all) but one they just added a few days ago is called "PhotoBeamer".  This app allows you to point your Lumia 920 at any internet-enabled screen and via QR-code technology "beam" any picture on your phone to said screen.  The absolutely simplest way to "show" family/friends a photo from your phone, give it a go ID you'll love it! 

Anyway,  I could rave and rave about this phone.......suffice it to say it has integrated with my Exchange environment and my Win8 desktops/notebooks so easily I wonder if Microsoft has secretly stolen the "consumer-usability-and-ease-of-use" crown from Apple somehow!  hehe

@ the_Monk.  Thanks for your comments on the Win 8 powered Lumina 920, it sounds more and more like it will be my next Smartphone.  Yeah, I've only had my Telstra Smartphone a few weeks, but it just seems to be lacking somehow.  While it makes and receives calls and texts well enough, and is connectable to my PC via the 'Join Me' software, I'm thinking a Win 8 phone would be the better option, and that Lumina screen just looks elegant as well as sumptuous.

Let's hope so... I'd like to hear some MS fanbois for a change. 

That'd be 'minimalist HD'  - "real" HD is 1080, not 768 .... ...

i had a white 920 in my hands the other day and came this close |<->| to getting one. i currently have an iphone 4s and that 920 is very appealing. i'll probably get one for an early Christmas gift to myself in the next few days. if i do, i can sell my 32 gb iphone and come out ahead money-wise on the deal. the only reason that MAY stop me from getting the 920 is the fact i have 3 Bose headphones designed for the iphone.

The equalizer and dolby headphone settings on the Lumia 920 do a pretty decent job of boosting selective frequencies for audiophiles like myself.

Does sirius work on the device?  I my iphone, but am due for an upgrade in Jan.  Either its iphone 5 (from a 4) or something else.  Any additional thoughts would be appreciated.  Thanks!

Well I had a close up look at the Lumina 920 and it sure is nice, but for the time being price is the killer, for me at least.  My telco has them on contract for 60 bucks a month over 24, months minimum price $1,449... not including calls.  Nah, that's too rich for me.  I could pick up an unlocked one for $749.95 at an online dealer I've used before.  Yeah, well, the sales rep reckons that if I wait 6 to 8 months, they'll be available as PAYG units for about 450 to 500 bucks, which is alright... it would likely have taken me longer than that to raise the $749, so I'll just sit back and wait a while.

For that price the calling should be a teleport face to face....

Its very aesthetically pleasing piece of hardware...definitely up there with the iPhone, when it comes to cellphone design. 

Personally i would still prefer iPhone cause of its smaller size. Its funny how things change btw, i remember times when Nokia 8310 was the shit, because of how little it was... 

Yeah, another typo that got by me.  However, I was in quite a deal of pain and discomfort at the time, and as hard as I tried, well I messed up.  We had not long gotten home from our fortnightly shopping, and by the time we'd lugged it all up the stairs and put it all away, I was pretty much knackered.  Anyway, I will correct it to put it in context and reflect the actual price.

For mine, it surpasses the iPhone by far and leaves Apple quaking in its boots.  As for the size, well I held it in my hand and it felt really good... and that large screen is top notch for viewability and getting things done.  Brilliant.... and ooh, how I hate having to wait for new toys. 

I want it now, wahhh, wahhhh, wahhhhh.

Island dog, Couple questions if you don't mind..

1. is your pic of the lockscreen or the main screen once un-locked?

2. Does it let you see calendar events (on lockscreen or just main screen) and if so how many/how far in advance.

3. I have heard the live tiles are resizable, if true, just how big can those go?

Thanks for any answers. Am really considering upgrading to this from my iPhone4, have been holding out on upgrading since the iPhone5 came out, just waiting to see what this phone was like. It looks beautiful!

Rich and infamous first. Toys.......ASAP!

1.  That's the main screen un-locked.  

2.  Yep, you can choose what to display on the lockscreen.  My calendar is clear at the moment, so I'm not sure how far it goes.  The Live Tiles also display events.

3.  There's 3 sizes.  The small and medium sizes you can see in my image, and the big size spans across the screen.