Nokia's Physical Phone Tests

The BBC has an amusing little video and story describing the many physical tests that Nokia puts its phones through. There's no mention of usability testing, but I assume Nokia does a lot of that too.

The video:

An excerpt:

Mobile phones have each navigation key pressed half a million times to check wear and tear.

When Nokia introduced games onto some handsets, it found certain buttons were being pressed more often and harder than others.

So different pressures are now applied and the select button and number keys which are used more often get pounded a million times.

Another test aims to check how handsets perform when put in and pulled out of trouser pockets.

A trouser leg is used to rub the devices up and down 750,000 times over a period lasting several days.

This is a much about testing for dust build up as it is about marking and discolouration.

Another repetitive test is manually plugging in and removing the charger for each handset at least 6,000 times.

A group of people are employed do this because, unlike machines, humans do it differently every time.

Engineers also mimic the scrapes and scratches you might get from keys or purses in a handbag.

The handset is put in a revolving container with sharp items to check how it performs.

Link: Testing times for mobile phones.