This new Nokia device is boasting looks similar to some Blackberry phones; the Nokia E5 is an affordable alternative QWERTY messaging phone with one or two other features that may capture your interest. It has speedy web connections supporting its accomplished web browser and a full Ovi package which offer there services in a number of fields but its primary features include its superb messaging and e-mailing support. The E5 comes in a ranged selection of colours including an ice cold blue and more oddly brown.
Nokia are focusing the E5 on quite a wide market, they are trying to win over current Blackberry users with its affordability bettering its competition and its functionality close to matching it. The full QWERTY keyboard sits neatly beneath the 2.36 inch QVGA landscape display; the buttons are perfect fingertip size so they are easy to hit making it quick and easy to form messages and the screen is large enough to materialize web pages brightly and clearly; it can recreate up to 256k colours but the contrast ratio is pretty standard. The general design of the phone does hold similarities to the Blackberry Curve and Bold but it still has that Nokia feel; professional and functional. It runs the Symbian S60 OS and UI combination; quick page loading, smooth running and easy to use controls are the norm here, Nokia rarely fail to deliver a good mobile user experience.
The E5 carries WLAN and HSDPA/HSUPA web connections so getting high speed web access is no problem at all, you have full access to the internet and can manage all of your online accounts from the E5, live feeds for Facebook and Twitter are in place to keep you in the know when it comes to your friends status updates and latest tweets and Nokia have also made it possible for users to handle up to ten e-mail accounts from the device; Hotmail, Yahoo! Mail, Nokias free Ovi Mail service and other popular e-mail providers are all compatible including Exchange, Lotus Notes and Traveller. IM messaging is supported by WindowsLive Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, GoogleTalk and Nokias own Ovi Chat and a document viewer called QuickOffice allows you to view and edit Word, PowerPoint and Excel documents. You can also synchronize your calendar and contacts with your personal computer so the E5 can work in collaboration with your PC. So far we have established that this phone is perfect for business users and it hosts much of the same features as the Blackberry alternatives.
The Home screen on the E5 can be completely customized; your friends social network activities can be streamed straight to your home screen, your calendar and e-mail account can be accessed from here too and there is variety when it comes to background, theme and icon settings. The Nokia E5 possess a potent 5 mega pixel digital camera, it produces pretty good high resolution photos and can record DVD quality videos which can be uploaded to your social networks instantly, the LED flash performs well in low light conditions and acts rather well as a scene light for video capture. The phone has a full music and video player to accompany its FM radio receiver, multiple formats can be handled and playback quality is pretty good across the range. The phones memory can be upgraded via microSD card; it will take up to 32GB so you will have tons of space for music and video alike.
The question is, have Nokia produced a Blackberry beater? Or have they just churned out another boring mid-range device, it has much of the same functionality and looks almost as good, the E5 is reasonably priced and its colour variations will appeal to a range of users. In my eyes Nokia have created an efficient device focused on the business user, but saying that Blackberrys were originally produced for the business community.