Sunday, January 04, 2009

Review: Nokia E71

The time a business mobile phone was simple and boring is in the past. Business and private are being united. The genuine corporate mobile companies such as the BlackBerry creators, aim more and more at the private user, whilst Samsung and Nokia in turn serve the business user Business cell phones of Samsung are found in the i-series. Nokia serves the business user with their E-series. In addition to a compact slider, the E66, Nokia has introduced the E71. Nokia business phones have a neat design and feature many functionalities. That's the reason more and more private phone users end up going for a mobile phone from the corporate segment.


First impression of the Nokia E71 handset
The Nokia E71 cell phone stands out for its efficient design. The package is carried out in red and white, and the handset is displayed. It's easy to recognize the Nokia E71 by its full QWERTY keyboard, the metal/aluminum coating and the slim design. Standard included together with the Nokia E71 are a battery charger, a headset, a pouch, a software CD and the users guide. The sleek back of the cell phone looks somewhat scratch-prone, however, it doesn't seem too bad, although sticky fingerprints are left behind on it constantly. Other than that, the cell phone has an attractive appearance.


QWERTY keyboard of the Nokia E71
The full keyboard the Nokia E-71 features, is rather small, yet operation is quite easy thanks to the round buttons. It does take time getting used to them, although with a bit of practice you should soon be able to type fast using two fingers. This facilitates sending text messages and e-mails with this phone and makes it more appealing. Thanks to the compact design of the keyboard, the Nokia E71's width has been kept nicely in proportion.

Nokia E71 with Symbian OS software
Nokia also chose Symbian as the operating system for the Nokia E71. Usually, this is the standard for the corporate E-series and the popular N-series of Nokia. The version used on the E71 is Symbian S60 3.1 Edition. The disadvantage of Symbian software is that it unfortunately tends to slow down the cell phone, which is what we experienced with the Nokia N96 for example. Surprisingly, the Nokia E71 doesn't suffer from any delay, the mobile phone works fast and smooth.

Nokia E71 Symbian smartphone
The menu has become more straightforward and simple when it comes down to graphics, which might be why it is faster. The structure and use of the E71 menu is similar to other Symbian mobile phones. The menu works via clear icons. In addition, installing external software is also enabled. New is the dual desktop; one for business use and one for private use. Backgrounds and shortcuts can be adjusted and added. Pressing the button on the main screen once changes the desktop. A nice addition!

Nokia E71 voice aid
The Nokia E71 supports voice aid. Not only voice dial, as we know from many mobile phones; the E71 offers a fully spoken menu. Recent calls, contacts and, for example, the time are read out loud. This menu is available at instruments and is very convenient for someone that is visually disabled. At the same time however, I doubt whether the Nokia E71 mobile would be a convenient phone for this person.
Nokia E71 3.2 Megapixel digital camera
The Nokia E71 phone features an integrated 3.2 Megapixel digital camera. Furthermore, the mobile phone also has a LED flash at its disposal, to enable shooting pictures in badly lit circumstances. The monitor is quite large and entirely used as viewfinder. The camera is quick in capturing a picture and the application start-up time is fast too. After capturing the picture it is not reproduced completely sharply on the screen which is rather annoying since it makes you think that you failed in capturing the object.

Taking pictures with the Nokia E71
In some cases the pictures turn out well, although certainly not always. If there is insufficient environmental light, the pictures become blurred very fast and they show a lot of digital noise. It is almost impossible, even in close-up mode, to capture an object from close-by. The camera does respond extremely fast, however, it seems like it skips focusing. In case of correct exposure and a larger distance, like a building in broad daylight, the pictures turn out reasonable. The camera leaves a lot to be desired and it is clear the camera did not have priority on this phone.
Nokia E71 Multimedia
Besides being a smooth business mobile phone, the Nokia E71 also features various multimedia applications. Media contains Realplayer, the camera, Musicstore, picture gallery, voice recorder and a Flash player. Music and video are perfectly reproduced on the E71. The media player looks fine and neat. The monitor is not that large, but is instead quite wide and this is very convenient for video files, since nowadays many wide screen films are available. The built-in speaker delivers a nice sound however, to fully enjoy your music, you ought to use the included stereo headset.

Nokia E71 memory
The internal memory of the Nokia E71 counts 110MB. The memory is expandable with the use of a microSD/SDHC memory card. Standard included is a 2GB memory card offering more room to multimedia files. If 2GB is insufficient, you can purchase a memory card with a larger capacity, since the Nokia E71 supports memory cards up to 8GB. Memory cards are placed on the side of the Nokia E71 which makes it possible to switch the card without having to turn the mobile phone off.

Microsoft Office support
Standard support for Microsoft Office files is not a superfluous luxury on a corporate mobile phone. Quickoffice is found in the menu, with which all Microsoft Office files can be opened or even created. The latter is not the case for all supporting Microsoft Office phones. In addition to Microsoft Office files, the Nokia E71 is also able to display Adobe PDF files. Viewing Excel files actually was the easiest to do. The monitor seems a tad too small for the other documents, which makes you have to scroll the whole time. However, opening and editing your files on the move has been made possible.

HSDPA internet on the Nokia E71
The Nokia E71 supports HSDPA and Wi-Fi. This makes Internet available for the user at all times. Thanks to the HSDPA support, exploring the Internet is appealing too whilst on the road, since it offers a reasonable speed providing the network is actually able to handle the speed. The built-in Internet browser works fine, although the wide screen monitor is not always convenient for reproduction of the Internet pages.

Nokia E71 GPS receiver
The built-in GPS receiver in combination with the Nokia Maps application can be used as navigation system. However, this does require purchasing a license beforehand. Finding the required satellites to stipulate the position takes a tad too long at times. Installing a different software program such as TomTom is also possible.

Nokia E71 battery
The included 3.7V 1500mAh Lithium Polymer battery is able to last for a maximum of 410 hours standby and a talk-time of 10.5 hours. The standby time exceeded the expectation; I was able to keep the E71 standby for 5 days with average use. This battery is definitely stronger than I am used to from other Nokia mobile phones.
Nokia E71 software
Nokia has included the well-known PC Suite software with the E71. This software offers copying files to and fro the Nokia E71, managing contacts, synchronizing the agenda and making back-ups, thus reducing chances of data loss. It is easy-to-use software, however, nothing new under the sun.

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