A Great Little Phone – Nokia E6 Unboxing and First Impressions

WOMWorld/Nokia has loaned me a Nokia E6 to evaluate. Here are my initial impressions and few unboxing photos. Hardware: This is one solid little phone. Mine is black with white and stainless steel trim which I think looks quite nice on this particular phone. The battery door and sides are metal and the front is all glass. The body of the phone appears to be a high quality plastic that is almost indistinguishable from cast metal.  The back of the … Continue reading

T-Mobile Astound (Nokia C7) Full Review

My two week trial of the Nokia C7/T-Mobile Astound is over. A big thanks to WOMWorldNokia for letting me get extensive hands on with this pre-release device, which is now available from T-Mobile USA for $79.99 after rebate on a two year contract. The off-contract/prepaid price is  $299.99. Here’s a wrap up of my experiences with what I consider (thanks mainly to the updated “pre-2.0” firmware) the best Symbian phone yet. The Astound is  newsworthy for a couple of reasons.  … Continue reading

Nokia E7 First Impressions

Click image to enlarge I received a Nokia E7 for review yesterday from WOMWorld/Nokia. I’ve been looking forward to some extensive hands on with this phone since I first saw it at Tech.Ed in Berlin last October. I got quite a surprise when I ripped off the wrapping and saw the box’s custom slip wrapper. It looked like regular Nokia packaging with an image of the E7 on the front. But the phone’s screen was displaying a Tweet I sent … Continue reading

E7 Near Release? New Video

WOMWorld/Nokia just sent me a a previously un-released video of the E7 along with a message that the E7 will be shipping “very soon”. The short clip (below) features Nokia designer Shungiro Eguchi speaking about some of the design ideas behind the phone. Update: the video has been taken down. I spent some time with the E7 at Tech.Ed Europe in November and was very impressed with the phone, especially the form factor and keyboard. It manages to pack a … Continue reading

The Nokia E73 – Quality Construction And A Great Keyboard

I’m been been enjoying the Nokia E73 loaner that I got at WOMWorld’s E73 Mode Beach Party Saturday. It’s a pretty and very useful little device.  I especially like the keyboard which I think is the best I’ve ever used on a pocket size device. The things that make it so good are: Single handed operation.  The phone and keyboard’s small size means you can easily hold it in one hand and reach every key, something that’s difficult or even … Continue reading

Nokia’s QWERTY Trio – Lots of Bang for the Buck

Last night Nokia announced three new moderately priced QWERTY phones that look very impressive. The thing that stands out to me is the amount of advanced functionality Nokia has crammed in at such low price points. There’s the $122 (list) C3 (top left), a  BlackBerry styled 2.5G S40 with WiFI, music player and WebKit based browser.  The $244 E5 (top right) is similar to the $469 E72 but with twice the RAM,  an even better keyboard and a bigger battery. … Continue reading

Here Come The Cheap Smartphones

Smartphone market share has been steadily rising for the last few years and I think that the growth rates are about to turn exponential. I’m not alone in this belief,  Nielsen predicts that smartphones will outsell feature phones in the US by the end of next year.  The main impediment to smartphone growth is cost.  Even in developed countries many purchasers balk at the average $400 that a typical smartphone commands.  But that’s changing thanks to open source smartphone OSs … Continue reading

So Long N900, Thanks For The Good Times!

I have to send the Nokia N900 loaner back to Nokia’s WOMWorld tomorrow. It’s a great phone or as Nokia likes to call it, “mobile computer” and I’m going to miss it. I’ve covered the browsing capabilities of the N900 quite bit here on WapReview but to summarize, the built in MicroB  browser is the best browser available today on any pocketable device.  The combination of 800 x 480 resolution, 3.5 inch screen, high performance JavaScript engine and full desktop … Continue reading