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Nokia E71 Smartphone

Last week Expansys shipped me a shiny new Nokia E71. This is a follow on to the popular E61/E62, and a significant step up from my E60 which also lacked 3G support on AT&T’s network.

I was thinking about getting an iPhone, but the poor battery life and lack of real keys were a problem for me. It turns out Joel Spolsky got an E71 too - maybe great minds think alike?

The Good

  • Great battery life with a mixture of voice, WiFi, HSDPA (3G), and GPS usage. It only needs to be charged every third day.
  • Some very solid applications are available including Mail by Google, Google Maps with GPS integration, and a decent Web Browser (based on Safari/KHTML). It plays Flash in the the browser, so YouTube doesn’t need it’s own application. The device supports Java (J2ME), Python, and Symbian C++ applications so there is a big market.
  • Camera. Whilst users of the consumer Nseries phones may have a better camera in their phones, the 3 megapixels works pretty well for me. I was able to post to Flickr without downloading another application.
  • Bling factor! It’s lighter and slightly thinner than an iPhone. It’s stainless steel outer shell is also a nice touch.

The Bad

  • Application market is likely to grow faster in the iPhone and Windows Mobile world. Nokia need to improve their development tools and documentation. Python support is a nice touch but they can do better.
  • Locking the device can be a pain since the default option when you tap the power button is to switch off. Perhaps there is an application that can hook this button?
  • Headphone socket is 2.5mm instead of the regular 3.5mm size. It means you need to carry a convertor or a second set of headphones.
  • Flash Lite 3 seems to be integrated with the File Manager. This can be annoying if the Flash doesn’t fully support a device without a touch screen.
  • No touch screen. Sometimes it’s nice to be able to do things with a stylus or your finger. You won’t miss this if you are coming from a Nokia phone.

So that’s it for my E71 review. I’ll update this post as I get more experience with the device.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 5th, 2008 at 9:38 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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Brian Lyttle - portrait photo by Sarah Gray ;)Brian Lyttle runs Source Foundry, a consultancy that specialises in Web development and content management. When he's not writing code and experimenting with the latest tools, you can find him honing his photography skills or helping Bill to improve his Mazda Miata.

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