In yet another strike against Nokia’s new flagship smartphone, the company admitted today that its N8 phone is having power management issues for “a very small number” of users.

The issue in a nutshell: Some N8 users are reporting that their device no longer turns on. What’s worse, their phones won’t even charge properly — a clear sign that some aspect of the device’s power hardware is faulty.

Nokia assured customers that the issue is covered by its warranty — going so far as to bring out executive vice president Niklas Savander to discuss the device’s build quality (video below).

But while it’s nice to know that the issue is covered, dealing with a warranty replacement is certainly something no user will welcome. Hopefully Nokia will do the right thing and ship users replacement phones before they have to return the faulty phones. At least there won’t be any downtime for users with that method.

The issue is surprising given that the N8′s hardware was the one aspect of the device I was impressed by in my review. Nokia has historically made handsome and sturdy hardware, so I wonder what exactly is going wrong with these faulty N8s.

The company is stressing that only a small number of users are affected right now, which I certainly hope is the truth. The last thing Nokia needs right now is for its flagship smartphone to be a ticking time bomb.

Via BGR