Nokia Unveils "World's Thinnest" QWERTY Smartphone

Barence writes "Nokia has revamped its E-series of business-oriented smartphones with two new models, including the 'world's thinnest' QWERTY device. The GPS-enabled E71 is the slimmer successor to the Nokia E61, with a thickness of only 1cm. It's HSDPA-enabled, offers switchable home screens, and gives a claimed 'two full days of heavy, heavy use.' The E66, on the other hand, is a slide-phone with a conventional numerical keypad and a built-in accelerometer. At the same event, Nokia also gave a tantalizing hint about its plans for an iPhone rival, with its senior vice president saying, 'we will have touchscreen devices coming this year.'"

Comments

for a quick fix fine

[jacquesm]

But I don't see anybody coding up the next installment of gcc on these keyboards :)

And the speed with which some of my (female) friends can SMS using the shorthand method is simply amazing.

Personally I use my phone to call with, the camera function is nice to have (and a better camera would be a good reason to upgrade the phone) but after playing with the internet features a bit I really don't find much use for them.

The 'qwerty' bit is nice (same as with the blackberry) but it would not be enough to get me to switch (and the keys will be *even smaller*).

Re:for a quick fix fine

[ShieldW0lf]

The 'qwerty' bit is nice (same as with the blackberry) but it would not be enough to get me to switch (and the keys will be *even smaller*)

Hey, if you don't mind having the hammers that make the letters jam when you type too fast, stick to what you're using. Personally, I think there's a real need in the world for technology that makes people type slower, and I'm sure it's going to take the world by storm. I'm filing my fingernails to points in anticipation this very moment.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[jacquesm]

hehe, a wolf that is sharpening his nails to points will have me go the opposite direction :)

I'm trying to remember when I last used an actual typewriter but I can't pinpoint it any better than 1982 or so...

Re:for a quick fix fine

[CastrTroy]

I agree. Having a full qwerty keyboard would be nice, but in this instance, and many others, it just means that the actual number keys are quite a bit smaller. I'd rather have number keys I can actually press rather than having an extra 10 cpm typing rate on 160 byte messages.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[agallagh42]

I'm trying to remember when I last used an actual typewriter but I can't pinpoint it any better than 1982 or so... That would by my grade 9 typing class for me. 1988-89. Coming up on 20 years ago... damn I feel old.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[deathlyslow]

BAH I graduated in '89. You insensitive clod.
There now you don't feel old... I do.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[sm62704]

And the speed with which some of my (female) friends can SMS using the shorthand method is simply amazing.

SEE?! I'm not the only one here with female friends!

As to the actual topic, this isn't the phone for me. As I'm neither female nor gay I don't carry a purse. That means I have to keep my phone in my pocket, which means that I need the keys covered. It has to be a flip or a slider.

The one I have now isn't, and it's a pain in the ass. It once dialed 911 (who promptly returned its call, to my extreme embarrassment), because it takes a few seconds for the keys to lock.

This morning it answered a call I dodn't want to take.

Attention Nokia and other phone manufacturers: some of us are neither female nor gay. We need key covers!

Re:for a quick fix fine

[ShieldW0lf]

That would by my grade 9 typing class for me. 1988-89. Coming up on 20 years ago... damn I feel old.

Funny, I remember grade 9 typing being a prerequisite for computer courses, and thinking at the time how stupid that was. But it probably did more good for my career in IT than any of the high school computer programming classes I subsequently took.

BTW: You are old.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[drsmithy]

As to the actual topic, this isn't the phone for me. As I'm neither female nor gay I don't carry a purse. That means I have to keep my phone in my pocket, which means that I need the keys covered. It has to be a flip or a slider.

Flips and sliders are just more stuff to break and waste space. The so-called "candybar" format is the best use of space and with either auto-locking, or just a habit of pressing the appropriate key combination to lock the keypad whenever you stop using the phone (after 15 years of Nokia phones, "Button"+* to me is simply an iautomatic reaction).

As for QWERTY phones, I just don't get it. How often does anyone who supposedly needs that degree of "connectivity", actually require a real keyboard (or rough approximation of one) when there isn't a laptop near at hand ?

(Loving my new Nokia E51. It's a bit ugly, but Nokia _finally_ made a proper successor to the 6310i.)

Re:for a quick fix fine

[xSauronx]

...That means I have to keep my phone in my pocket, which means that I need the keys covered. It has to be a flip or a slider. I have a kyocera strobe. My timing on cell phones is awful. Long story short the only option i had last time i got a phone was US cellular. They didnt have the MotoQ yet, i couldnt afford the blackberry phones that they carried, and the strobe was the only thing I *could* afford with a qwerty keyboard. I text *a lot*

I know some people dont get why, nevermind that. This phone flips open to reveal a keyboard (its a thick, ugly phone, to be honest) and the keys on the face outside are quite small, so its nice to lock the keypad...

but I dont. It has a "quick menu" that doesnt let you access a number of features that would be nice to have "quickly."
I can edit the meny to allow me to quickly change useless things like my wallpaper and ringtones, set an alarm clock, and change color themes: i cant imagine why anyone would want to do this so often that they allowed it to be on a shortcut menu.

I can also view my scheduler, change my ringer (lights, vibe, ring) send a text and get the calculator. All relatively handy stuff.

Other options are 2 button presses away anyway, so im not sure why theyre available. I CAN NOT use the flashlight or lock the keypad without several keypresses, and its fucking idiotic.

Of course, kyocera has nicer phones now with a slide-out qwerty keyboard, but that doesnt do me a damn bit of good right now :-/

Re:for a quick fix fine

[agallagh42]

Funny, I remember grade 9 typing being a prerequisite for computer courses, and thinking at the time how stupid that was. But it probably did more good for my career in IT than any of the high school computer programming classes I subsequently took.

BTW: You are old. Agreed. Grade 9 typing turned out to be the single most important and useful class I've ever taken. Touch typing makes everything about any desk based job infinitely easier.

BTW: Thanks for confirming that. :p

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Have Brain Will Rent]

You had typewriters!?!?

We had to pound moose antlers into antelope hide using logs for the pounding... a different antler for every letter too... and don't even get me started about having to chew the hide smooth first or what we had to do for carbon copies.... kids, sheesh, don't know how lucky they got it I tell ya.....

Re:for a quick fix fine

[snoyberg]

You think that was hard... at my school, we had to use WINDOWS!

Re:for a quick fix fine

[speedtux]

And the speed with which some of my (female) friends can SMS using the shorthand method is simply amazing.

Nimble fingers like that are... desirable in a girlfriend. "Mmmm... can you show me again how you would text 'supercalifragilisticexpialidocious'? Oooh, yeah, baby."

Oh, wait, look who I'm talking to, this is Slashdot. Never mind, you wouldn't understand :-)

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Anonymous Coward]

-1 Unfunny

Re:for a quick fix fine

[jabuzz]

I agree totally, the netbook concept with a Bluetooth link to my phone does it far better for me.

As an aside what's the reception like on the E51? One of the major pluses of the 6310i (you'll prise it from my cold dead hands along with my Model M) is it's ability to get signal where other phones fail. One needs something with a bit more than GPRS to mate to my Eee 901 as soon as I get my hands on it.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Mr. Mikey]

BAH^2...

I started grad school in 1989. I graduated high school in 1980 (and have been programming computers since my TRS-80 Model I days in 1978).

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Anonymous Coward]

-1 Unfunny -1 No sense of humour And at my school we got the opportunity to use Windows 2.0 (it sucked and you've made me feel old).

Re:for a quick fix fine

[sm62704]

Locking doesn't cut it for me, even with the keys locked it answered a call this morning I dodn't want it to. I haven't had a slider but I've had flip phones since the old Motorola analog Star Tech and never had a problem with any of them breaking. The only two I had to send back were a POS LG (and its replacement was equally buggy) and a Razr that I dropped in the toilet.

As for QWERTY phones, I just don't get it.

me either, altough I'm sure there's a certain "cool" factor at play there, especially when you open up your little pocket computer and surf CNN.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[CastrTroy]

I agree. I've had it with flip and sliding phones. Everybody I know with a flip/sliding phone, and every one of my phones that did the same eventually had the keypad or screen stop working. I just went back to a candybar phone after my last sliding phone died. I actually like the fact that there are no moving parts, and have no problem remembering to lock the keypad when I'm done with it.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[raju1kabir]

The so-called "candybar" format is the best use of space and with either auto-locking, or just a habit of pressing the appropriate key combination to lock the keypad

Agreed. I have the E61i, and I keep it in my pocket all the time. It's not a problem, in fact sometimes I worry that I've lost it and have to tap my pocket to check that it's still there.

As for QWERTY phones, I just don't get it. How often does anyone who supposedly needs that degree of "connectivity", actually require a real keyboard (or rough approximation of one) when there isn't a laptop near at hand ?

With this phone I can go on unauthorized vacations with only a carry-on bag and know that I can still deal with problems that come up at the office. Having a keyboard that provides for reasonably-quick shell typing is well worth it in my opinion.

And on a day-to-day basis, it means I can go to the park or the bar when my colleagues are still working, in cases when all that's expected of me is being in rapid email contact.

I have some problems with the E61i but the form factor ain't one of 'em. It's been great for my lifestyle.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[trooperer]

moose antlers? Luxury. Back then we used to have to get up at six o'clock in the morning, look for stag beetles and use their antlers...

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Bloodoflethe]

Get off this man's lawn already!

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Bloodoflethe]

I remember when they released Windows RG. Ahhhh, good times...

Re:for a quick fix fine

[morcego]

You do realize some people actually use their smartphones for other things than phone calls and SMS ? Like remote computer maintenance (ssh) ?

Trust me, even if you can find a ssh client for a non-qwerty phone (and you can), it is simply impossible to do anything.

I love my Nokia E62. To a point I never even bothered to upgrade to a E61 (I don't need a camera ou Wifi).

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Bloodoflethe]

How long is eventually? I've been using this same Razr since it came out. I have even been fairly rough with it, but it works just fine. The flip phone before that was working fine after 4 years.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[CastrTroy]

If you really need to do remote maintenance, wouldn't it be nice to get a laptop with a data card?

Re:for a quick fix fine

[morcego]

Yeah. I have one of those (actually, I use my E62 as a "data card"). Unfortunately, it doesn't fit in my pocket. It is not small enough to be non-intrusive when I go to the supermarket.

Also, why would I need to carry something as big as a laptop (even a 12" one) when all I need is ssh ? Carry a laptop and a cell phone, since I have to receive calls.

This little baby here makes my life much easier, but I know I'm the exception to the rule. Most people (98% ? Maybe more ?) get smartphones just for SMS and e-mail (if that!). But I'm glad they do, since it drives the price down quite a bit.

As a side note, I also read books on my smart phone. The screen is very nice for it, even if I don't need the qwerty keyboard for that particular task.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Elsapotk421]

BAH I graduated in '89. You insensitive clod.
There now you don't feel old... I do.

BAH I graduated in '89. You insensitive clod. There now you don't feel old... I do. Just to make you feel older I took typing in 8th grade class in 1999.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Crazyswedishguy]

As for QWERTY phones, I just don't get it. How often does anyone who supposedly needs that degree of "connectivity", actually require a real keyboard (or rough approximation of one) when there isn't a laptop near at hand ? From personal experience, I can say that some industries have a lot of use for them. It's no surprise that most banks and consulting firms issue Blackberries (sometimes even to interns!). This is not another thing to attract employees. In general, when your company issues you a blackberry, that's a bad sign (=> they expect you to be connected at all times, including weekends).

Personally, I find that having a Blackberry (no advertising intended) helps me stay connected in a positive way to add more value to my company. If the client emails on a weekend and I'm in a position to respond, that's good. I don't necessarily see it as a bad thing, as I can perform my job better with one. Because my company only pays for the data plan (not the phone itself), I can have my personal email and other applications I want on it. If I had to carry a corporate blackberry in addition to my personal phone, that would suck big time.

To more specifically address your question, I frequently need to reply to work emails while I'm not at work, while I'm traveling (for business) or while out on a sunny weekend day. Having a full-keyboard email-capable phone (Blackberry Curve) is helpful.

Can't wait for the new iPhone!!

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Anonymous Coward]

How in the world did this get modded insightful? I mean, yeah, it's funny, and I laughed. Please mod it that way.

Seriously, one wonders what the mods were drinking the night before sometimes...

Re:for a quick fix fine

[PitaBred]

The Internet features are great if you travel for a living. I don't have to hunt down an open wifi (or even worse, pay for one). I just connect to my phone and I'm able to get my emails sent and received, get everything done, no matter where I am, as long as I have cell service.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[PitaBred]

Man, and here I am thinking I was old just being born in 1980... ;)

Re:for a quick fix fine

[Anonymous Coward]

Of course it's insightful, it's just you're too young to remember moose antler printing. Now get off my lawn.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[jacquesm]

I'll see your moose antlers / stag beetles and raise you stone tablets...

Re:for a quick fix fine

[CastrTroy]

Of course there are exceptions, but for the most part, flip and slide phones break really easily.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[shellbeach]

I'll see your moose antlers / stag beetles and raise you stone tablets... Cuneiform all the way, baby ...

First written language and the first typed language. (It's a little known fact that the Sumerians invented the first typewriter. Half the keys looked like this:

>-

and half looked like this:

|
^

It made texting a breeze ...)

Re:for a quick fix fine

[wvmarle]

Actually I'm using my typewriter maybe not on a daily basis, but certainly weekly. It is a great device to quickly get printed letters on a pre-printed form. Or when you have to fill in a multi-layer form, e.g. bank remittance forms or shipping documents. Everything becomes so much more readable compared to hand-written, and some organisations require printed letters.
Those multi-layer forms work with matrix printers fine (that's why they're still being made, in case you were wondering), but then only if you have to print dozens or hundreds of the same, for a single sheet it's not worth the effort of setting it up.
It may be a niche, but there is still a market for typewriters, and I think this niche will remain pretty much forever.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[redstar427]

At my school we had to WASH windows!

Re:for a quick fix fine

[musicalwoods]

I'd rather have number keys I can actually press rather than having an extra 10 cpm typing rate on 160 byte messages. I rarely have to type numbers on my phone. Everyone I want to call is already in my contact list. Sure I come across a number every once in a while that is not in there, but that is only about once a month (and when that happens, entering the contact's name takes longer than the number). I primarily enter letters into my phone, and as such would much rather have a letter layout that I already have memorized than try to become fast at keypad letter input.

To each his own.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[mpathy]

But for the long traveling home, I use the predecessor of this smartphone, the Nokia E61i, to try some coding stuff out.

You can install Python on the Symbian Platform, and with a additional syntax highlighted editor - of course also programmed in python for symbian - it is much smaller than have always a laptop.

Also I have installed a Putty, and a IRC client for it, so when I recognize I am at home in a few minutes, I upload it to my home computer and then write further :)

Such things are already possible, if you want, and will get easier and more convinient when Linux arrives of the mobile phones.

If the only problem is the keyboard on this smartphones, why not using this holographic keyboard stuff already available?

http://www.thinkgeek.com/computing/input/8193/

You find them also much cheaper if you look a little bit. But the "Star Trek" - feeling you got when you use them, makes such a thing worth. Also the people in the bus who thinks you are a time traveller :)

If its too expensive, they are also physical, foldable bluetooth keyboards with the end-size of a cigarette box.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[mpathy]

With a E61i and Putty on it, and the many public access points (+ open wifi networks *g*) you can do SSH stuff much more convinient and cheaper.

I also use my Nokia for python programming stuff while travelling with train or bus. Python for Symbian S60 rocks! Plus and syntax-highlighted editor :)

When I got internet connection and need to know something my colleges couldnt answer, and have no computer around, I use my IRC client on my phone, MIRGGI.

Re:for a quick fix fine

[marcuz]

what do you want to use number keys for? once a week for adding another contact?

Re:for a quick fix fine

[UnixUnix]

Aren't long fingernails a hindrance?!

Actually, practice made my thumbnail pretty agile on BlackBerry Pearl's MultiTap condensed keyboard. It's faster than on a QWERTY.

All things considered, I'm happy to be a man :)

Re:for a quick fix fine

[UnixUnix]

I bought a leather holster for my BlackBerry, but then I put it on a lanyard -- and have yet to use the holster.

Or make an inadvertent 911 call :))

Nothing To see here...

[aeskdar]

Slash advertising at its best... Come back when you tell me it runs linux.

Re:Nothing To see here...

[jacquesm]

spot on the guy 'barence' actually links to a page of his *own* 'pcpro' site!

Re:Nothing To see here...

[mpathy]

It doesnt but you can install a putty on it, in the meantime, so as I do, until I have a usable linux smartphone with the manufacturing quality of a Nokia phone.

Why Why Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

Why can't the people making these devices with "full QWERTY keyboards", actually include the row for numbers. Having to switch modes to type numbers and then have all the alternate symbols on the number buttoms (!@#$, etc) hidden elsewhere is such an incredible pain. I would deal with the device being an eight of an inch longer in order to actually include a full keyboard.

Re:Why Why Why?

[BacOs]

I've got an LG Voyager and it's got the row for numbers.

Re:Why Why Why?

[jonfr]

Sony Ericsson has one with normal keyboard.

http://www.sonyericsson.com/cws/products/mobilephones/seethephone/x1?cc=is&lc=is

Re:Why Why Why?

[Ilgaz]

In fact if there is a bluetooth "numpad", you can easily use it with these smart phones. They allow ordinary bluetooth desktop keyboards to be used.

Re:Why Why Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

No, that's still missing the row for numbers. There's only 4 rows, and the numbers are superimposed over the jkl area.

Re:Why Why Why?

[agallagh42]

I've got an LG Voyager and it's got the row for numbers. The upcoming HTC Touch Pro will have a full five row keyboard, with number row and space bar both in the right place.

Re:Why Why Why?

[jacquesm]

htc phones have just about the worst battery life (both usage-per-charge and total battery life span) of any phones I've seen.

Another nice 'feature' is that nobody seems to stock spare batteries.

Re:Why Why Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

The Nokia E70 had a row for numbers, and much more. This device sucks in comparison. I only got a cursory look at TFA, but it looks like they are selling out on their own innovations and going with the stupid blackberry look.

Re:Why Why Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

My IBM Selectric has a full keyboard.

Re:Why Why Why?

[T-Bone-T]

Why would you want to carry around a number pad? That seems to be close to the epitome of inconvenience.

Re:Why Why Why?

[flerchin]

My two year old HTC Tytn has a stock 1250 mAh. Its battery lasts at least 2 days under heavy use. You are wrong.

Re:Why Why Why?

[Dtyst]

For full qwerty-keyboard with number-row and excellent wide-screen there is Nokia E90 and the older (but cheaper) Nokia 9300i too.

Re:Why Why Why?

[Dtyst]

Actually there has been a Nokia phone with full qwerty-keyboard (and number-row) since 1996: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_Communicator

Re:Why Why Why?

[foxx1337]

2, Q, W, E and S? These people got it wrong, eveyone knows it's W, A, S and D.

Re:Why Why Why?

[flosofl]

Anecdote fight! Anecdote fight!

Re:Why Why Why?

[dotancohen]

Why can't the people making these devices with "full QWERTY keyboards", actually include the row for numbers. You want dedicated keys for numbers? ON A TELEPHONE?!?

Re:Why Why Why?

[Achromatic1978]

Yeah, it's not like you can't get them on eBay or anything...

My wife got a 2400mAh battery for hers, came with a new form fitting battery back, and now lasts the best part of a week in heavy voice usage + push email.

Re:Why Why Why?

[Waste55]

another alternative on some phones is to hold down that key for a short time then the number\symbol will be used instead of the character. Not ideal, but a step better.

Re:Why Why Why?

[jacquesm]

ok, so your experience does not match mine. I have two friends with HTC phones/organizers (the windows variety), both are less than 6 months old and have had to have their batteries replaced, even when new they don't last much over 6 hours.

can you have a look at your battery and tell me if it has any markings on it that would help me to identify the batch/manufacturer ? Then I'd scrounge around for a set of those, I'm sure I'd have two very happy friends :)

Re:Why Why Why?

[flerchin]

I appreciate your considerate tone, especially when my post came off as rather brash.

It's got a Celxpert
Model: WIZA16
Rating: 3.7 VDC 1250 mAh
P/N 35H00062-03M

I hope that helps. I would be quite annoyed with my device if its charge only lasted 6 hours.

Re:Why Why Why?

[jacquesm]

thank you for taking the time & trouble to dig that up, next time I'm in Amsterdam I'll have a good look at what is in those phones.

Re:Why Why Why?

[dunkelfalke]

try htc universal.

Re:Why Why Why?

[Anonymous Coward]

It would make sense to use a different keyboard arrangement from qwerty anyway, since you have to learn to type again on a qwerty phone anyway, you might as well learn a more to use a more efficient (both temporally and spatially) design. A full keypad is a good thing, but the arrangement seems to me like a marketing-driven decision or a lack of forethought,

Touch Screens

[oahazmatt]

we will have touchscreen devices coming this year Fine. As long as their not too small, are easily manageble, not too cluttered or prone to mis-cues or a sudden lack of input.

If you can't promise that, keep it off my phone.

Re:Touch Screens

[smittyoneeach]

As a happy Nokia E61 user, a touchscreen is not terribly important. I like this unit, though I'd rather get it sans the camera.
The E61 fueled my Google Reader addiction, helping me get through boring classes and keeping me entertained while wondering when my flight was actually taking off.
The S60 software has the simplest setup for use as a wireless modem I've ever encountered, and the T-Mobile GPRS service has been, while not exactly cheap, extremely useful and effective.
Not to be too glaring a shill, I'll give my Nokia Ex1 experience 2.5 snaps out of 3 in a "Z" formation, and strongly consider upgrading to this svelte gadget.

Re:Touch Screens

[JCSoRocks]

The thing I really dislike about touchscreens is the lack of tactile feedback. My friend's phone doesn't have a touchscreen but its got "touch buttons" that basically act the same way. It's *really* annoying. You can inadvertently hit a button without knowing it because there's no way to feel a button press. Personally, I think that that's the reason we don't see a slew of touch sensitive PC keyboards. The lack of tactile feedback would make typing awful.

Re:Touch Screens

[Iron Condor]

... and strongly consider upgrading to this svelte gadget.

Is it actually "svelte"? The article speaks of "thin", but it only shows a face-on photograph. If the "thin" part is some kind of selling point (i.e. worth a press release) why don't they show us how thin it is?

Re:Touch Screens

[Anonymous Coward]

Nokia did buy a company that provides tactile feedback for touchscreen, and Nokia have said that their screens will provide some sort of feedback when touched. How well it works remains to be seen. I assume first models won't be that good.

Re:Touch Screens

[grgyle]

My E61 is slightly over 1/2" at its thickest (top) narrowing to under 1/2" at the bottom. I love the form factor.

My only complaints with the device, which I otherwise love more than any phone I've used, are:

--It has a smooth featureless metal housing with no "grippy" ridges, and has a tendency to slip out of my hand or loose pockets if I'm not careful.

--The UI is very slow, it takes a zen patience to navigate the menus, and actively punishes rapid selecting with random results (you can't reliably cue up input from reflex and wait for the UI to catch up).

Button Masher

[Sterrance]

One reason why I'll stay with the iPhone is that it is near on impossible for a 6 foot 2 person nearing 220 pounds to work those tiny keys. Strangely though I do fine on my IPod touch especially thanks to spell check.

Re:Button Masher

[Anonymous Coward]

or you could lose some weight...

Re:Button Masher

[AmiMoJo]

Having used similar devices with small keys and being 182cm tall myself, I can assure you that they are not a problem even for people with big stubby fingers.

The trick is that the keys are not flat, but rounded on top and require a small but important amount of pressure and travel to operate. Thus the hard part of your thumb or finger can easily press the right key, and the soft flesh around it does not push the neighbours.

It's a lot better than the iPhone interface (which is similar size "keys" but flat) and traditional predictive text because it doesn't rely on any kind of prediction or spell checking, so is much less prone to errors. You can also type non-dictionary and unusual words as easily as common ones, and not having to check if the phone picked the right word as you type speeds up the rate of entry and makes it easier to just think about the message rather than how you are entering it.

Re:Button Masher

[raju1kabir]

One reason why I'll stay with the iPhone is that it is near on impossible for a 6 foot 2 person nearing 220 pounds to work those tiny keys.

I'm considerably taller than you and I don't have a problem with the E61i keyboard. For the first couple of weeks I was really slow and error-prone and worried I was going to hate it. But now I can barely remember what that dark and somber period was like.

Re:Button Masher

[vrai]

"The fingers you have used to dial are too fat. To obtain a special dialling wand, please mash the keypad with your palm now."

As someone who's 6'1" and 170 pounds, I'd suggest that the problem isn't entirely Apple's fault. Though it is strange that the iPhone doesn't have a fat fingered option, it's a software keyboard after all.

Society's perfectionistic standards are just....

[Anonymous Coward]

going overboard. First ultra thin models giving young girls a false sense of their bodies and the phones. How do you expect the young phones to feel when they see these thin phones? Huh?

Looks good

[Idimmu Xul]

I'm forever after a phone that I can use ssh with easily for when I'm on call, so a full qwerty keyboard is mandatory. This one is actually looking good with an easily accessible @ / and . characters. Does anyone else have any other recommendations?

--
Free Playstation 3, XBox 360 and Nintendo Wii

Re:Looks good

[jacquesm]

there was a *much* older nokia phone with a slide that exposed a good size keyboard, a friend of mine used it quite a bit to keep an eye on a large serverfarm.

here is an image of what the phone looked like:

http://www.mobileburn.com/media/nokia/9300/9300_open-IMG_9425.jpg

also there is this old ./ thread:

http://ask.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=05/09/08/0214240&tid=215

Re:Looks good

[wkk2]

I like ssh on my E61 but I wish certificates could be stored on a third party smart card for a little extra protection going through customs. I hope the E71 has a version without a camera since that is a show stopper. With the added GPS, maybe it won't crash on maps.google.com like my E61.

Re:Looks good

[weston]

Well, the iPhone is a great --- kidding! :)

The E70 looks pretty good. I had its predecessor (the 6822) for a while and quite liked even that.

There's also a good review here. ;)

I do happen to think the iPhone is great, but if you want a good keyboard, it's probably not what you want, and I found that the fold out keyboard seemed easier for me to use than most on mobiles.

Re:Looks good

[rho]

The Blackberry Curve is pretty good. It's a pain to get to the pipe symbol in MidpSSH, but it's doable.

Re:Looks good

[Incster]

I'm forever after a phone that I can use ssh with It's been around for a while. http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=iphone

Re:Looks good

[phorm]

My question is: What software do you use? I remember looking for a WinCE SSH/Putty client without luck awhile back.

Re:Looks good

[niko9]

Your link to the phone is dead.

Perhaps you meant this one: http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=iphone

Pirate not included.

Re:Looks good

[halfnerd]

You want the Nokia E90, or maybe the next Maemo-device from Nokia which is apparently finally going to include a GSM chip.

Re:Looks good

[drsmithy]

I'm forever after a phone that I can use ssh with easily for when I'm on call, so a full qwerty keyboard is mandatory. This one is actually looking good with an easily accessible @ / and . characters. Does anyone else have any other recommendations?

A Nokia E51 and an Eee PC.

Seriously. How often are you "on call" when you don't have a bag with enough space to throw in an Eee ? To say nothing of how much more _useful_ you'll be with something approximating a real laptop with a real keyboard and screen than the usability abortion that is a mobile-phone-sized QWERTY keyboard and screen ?

Re:Looks good

[drsmithy]

Here is the current version.

Re:Looks good

[Zelos]

My Samsung i600 has been pretty good. The new version (i670/Blackjack 2 in the US I think) is better, apparently. All the common special characters are on the keyboard (using the Function key).

It's a Windows Mobile Smartphone, personally I prefer WM Smartphone to Series 60.

Re:Looks good

[Anonymous Coward]

Isn't that just an old version of what is now called E90 Communicator?

Here's the link: Nokia E90

Re:Looks good

[Cederic]

I've had an E70 for a couple of years now.

It's pretty nice. Could do with a larger screen (but it's a relatively small phone), the nipple is wearing out and battery life while using wifi isn't great, but apart from that it's done me very very well.

Re:Looks good

[Anonymous Coward]

Both the Nokia E61 and Nokia E61i have ssh capabilities over both GPRS and Wifi using the S60 V3 version of putty.

Re:Looks good

[CastrTroy]

Not only that, wouldn't it be nice to be able to be on a call, and use your computer at the same time.

Re:Looks good

[Yer Mum]

Unfortunately, in Europe at least, it's discontinued and there's no successor. A shame as I want a phone which allows my to connect to my company's VPN and the fold-out keyboard was just the job, much better than having a impractical BlackBerry-type design which is unfortunately catching on; you have to drag around a big phone which at the same time is impossible to type with because it's got tiny buttons.

Re:Looks good

[Anonymous Coward]

the nipple is wearing out

Sounds like my wife ...

Re:Looks good

[bryxal]

Add My vote to the Curve. I use it for SSH into servers and set top boxes while on call and the phone is wonderful to use

Re:Looks good

[Kazymyr]

There's this:

http://www.pocketputty.net/

Re:Looks good

[Kazymyr]

...and then there's this too:

http://choung.net/mToken/

Re:Looks good

[nrdlnd]

I have the E61 and it's a good phone. It has Wifi and synchronizes with Exchange that I have in my workplace. So this is a phone, a calendar and an adressbook and has also some other useful functions. And it has a keyboard even if it's spartan it's much better than regular phones. If the E71 has the same functions and is thinner then it's a very good 'phone'. A camera could be useful sometimes and the E71 has it but not the E61. To be able to separate "business" and "home" functions seems nice also. I miss it doesn't use Linux instead of Symbian but bless it doesn't use Windoze.

Re:Looks good

[Kazymyr]

...and this:

http://www.codebrowser.org/

Re:Looks good

[ya really]

-- Free Playstation 3, XBox 360 and Nintendo Wii [free-toys.co.uk]

What the heck is this a the bottom of your post? Are you pandering for spamsites? Don't be a deadbeat, there's better ways to make money out there besides whoring out your slashdot account. Every time someone mods you up, it's like getting free advertising. Slashdot really needs a mod for "spam"

Re:Looks good

[Anonymous Coward]

Yup, you'd be exactly right.

Alternative models are E61, E61i and E70.

Re:Looks good

[Anonymous Coward]

[citation needed]

Re:Looks good

[dbIII]

Unfortunately dropped my 6820 a bit too hard and went back to the 6800. Huge thing but the larger keyboard and longer battery life helps. It also has more memory at 5MB and no camera to fill up memory.

Re:Looks good

[Anonymous Coward]

I have an E70. It is not that great.

The biggest let down is the software. It is
really sluggish. It can take up to 3 seconds
just to go from one SMS to the next as an
example. In general the responsiveness is just
poor all over.

Nokia's support is pretty lack lustre. Firmware
upgrade availability seems to vary from country
to country (eg in Australia, only really old extra
buggy firmware was available. Had to download
software to change phone minor model number to
be able to access newer firmware).

It's a shame. It could have been a great phone.

Re:Looks good

[Anonymous Coward]

the nipple is wearing out

Sounds like my wife ...

Maybe you should try the other one occasionally?

Re:Looks good

[Anonymous Coward]

They have updated that version to include everything you could ever need (3g, HSDPA, WLAN, GPS etc)

http://www.nokiausa.com/link?cid=PLAIN_TEXT_311295
It also runs a ported version of Putty natively.
http://s2putty.sourceforge.net/
http://sotchenko.ru/e70.jpg here is s2putty running on an older, smaller Nokia phone.

Great...

[Wireless Joe]

...for the rest of the world. Now if we could just get a carrier to stock Nokia again in the US.

Re:Great...

[Espectr0]

AT&T will carry this phone, according to this

Re:Great...

[Ilgaz]

I was desperately wondering why people in USA doesn't take Nokia serious but after months of watching and comparing US market versus Europe, I decided people has _right_ to see iPhone as second coming of Jesus.

How come they never shipped any good thing to USA market? You know what? It will take years and billions of dollars for Nokia to get taken serious in USA. Even technical people get amazed when I show specs of my Nokia E65 (older E66) not knowing Nokia can produce things like that.

I was wondering how come people get impressed by push IMAP in iPhone while my 9300 from 2003 can do it without even asking and I noticed lots of people doesn't even know there is a smart phone (laptop?) like 9300 exists.

Re:Great...

[Thelasko]

How come they never shipped any good thing to USA market? I have a theory. It's because Nokia doesn't play nice with the carrier pricing models. Most notably, they include Wi-Fi on their phones. Phone carriers in the US subsidize the price of the phones based on charging high rates for data. Wi-Fi enabled phones prevent them from doing that.

I've noted this before on Slashdot and have been modded into oblivion by what are presumably Apple fanboys claiming it's the iPhone's interface that made it popular in the US. That may be true, but I still stand by what I said.

Re:Great...

[Anonymous Coward]

Guess what -- Nokia would love to play big in the US. It's no small secret that they can't because of the carriers here. Practically every phone sold in the US goes through carrier channels. And if the big carriers don't like Nokia's phones or don't think they will appeal to enough people, they're DOA, no matter how cool the phone is.

So go complain to AT&T and T-Mobile. Seems like the only Nokia phones they actually want are low-end featureless ones. It would be awesome to see a phone like the N96 come to AT&T.

Yes, more phones are coming to the U.S., but the rest of the world will have had them forever by the time we get them.

Re:Great...

[supercrisp]

I'm an Apple fanboy, but you are no doubt correct. Insightful I'd say, but my mod points expired yesterday.

Re:Great...

[kaiser423]

It's because US carriers decided that they could make more money by crippling phones and then selling the features back.

Nokia's didn't have cool features, because they weren't allowed by the carriers!

Re:Great...

[222]

This is absolutely true. Well, from what our Nokia rep tells us, its more of a fear of VoIP, but its all really the same thing in the end I suppose. That being said, I think the Blackberry Bold may make me a Nokia -> BlackBerry convert...

Re:Great...

[Colin Smith]

How come they never shipped any good thing to USA market? Cos the US telcos won't let them. Nokia supplies the mobile telcos, they can only sell what the telcos will buy.

The US mobile market is owned and you are their bitch.

Re:Great...

[F34nor]

The whole e-series is basically identical except for form factor. Like a folding QWERTY? E70. Like a full keybaord E90, E61, E62, E61i, E71. Like a Slider. E65. The E90 is awesome but beefy. You can pick em up used for around $600 USD in the Gulf after people buy them becasue they are the most expensive and return them becasue they don't need a laptop to call their friends.

Re:Great...

[Cynicor]

While I don't know anything about US specific pricing structures, this can't be the only reason as here in Aus we have plenty of Nokia phones subsidised by the carriers. These carriers still manage to charge outrageous prices for data, voice and sms (25c/sms).

Re:Great...

[wvmarle]

In many other markets (Europe, Hong Kong to name the two that I am familiar with) it is also practice to heavily subsidise handsets. That is nothing new.

And to further undermine your argument: isn't the iPhone also WiFi enabled? It was when I checked last. And since when is WiFi really an issue? Only since a few years at most, so that can't be a big reason of stopping operators to carry Nokia phones. Before, mobile data (certainly in the mobile backwaters of the US) was not much of an issue. SMS may be but WiFi is not an alternative for SMS.

The iPhone is also not just popular in the USA, it is also in Hong Kong. The release of the 3G iPhone made front page(!!) of the main English language daily here! It's just a phone! Or at least I'd think so... Nokias are also widely available and popular here, so it's really not just the pricing model that does it.

That said, it makes me wonder really why Nokia is so poorly available in the USA.

Re:Great...

[F34nor]

It is simple. US carriers have entered into a devils bargain with the subsidized phones for contracts. The carriers demand control over their networks and more importantly will only carry phones that are bad enough that people will be desperate to upgrade them 2 years later. This has created a cadre of American mobile users who are more interested in initial capital cost rather than technical quality and low price service for the duration. Also because the 4 carriers (read not a free market) are terrified of free WiFi combined with VoIP. This means they will not carry phones that will support WiFi and VoIP. Iphone you think, um well they have locked down a BSD based phone so it cannot multitask for the simple reason they do not want a VoIP app resident in memory. In fact Skype has refused to release mobile versions because they "cannot guarantee quality of service over mobile networks." in a world with WiFi enabled phones this is a lie has illustrated by Fring et al.

This comes to the basic fact that WiFi if implemented freely and openly (let alone WiMax) could be the end of mobile phone service for most metropolitan users. Imagine a world without channels in the spectrum just one open cloud from top to bottom, imagine multi-spectrum chipsets and antennas that could be peer to peer nodes relaying from phone to tower etc until it reaches the nearest fiber. Imagine each peer buying an selling service as needed from any other node on the network, each peer interaction based on a system of free market a micro payments for the bridging service. Once again oligopoly cripples technology for pricing.

Re:Great...

[ras]

I have often read the Nokia engineer's whinge about how they make phones with tons of features, then the US carriers ask they all be removed. I presume the simply don't bother trying to sell phones in the US that require them to put a whole pile of effort into removing features.

Apple is about to be bitten by the same thing, only in reverse. The DRM, the "thou shall not run applications in the background", the "thou shall only sell software through Apple" - all those things aren't consumer friendly. I presume its just Apple crippling their phones at fit in with the carriers wishes, just like Nokia has to do.

Only there is one difference. Nokia doesn't sell crippled phones to the rest of the world, only to the US. Consequently, they dominate the world market. From what I can tell, Apple is going to try and sell their US crippled phone to the world. If so, they are in for a bit of a shock.

I personally would buy an iPhone V2, if I could use it with a blue tooth keyboard and run applications on it just like I can with the Nokia. Nothing out of the ordinary - just things like download my pod-casts in the background over WiFi with my favourite 3rd party podcast app, run a GPS tracker in the background when bushwalking, a keyboard monitor - all pretty simple stuff really which works now on my Nokia. But I can't. Sort of kills it, really.

Re:Great...

[Thelasko]

Sorry, for some reason I thought the original iPhone didn't have wi-fi. That explains why others are so impressed with it and I wasn't.

Re:Great...

[Anonymous Coward]

What do you mean by "stock"? Do US carriers have networks that reject certain phone models?

Re:Great...

[Ilgaz]

Japan too. My poor E65 (compared to E90 etc.) was treated like I stole it from Nokia protype lab in various places.

I have very serious concerns about iPhone in Japan. I don't think that 2MP junk cam will do macro to read QR code, Apple itself will be ignorant to include QR code reader, Softbank is secondary class network (It is the Voda JP) which was kinda forced to market when Vodafone crashed.

Oh why Vodafone crashed in Japan? They didn't care about specifics and unique needs of Japanese market. Hear me now Apple? Well iPod will save them.

Re:Great...

[UnixUnix]

I don't know about this... My Data Plan costs $20 a month, for unlimited Internet access including use of my BlackBerry as a tethered modem. How much less could it possibly be?

I should think you have a good point about WiFi... but such phones are currently becoming available. For one thing, BlackBerry models with WiFi and 3G are coming out of the pipeline (in a month or so).

To appease the Apple fanboys :) the latest poll I saw had Blackberry vs iPhone 51% to 49% -- a difference quite likely not statistically significant. [Phew!]

Who the hell buys Nokia anymore in the USA?

[Anonymous Coward]

Seriously, Nokia? My dad uses a Nokia. It's like saying you own a computer made by IBM. We really need to get off their lawn.

Re:Who the hell buys Nokia anymore in the USA?

[sm62704]

If you are so impressed by "cool" and the lack of "cool" that if someone over a certain age uses something then it can't be useful to you, you are pathetically uncool.

Cool people don't care about cool.

Re:Who the hell buys Nokia anymore in the USA?

[Albanach]

Let me guess, you own a Motorola?

Re:Who the hell buys Nokia anymore in the USA?

[Anonymous Coward]

And you are so obviously from of United States.

Touch Screen != Success

[imstanny]

People and companies are attributing the success of the iPhone to its Touch technology. Yes, it was the first one to come out with it in a successful design, but the iPhone is succesful mainly because it capitalizes on Apple's software platforms. The iPhone brings together iTunes, iPod, & Telephone, and Web capabilities in a unified architecture that is based on OSX format. A Nokia or Blackberry with a touch screen will not be able to support anything remotely close to what Apple is offering. Yes, they will look similar and offer 'me-too' capabilities, but just b/c users can touch the screen and the phone can play music, doesn't mean it will be remotely competitive to the iPhone.

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[drinkypoo]

It's also worth mentioning that Motorola has had touchscreen phones literally for years (including Linux-based phones!) and they definitely don't have anything that's any threat to the iPhone.

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[peragrin]

After playing around with both an iphone and several of it's So called rivals you can tell the manufactors don't have a clue.

the itunes integration is a bonus. The big difference is the hardware/software integration. using the so called rivals was like using PalmOS circa 2000. it did nothing that couldn't be done then. the iPhone is almost interactive in how you touch the screen it responds.

Apple doesn't make the greatest innovations, they simply make them usable.

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[jellomizer]

It is not features but how easilly it is to use the existing ones. I had a samsung sync phone, A lot of features good battery and overall a good phone. But for me to access the calculator I needed to go to Apps->tools->next->Calculator. While it is a commonly used tool it is not as common as the other tools I have setup to be quicked accessed. On the iPhone I just press the calculator icon and I am there. Or I can rearainge the icons to be where I want them. It is actually a well designed phone while it may not have all the features that other phones have, it made my life a little easier.

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[Kelbear]

Bingo, while the touchscreen may be neat, it's certainly no substitute for physical feedback. In particular I'd like some music control buttons so that I don't need to activate the touch screen first in order to see the options to change the volume or track. Using buttons on pretty much any other mp3 player won't require me to focus my eyes on a screen to manipulate the controls. I was able to operate my last mp3 player(iriver clix 2) with my /chin/ on an armband while running, I can't do this with my ipod touch.

I hope that future devices will remember that just because there's a touch screen on the face, doesn't mean that buttons along the side are a bad idea.(Maybe a slide-out keyboard to boot?)

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[Anonymous Coward]

Nokia realizes this, and is working hard on their Ovi services and the Nokia Music Store.

But the actual device is important too, and I'm afraid the first Nokia touch device is disappointing. I've played with the prototype, and it's merely "ok". Not enough to blow away the iPhone.

That said, they do have other phones that, IMHO, blow the iPhone away in terms of cool things you can actually do with the phone. The interface isn't as nice, but the features are much better. A beautiful successor to the N82 is coming out around the same time as the Touch device, and it's gorgeous. A truly stunning OLED display.

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[Toll_Free]

You want the HTC Wizard / Cingular 8125.

Slide-out QWERTY
Data (gprs / edge / 802.11b/g)
volume control on side
7+ programmable function external keys
Bluetooth

No on board gps, have an external unit for that. Phone has enough oomp to run Garmin XT or TomTom functionally, and run the bluetooth on top of that to the external GPS unit.

Runs windows mobile, has a fairly large hacking background.... LOTS of support on the internet.

Someone else said HTC had suck battery life. Depending on how many and quality of background process apps running (your today screen, so to speak), wifi / data left on 100 % of the time, etc., I get 2 days at a time out of mine.

It's an old device, but I really like mine. Touch screen, does everything an IPOD will (and so much more... I don't have to hack my phone to install a program I want, and I can program my own software as well), but has WiFI as well.

YMMV

--Toll_Free

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[Mattsson]

IMHO, the itunes requirement is the biggest weakness of the iphone.
Also the main reason why I never got an ipod.

Nokia and Sony-Ericsson have rather badly designed software for syncing the calendar, phonebook and such, but at least I can connect them in mass-storage mode and copy music, pictures, movies and software to/from them with any file-manager, or simply remove the flash-card and use a cardreader if I happen to not have one of those proprietary cables at hand.
The biggest downside with most SE and Nokia phones is that they usually don't use standard mini-usb connectors, which is really dumb design.

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[Tom]

You're right that it isn't the touchscreen.

I don't think it's the software, either. That's just part of it. It's the user-friendliness. The iPhone is easy to use, it integrates well with everything else (that's the software part) and it has all the right features in the right places. One example I occasionally mention is conference calls - setting one up on an iPhone is dead simple. Setting one up on a Nokia - according to people who've done it - is just a little short of voodoo.

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[Yer Mum]

Most wireless phones in the Nokia's N series beat the iPhone feature by feature, it's just that Nokia's marketing department in the US seems incapable of getting this across to anyone.

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[ratboy666]

Actually, the "success" of the iPhone is attributed to it being an Apple product. It certainly does not replace the Blackberry.

And, as to replacing Nokia? Good on Apple if they can. But... where is the $40 iPhone?

Which leads me to a question: just how are you defining success?

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[mdwh2]

The iPhone brings together iTunes, iPod, & Telephone, and Web capabilities in a unified architecture that is based on OSX format.

It appears to be a common Apple myth that the Iphone did this. In reality, convergence of the telephone, portable music, Internet access (at 3G speeds, btw), along with things the Iphone still doesn't offer (video recording) happened years ago. It's standard - even on dirt cheap phones.

Of course, the myth itself probably attributes to the small success the Iphone has enjoyed, as lots of people here appear to have bought it, thinking that no other phone offers Internet access. That, and all the free advertising the media seems to be giving Apple (this is the first Nokia story I've seen in ages, and even that has to pipe in a spam-ad about Apple; not to mention the hype the BBC give it) - it would be hard for them not to sell. But their market is still tiny compared to Nokia.

A Nokia or Blackberry with a touch screen will not be able to support anything remotely close to what Apple is offering.

I'll bite - what does the Iphone do that no other phone does? (And please, save me from the inevitable "It Just Works", "It's better! It Just Is!" replies...)

Re:Touch Screen != Success

[Anonymous Coward]

It's not like Nokia hasn't had its share of working prototypes of touch screen gsm + 802.11b wlan phones built around a strongarm processor shot down by market analysts almost a decade ago. The technology is not new but it was too expensive in the past.

Maybe it is for the better, as the planned os was definitely from the dark side.

About that home screen switching...

[cupantae]

It would be nice to have unix-like workspaces on a phone. If it had swap space 3 times the size of the RAM then I could nicely switch between writing messages and browsing the web without the bother of closing one. Does anyone know if android has anything to this effect?

Re:About that home screen switching...

[athakur999]

Symbian-based phones definitely have this capability, at least my 5 year old Nokia 6600 does. While in an application, I can hold down the "menu" button and it will show me task switcher that will let me go back to the menu and start another program without closing the first one and swap between them. I'm sure the limited memory of the phone will stop you at some point but I've had 4 or 5 applications running at once at times.

Re:About that home screen switching...

[dago]

er, phones running Series 60 (back from Nokia 7650 in 2002 to N95 today, including all Exx ) can multitask. They may not be as powerfull as other small devices, but it's no problem to run a few programs at the same time

Re:About that home screen switching...

[Constantine XVI]

On my BlackBerry, I can hit Alt+Back to tab through open apps, or hit "Switch Application" from the menu key for the same effect. All the apps keep running.

Re:About that home screen switching...

[SCHecklerX]

if you 'red key' a running app on a blackberry, it puts it in the background. You can then assign the task list to one of the convenience keys (left, on my phone). You can then easily flip-flop from writing memos, to looking at web pages, ssh, etc. You can even do all of this while talking on the phone (but I don't recommend it...data becomes dreadfully slow when using voice, even on the edge network).

Re:About that home screen switching...

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes. And when the internet browser runs out of memory, Symbian kills background apps without any warning.

Re:About that home screen switching...

[jrumney]

Windows Mobile does this too. If you need a process to be doing work in background, create a service (does Symbian have such things?) but it'll drain your battery pretty quick.

Re:About that home screen switching...

[Anonymous Coward]

Switching modes is a different thing than switching applications.
Mode switching in this phone refers to "having a work-mode with email, office apps etc on your home screen and having a home-mode with music player, camera etc on your home screen"

E-serie

[Dionysus]

I got a E-65 for work (the company gives us a cellphone instead of assigning us a deskphone), and I love it. The only thing I don't really like is that it has a camera. I think it's a phone that many /. would like to have if it came without the camera. (I say, lose the camera and include a GPS instead). I noticed that the E-66 (the successor) still has a camera...

Re:E-serie

[drinkypoo]

Personally I want the VGA-video Multi-Megapixel super-tiny liquid-zoom-lens camera, in a RAZR-size phone. Running Linux. With 2+GB MicroSD. Is there anything like that out there? Bonus points for quad-mode GSM, but I'd consider going to sprint maybe. :/

I'm an edge wireless customer until the end of the year. AT&T just bought them. Ma Bell is baaaaaack...

Really? World's Thinnest QWERTY?

[CrankyFool]

I was wondering about this -- my Blackberry Curve (8310) doesn't actually feel like it's thicker than 1cm. So I looked it up -- it's 0.91cm thick (0.36"). How is the F71, if it really is 1cm thick, the world's thinnest?

Re:Really? World's Thinnest QWERTY?

[m0nkyman]

Um, no. It's at least 1.5cm thick- http://www.blackberrycurve.com/brains/learnmore/specs.jsp

Re:Really? World's Thinnest QWERTY?

[jandrese]

I wonder if the GPP wasn't including the height of the trackball in his measurement?

Re:Really? World's Thinnest QWERTY?

[CastrTroy]

It may be thin, but personally, I'd go for a little thicker, and have a much more useful device. Sure it's not a smart phone. But I'd rather have a dumb phone, and smart computer.

Re:Really? World's Thinnest QWERTY?

[maglor_83]

Because the Blackberry Curve is 1.55cm thick

Re:Really? World's Thinnest QWERTY?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the BlackBerry 8310 is 15.5mm thick.

http://na.blackberry.com/eng/devices/device-detail.jsp?navId=H0,C221,P583#tab_tab_specifications

Re:Really? World's Thinnest QWERTY?

[Anonymous Coward]

I was wondering about this -- my Blackberry Curve (8310) doesn't actually feel like it's thicker than 1cm. So I looked it up -- it's 0.91cm thick (0.36"). How is the F71, if it really is 1cm thick, the world's thinnest? Maybe it's just the keyboard that's 1cm thick?

But

[Skraut]

I'm still waiting for a company to come out with a Dvorak smartphone.

Re:But

[bloobloo]

Dvorak? Smart?

Oh, the other one.

Re:But

[Ilgaz]

(actual keyboard changer/driver)
http://nokia-9210-software.epocware.com/InterKey.html , it is very old but proves that it can be done on Symbian.

http://www.soft32.com/download_159680.html
"PopOnTop Keyboard 1.05
Pop the keyboard on top at the click of a side button. Keyboard layouts from Qwerty to Dvorak, full screen or part, large keys or small, upright or sideways - even design your own!"

I bet there are better solutions but it is really hard to find "Dvorak" in mobile phone thanks to that guy named Dvorak.

That is the bonus of being able to install anything you like unlike some other device claims to be smart ;)

Re:But

[morgan_greywolf]

That's nothing. I'm still waiting for a smartphone that supports at least 3 flavors of IBM EBCDIC! Now get off of my lawn!

Re:But

[Firehed]

(insert crack about iPhone's virtual keyboard that can be rearranged to whatever your thumbs desire)

Re:But

[quizzicus]

I'm still waiting for a company to come out with a Dvorak smartphone. You may say so now, but what will you do when the type bars in your smartphone jam? What then?

Next iPhone clone from Nokia?

[Fri13]

And same time Nokia release very low-budget commercial from non-exist phone.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rW3rAmwn3d4

Re:iPhone rival

[Anonymous Coward]

I thought it was just rabid Apple fanboys calling it the Jesus phone. Hm. Certainly no-one else calls it that, not even the majority of Apple users.

Prepaid...

[fprintf]

Call me when a US prepaid plan (e.g. Tracfone, Net10, Virgin) offers these. I am done paying in advance for minutes that I never use and for the times my cellphone sits idle. I guess I don't chat so much anymore to pay $40+ a month.

E65 owners, I tell you the real deal about E66

[Ilgaz]

It has 256 MB of RAM compared to our 64MB. Evil them.

I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[F34nor]

I have been using the e61 for some time and it is fantastic. Wifi in a phone more than a year before the iPhone. The only thing it lacks is a tab key and it misses it badly. I just went phough phone buying hell for my father and got him a Centro (mostly becasue he is a technophobe who has had a palm, handspring, or treo for over ten years. ) I have been using the iPhone and a V3xx for the summer and all of them basically suck cock compaired to the e-series. Touch screen is cool but add no functionality for me and somewhat diminished typing experience. Oh had why the fuck doesn't the keyboard go to landscape in half the iPhone apps? Anyway none of you chumps will ever see this phone anyway becasue the US mobile phone companies are a ass licking oligarchy based on reduced function in returned for increased prices.

http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=iphone

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[JCSoRocks]

Sounds about right... I don't have any modpoints though and you insulted Apple so you'll probably just get modded flamebait. Sorry!

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[Anonymous Coward]

The review by maddox is obsolete now given the new firmware fixes and the open platform for development. And the google maps app that apple bundles with the phone kicks e-series buttocks.

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't hold back, tell us what you REALLY think.

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[T-Bone-T]

If you were a good mod, you'd mod him flamebait for "cock sucking", "ass-licking", and "chumps". If you can substitute brands and still feel slightly offended, it is probably flamebait.

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[rokp]

You can use Ctrl-I instead of TAB key on E61 (at least in putty).

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[wkk2]

On the E61: Ctrl and i will work for a tab in some applications.
Escape isn't nice either Ctrl [ with [ on the chr key.

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[T-Bone-T]

Hey, dumbass, THIS is flamebait, not what I just posted, asshole! Am I allowed to speak here without someone using their mod points to try to censor me?

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[PottedMeat]

I don't really care which is better but that page was funny as hell. Thanks!

PM

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[F34nor]

I think you just made me cum in my pants. So both thank you and no thank you.

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[F34nor]

Don't hold back, tell us who YOU really are (at least within a generally anonymous fourm.) And by the way the reason that the world fucking sucks is becasue ass clowns like you have no fucking balls and don't say anything of value.

Re:I've said it before and I'll say it again...

[F34nor]

According to the Woodcocks-Johnson test I spell in roughly the 28% percentile but my vocab is in the 98% percentile. It sucks when you know apodyopsis means but have no idea how to spell it without the internet.

Looks good but...

[thammoud]

Symbian is a really awful operating system. I had the E61 and it used to crash and freeze all the time. I thought it was the phone and then I bought the N95 and the freezing and crashing continued. I will never buy a Nokia again until they fix the OS.

Re:Looks good but...

[hirschma]

Same here. My E61 will crash and freeze if messaging is open in the background. They have memory leaks or something; it really isn't much good at doing anything other than being a phone.

No more Nokia for me, not until they fix my E61. Not holding my breath :)

Re:Looks good but...

[Ilgaz]

All Nokias have firmware update option, either on phone, on desktop or service center. It is like insisting to use iPhone first ever released version while Apple fixes load of bugs.

If you have anything in Symbian, you are expected to update its firmware. The stock firmwares sometimes are horrible. I got my E65 updated in service center today, freaking thing became 2x faster.

Re:Looks good but...

[hirschma]

The E61 sucks *with* the last released firmware, it just sucks less. They never did ship a fully stable device, and I see no evidence that they fixed the E61 issues in any successor devices. Again, no more Nokia for me.

jh

Re:Looks good but...

[snarfies]

Really? Because I've had an E61i for around six months now, and it has NEVER crashed or frozen, not even once.

Mind you, there are 1) different versions of the Symbian OS, as well as different versions of S60 (the gui). The E61/E61i both use S60v3, dunno what version of Symbian OS is under that. I have pretty recent firmware though. Full stability, so far. Best phone I've ever owned.

Re:Looks good but...

[Cederic]

Strange, my E70 has locked up on me twice in two years.

I've had my car electronics crash on me more than that..

Re:Looks good but...

[Yer Mum]

I suggest you download the Nokia Device Software Update program (Google it), most problems which cause Nokias to crash are fixed by about 3 months after launch, then after that come regular updates which improve speed, etc...

In particular the N95 had an update which went from version 12 to 20 and improved things greatly.

Re:Looks good but...

[Terrasque]

My N82 have been perfectly stable after newest software update. I had first firmware released before upgrading, and the phone restarted in some cases. As others mention here, grab the nokia updater and keep phone updated :)

Re:Looks good but...

[maglor_83]

Nokia don't write Symbian, Symbian do. Nokia adds Series x0 on top. Similarly, UIQ is added on top for several Sony Ericsson and Motorola phones.

Re:Looks good but...

[Anonymous Coward]

Had your carrier put a custom firmware on it? I've been using an E61 for a year or so and I've never had it crash. It might have frozen once or twice, but I don't remember it happening.

Re:Looks good but...

[Anonymous Coward]

It's fairly normal for the early releases of any Nokia phone to suffer from the odd crash or freeze but normally within a very short time new SW updates will cure these problems. This is normally worst on those that use the very latest sub-variant of S60. Normally down to a rush to market. People want the latest items the additions to a OS make but not the faults(of course) that occur due to the rush to implement them. Its a difficult balance and one I think Nokia doesnt do so well with. Any delays though and the HW is seen as old too.

Whats up witht his form factor

[Altus]

I don't understand the popularity of this form factor. If you want a qwerty keyboard it really needs to be a flip/slide open style. Mixing a keyboard with a keypad is not a very good idea since you end up with a cramped keyboard and a difficult to use keypad. Not only that bu phones like this end up with half the screen real estate that the iPhone does and they are very large overall. I just don't understand the popularity.

Id rather have a phone that is a bit thicker that has a comfortable qwerty keyboard and a large screen. Id be willing to do my numeric dialing on the screen to get that.

Re:Whats up witht his form factor

[Meorah]

Its the best form factor for people who want to pocket business phones. side-sliders or side-flips work okay, but they're bulkier and less "biz-designer friendly."

The person who wants to buy an E71 is not interested in watching movies on their phone, as they can watch movies on their 60 inch HDTV at the house or their widescreen laptop if they're stuck on the road. If you want huge touchscreens, you don't want Nokia E-series phones. They're for business people and compete with RIM and the WM-based handsets, not the iPhone.

Re:Whats up witht his form factor

[Altus]

I dont see the advantage. "Big" screens are for more than just watching movies. It should be obvious that editing a document or looking at a web page benefits from a larger screen.

The keyboard is extremely cramped as well. The only benefit it provides is being a bit slimmer than a slider style phone but it ends up being wider and taller without any of the normal advantages that a wider and taller phone would normally provide.

Its honestly not about the touch screen its about the terrible ergonomics of those keyboards and the small size of the screen. The iPhone isnt really a perfect design for this kind of business use either. That LG iPhone knock off looks like it would be pretty good, form factor wise, but of course its not a smart phone at all.

I get that these are supposed to compete with the black berry but I don't think the form factor makes very much sense on those either. I watch people cram their thumbs in there to try to use the keyboard and its just not worth it.

Re:Whats up witht his form factor

[SCHecklerX]

Try typing on your flip/sideways phone with one hand and get back to me. I do this all the time on my blackberry (cue the masturbation jokes). Seriously, thought. It is nice to use a handheld device with one hand while eating, looking at a google map, browsing almighty zeus, etc.

Re:Whats up witht his form factor

[Zelos]

It's a tradeoff, really. Thickness is an important dimension for phone pocketability, slider keyboards are generally thicker.

One other advantage is that the keyboard is always instantly available. I used to have an HTC Hermes with a side-sliding QWERTY. Decent keyboard, but using it meant sliding the phone open and waiting for 3-4 seconds while the UI slowly reorientates itself to landscape. Slide out keyboards also require flat keys, whereas phones like the Treo and the Blackjack can have raised, separated keys.

Hailing from San Fransideshow, I thought I saw:

[davidsyes]

I though I saw "Nokia Unveils "World's Thinnest" QWEER Smartphone" instead of

"Nokia Unveils "World's Thinnest" QWERTY Smartphone"

(Considering the "historic" day in Califor-ni-aye, re: civil unions/marriages, etc... And considering Scandinavia and other countries were way ahead of the US... but that's another topic...)

Now that THIN is REALLY IN, Nokia users ought to be delight(ed)...

touchscreen?

[Luke_22]

ipod vs e70
:p

anyway, why are we going with keyboard on touchscreen? it's a pain if you compare it to the "normal button" ones...
it's slower, makes you type more, and makes the screen dirty.
nokia e70 had maybe one of the most complete keyboard...

if we want bigger screens, why don't we go towards something like nokia n810? with slide-keyboard, i mean.... Personally, i don't like the design of this phone... it reminds me a blackberry, and the screen is not even that big...

*Yawn*

[Anonymous Coward]

No multitasking applications
No keys
Limited Enterprise connectivity
Non replaceable battery
Restrictive SDK (read the T's and C's before you comment on that one)
Mediocre phone performance

I'm really getting great amusement from all the fanbois touting the iPhone as the be all and end all of smartphones. It isn't, and if it were not for the 'me too' trendy value that society has ascribe to Apple products it wouldn't be selling well at all.

Meh

[Quattro Vezina]

I'd rather have a version of the N810 with a GSM antenna added.

The N810 would be the perfect handheld device for me, but it can't be used as a phone...

Re:Meh

[danzona]

If you really think the N810 would be perfect for you, you might want to check out Skype.

Re:Meh

[Dtyst]

The Nokia E90 is almost like a N810 with phone functions. It has Wi-Fi, 3G, GPS, bluethooth, big screen, full qwwerty-keyboard (with number-row) actually everything you expect from a top-notch phone. On downside it's not Linux, it uses symbian 9.2. But you can install putty ssh on it so you can then connect to your linux box ;)

Re:Meh

[Quattro Vezina]

If I had WiFi available everywhere I went, I'd get the N810 in a heartbeat, but I don't.

I've no problems using Skype or a SIP softphone, but they're useless if I don't have a connection. I've got WiFi at home, WiFi at work, and several restaurants/bars here have WiFi (and even there, I'd have to ask for the key), but not everywhere.

Re:Meh

[Anonymous Coward]

If they added 3G (instead of WiMAX), I'd buy this in a heartbeat. Its feature set is roughly equivalent to the iphone, but the screen is large enough to comfortably browse the web. Only now Apple has dropped the price on their 8gb model to $200, so the tablet may no longer be competitive. If Nokia had dropped the price sooner, they may have cannibalized sales of their other models, but they would have been very competitive with the iphone.

Which is it nokia?

[stormguard2099]

FTFA: "Something for us that sells eight or ten million [Apple's 2008 target figure for the iPhone] wouldn't be that big a splash."

Yeah, that's why nokia keeps talking about the iphone clone they are releasing....

Re:Which is it nokia?

[LilWolf]

You do realize that Nokia shipped 115.5 million phones just in the first quarter of 2008? 14.6 million of those were in what could be called the "smartphone" category. So something that sells 8-10 million in a time frame of a whole year doesn't really sound so astonishing to them.

Re:Which is it nokia?

[k_187]

yeah, nokia sells in a week what apple wants to sell in a year. This is why the iphone is not the major threat everybody thinks it is.

Re:Which is it nokia?

[stormguard2099]

yes, I can read the article, thanks.

That's exactly my point. if they are pushing so many other phones and the iphone is selling so poorly in comparision why are they pushing out an iphone clone? The two ideas just seem incompatible to me.

Re:Which is it nokia?

[stormguard2099]

This is why the iphone is not the major threat everybody thinks it is. If it's not a threat (i'm personally not saying it is) then why is nokia trying to make a clone?

I don't see how nokia can hold both positions at the same time. If the iphone market is so niche it seems like it wouldn't be worth their time.

Re:Which is it nokia?

[Anonymous Coward]

Because the Nokia competitive strategy is to make lots and lots of models in every kind of form factor. Whenever a new kind of phone gains market traction, if they don't have something like it on the market already, you can bet they will release one sooner rather than later. In the case of an iphone clone, they seem to be taking their time, which is promising since it indicates that Nokia is really rethinking their UI design.

Just imagine...

[Miladinoski]

... some stupid pick-pocketer comes to steal something from you and he sees the iPhone, and he'll say:
Lol! An iPhone! An iPod a camera-phone and an internet communications device!!11!oneeleven so its a "must-have"!! He comes and steals your phone.

... some stupid pick-pocketer comes to steal something from you and he sees the Nokia E71, and he'll say:
LOL! The slimmest phone with a QWERTY keyboard! The best fone evar!!one1 He comes and steals your phone.

.. some stupid pick-pocketer comes to steal something from you and he sees the Nokia 7110, and he'll say:
What a poor bastard. I'll give him my iPhone/Nokia E71 because he's god damn poor. He comes and give his phone to you.

You choose with what are you going to come out on the streets!

Re:Just imagine...

[dotancohen]

I had that phone, in fact, it's still in my drawer because I loved it so much. It was the biggest screen _ever_ on a phone in it's day. It has a GPRS WML web browser. The damn thing went all the way from my ear to my mouth so the whole train doesn't have to hear my conversation. The navigation roller rocked as well. Only problem that I remember: like other Nokias of the era, the battery would get loose. Nothing that a folded piece of paper wedged in the right place could not solve.

Although the wikipedia article says that the device was spring loaded, alas, mine was not.

Re:Just imagine...

[pandrijeczko]

I look at it this way.

For me, a mobile phone needs to:

1. Make phone calls and store a few telephone numbers.

2. Last or day or two on battery power while making no more than 10 minutes of calls per day.

3. Fit in an average-sized pocket and be lockable so buttons don't get pressed while it's moving around in my pocket.

Apart from that, anything goes within reason.

It does not need to be a fashion accessory because I buy shit because I like, not because other people do.

And if someone judges me based on the old phone I'm carrying or the non-designer clothes I wear then so be it - in my view, they're probably far too fickle a person to be of any interest to me anyway.

Re:Just imagine...

[joemod]

Nokia 7110 was an amazing phone. Along with 6210 and 6310 the best mobile phones this world has ever seen. Too bad that the marketing overlords choose what is good and what is not good for us.

Re:Just imagine...

[benxx]

Add my 6233 in the best phones list. It's based on S40 platform and far better than many N-series phones. It exceptionally does two jobs a phone really needs to do: phone and sms.

What it needs....

[Anonymous Coward]

While I've always been a big Nokia fan, the last phone I tried - an N75 was a miserable failure.

This phone looks promising so long as Nokia addresses these problems:

1. Battery life - it NEEDS to last longer than a day. I should be able to have the phone on for 3 days with a few conversations a day and not have it be dead

2. Responsiveness - the symbian OS was ridiculously slow on the 220mhz N75 processor. I mean - I considered it borderline unusable. The nokia maps addon became worthless as well

3. Durability - if I drop this from a foot above the ground, I don't want it to shatter into a million pieces.

All I want is a small, fast phone with a QWERTY keypad that's durable. Is that too much to ask?

Huh?

[commodoresloat]

You want your smartphone to periodically make bizarre predictions and go off on rants about Apple?

Insensitive Clod

[ndansmith]

But I type with the Dvorak keymap, and I doubt those tiny keyboards are good for touch-typing. So I think I will have to go the route of "soft" keyboards (a la iPhone) if I ever go down the smartphone road.

Re:Insensitive Clod

[smoker2]

I prefer the soft keyboard. I can "type" more quickly and accurately using a stylus, than I can using both hands but only thumbs. If they implement a way to use a hardware button to shift, then it'll be golden.
I'm tempted by a laser projected keyboard, with a piece of black foam rubber to hit for keys.

best smart phone around, but not saying much

[speedtux]

This is probably going to be one of the best smart phones around. I may still get this instead of an iPhone.

Plusses: tons of functionality and third party applications, tons of built-in applications, good Google support, supports lots of standards (stereo Bluetooth, tethered 3.5G modem, microSD, etc.), good keyboard, real GPS navigation.

Minuses: small screen, charge cable costs extra, OS likely still more buggy than iPhone (yeah, I know, hard to believe), at times unresponsive UI.

I'll have to see what the 3G iPhone is actually capable of and what the gotchas are with it.

What I really want is an Android phone, instead of this Nokia and Apple bullshit. Even a buggy Android phone would be better than either of these.

Is the built in GPS a real GPS?

[Maimun]

The other day I read the specs for Sony Ericsson C702. It claimed having GPS but it turned out the C702 has "GPS capabilities" which means that with the addition of certain software (you pay extra for it) it can---in case you are covered by at least 3 cells---tell you your position by triangulation. That is far from a true GPS. Do you think the Nokia unit has a true GPS or it simply triangulates using the cell transmitters?

Re:Is the built in GPS a real GPS?

[zyzko]

Yes, the data sheet clearly states GPS and A-GPS (GPS assisted with tower data to get initial fix).

Calling cell tower approximation (what Google Maps uses on phones with no real GPS) any kind of "GPS" would clearly be false advertising and just calling for trouble.

This is not Nokias first GPS model either, they routinely seem to put GPS on their new models. What really interests me how good is it. If initial fix takes minutes it is basically useless for quick "was the address I'm going to on this block or the next one"-type of usage. N95 (at least the early firmwares, I'm not sure if the newer ones have A-GPS) was terrible in this respect and keeping the GPS always on was not an option either because of the increased battery drain.

Re:Is the built in GPS a real GPS?

[Ami Ganguli]

The newer ones all have AGPS.

Re:Is the built in GPS a real GPS?

[rod]

Anyway, it's a FULL GPS. The A-GPS, A standing for assisted, would just make it much faster to get the first fix - first GPS position, like having the first fix in less than 10 seconds (it could be 1 sec in a really good network/info environment).

This phone is really good. It kicks ass... I went out to jogg using Nokia Sportstracker to log the exercise, listening to high quality MP3 via Bluetooth A2DP wireless headset, with my email/PIM in sync and with my phone. All included. Worked great. Really thing phone. Way better than the Nokia E61i.

The rub...

[catdevnull]

The thing about QWERTY buttoned KBs on smartphones is that they eat up UI screen space. Softkeys like the iPhone are handy for solving that problem but they have their own problems--we all know what the complaints are. Some solved the problem with the sliding/hidden KB.

Really, when it comes down to it, it's all about what you want in the device. The cool thing about the market now is that there are so many choices to meet the needs/opinions.

Re:iPhone rival

[outZider]

Have you ever used S60? It's a fine mobile operating system and easy to use. I'm certainly optimistic about their touch interface.

Also, you'll be able to tether your computer to it, will play audio over A2DP, allow non-Nokia authorized software to run on it, have an SDK that doesn't require a Mac... shall I continue?

Re:It sure ain't no iPhone.

[Cederic]

Nice flame. You forgot to mention that the iPhone has only 5% of the worldwide smartphone market, and that represents only a small fraction of the mobile phone market.

Is it a good phone? Sure. Is it a way better phone than anything Nokia sells? No.

Are Nokia getting "a little desperate"? laugh.

Nokia have three times the annual revenue that Apple do, and a similar profit margin. Apple should be thanking Nokia for the skill and talent they've employed to create a market for Apple to move into.

I'm looking forward to seeing Nokia's offerings towards the end of the year. I'll also have a play with a new iPhone.

You see, I do think differently, and better. I think beyond the shiny marketing message rammed down my throat.

Not an iphone rival

[goombah99]

The thing is everyone thinks iphone==Touch screen. This is like saying iPod == simplified MP3 player with round dial.

If you happen to catch the last apple keynote, then you know it's about the integration. some stats:

>80% of iphone uses have used 10 or more applicaiton functions on their phone
>95% use the internet and google says most of their mobile queries come from iphones.

Now they are launching a app store for developers which will allow anyone to sell in 70 countries and apple handles all the delivery, installs, micro payments, currency conversio, and store UI languages.

It's first year the ipod sold because it was cool to look at and hold. But it sold the next year because the iTunes and the Itumes Music store were so freakin easy use with it.

Making a touch screen is not making an iphone. These companies have about exactly 1 year to figure this out before the apple app store has a lot of applications on it. After that it's too late.

Re:Not an iphone rival

[mdwh2]

>80% of iphone uses have used 10 or more applicaiton functions on their phone
>95% use the internet and google says most of their mobile queries come from iphones.

How do those stats compare to a similarly priced rival smartphone? How did Google count different makes of phone from the same manufacturer?

Also remember Nokia sells its phones to a vast market - half a billion in 2009, TFA states - which includes all sorts of people, including those who don't care about many functions. Apple on the other hand are targetting only a few million users, most likely technology users who are interesting in Internet functions. It would be a fallacy to conclude that these stats are because of the phones themselves, and not the users.

Touchscreen is just what is notable about the Iphone. Not Internet features - which have been bog standard on dirt cheap phones for years. That's why Nokia don't really care about rivalling it. (I suspect the "Release an Iphone rival" hype comes from PC Pro, rather than Nokia, who don't seem keen to compare their half a billion target market to Apple's millions. Why does everything have to be compared to the Iphone? I'm glad for once in a blue moon to have a Nokia article instead of an Iphone article, but it seems we still have to sneak an advert in for Apple...)

Re:Not an iphone rival

[wvmarle]

Not just the touchscreen is notable about the iPhone, though it's of course the most prolific feature of the device.
What is truly making it success, includes:

• It Just Works,
• it doesn't crash (often),
• it looks good,
• it is easy to use,
• and most of all: It Just Works.

With that I summed it up mostly. Like many Apple devices, there is not much really innovative about it. They took existing tech, integrated it, made it work out of the box, made it work easily, made it look beautiful, and that's about it. But that's not easy to do: if so, many other companies would have done it.
The iPod is a great example. It is tightly integrated with the iTunes application on the PC, and thus very very easy to copy music onto. It works very easily and intuitively: the scroll wheel that is not really turning but feeling your finger, a very intuitive way. Right turn moves up, left turn moves down, click to select. No more buttons needed. The beauty of simplicity.

Re:Not an iphone rival

[Anonymous Coward]

If you happen to catch the last apple keynote, then you know it's about the integration. some stats: Apple keynotes are like political conventions, but anyhoo...

>80% of iphone uses have used 10 or more applicaiton functions on their phone
>95% use the internet and google says most of their mobile queries come from iphones. How does this "80%" (from a single model of iPhone) compare to single models of other smart phones? Google saying that "most" queries come from the iPhone is not too surprising because the iPhone is the only smart phone I can think of that has Google set as the default search engine out of the box. Most Windows Mobile phones (Internet Explorer) default to MSN Search and Opera Mini defaults to Yahoo.

Re:Not an iphone rival

[mdwh2]

It Just Works,
it doesn't crash (often),
it looks good,
it is easy to use,
and most of all: It Just Works.

Ah brilliant, a long list of subjective non-reasons! Evidence that it crashes less than all other phones? Example of a feature that is easier to use than all other phones?

My phone just works, it's easy to use, it just works, it doesn't crash (often), it just works, it looks good and it just works.

In fact - it doesn't just work, it does a whole lot more besides. Is the Iphone's best feature merely that it's a working phone?

It also works "out of the box". What phone doesn't?

I asked in a recent thread what some actual unique features of the Iphone were, and it was like getting blood out of a stone. Of course, people were happy to supply me with "But it just is! Iphone rules, other phones suck! It Just Works!"

Like many Apple devices, there is not much really innovative about it.

I fully agree. +1 insightful indeed.

Re:Not an iphone rival

[shilly]

OK, I'll bite.

I have my blackberry pearl sitting here in front of me. I have *no* idea about how to do conference calling on it. It may or may not exist, but it's certainly not easy to use. I'm sure there may be one or two phones where this feature approaches usability, but there's none where it's as easy as the iPhone, IMO -- have you evidence to the contrary?

Voicemail is something else that isn't remotely as well implemented on any other phone.

Ease of use may be subjective, but it's also very very real.

There are dozens of features that work this well on an iPhone and far less well on other phones.

Re:Not an iphone rival

[wvmarle]

Evidence that it crashes less than all other phones? Anecdotal evidence, don't look at official specs as all manufacturers will state perfect stability if asked. I have not heard complaints of any iPhone user that it crashes. It may do - but my OS-X based iBook doesn't crash either, at least not after I had my Airport Express card attached properly again. The iPhone also runs a version of OS-X

Now ask a smartphone user using Windows Mobile or Symbian about how often they crash. Daily or twice daily are quite common answers. And that is plainly ridiculous.

Re:Not an iphone rival

[mdwh2]

Anecdotal evidence

I'm after evidence, not anecdotes.

I've never heard complaints that my model of phone crashes. Or complaints that any model of phone crashes.

No, we shouldn't trust official specs of manufacturers - nor can we trust anecdotes posted by pro-Apple people on a webforum!

Re:Not an iphone rival

[mdwh2]

I'll bite back - if I want to copy and paste some text on my Iphone, how do I do that? What about sending a picture to someone whose phone doesn't support email attachments, or recording a video? These features may or may not exist, but I can't work out how to use them.

Re:Not an iphone rival

[shilly]

1. Copy and paste is missing, you're right. It's a lack.
2. MMS is crap, expensive and unreliable. I've tried it multiple times on my blackberry and it doesn't work 80% of the time -- the intended recipient never gets the picture (although I still get charged). It's not enough to have theoretical functionality, it needs to be real functionality. That's borne out in the traffic figures, which show that in 07, there were roughly 27bn MMS messages sent globally, compared with 42bn SMS messages passing through Verisign alone in just Q1 08. I'm sure that the relative unpopularity of MMS means that Apple was confident in focusing on email instead.
3. Video is a lack, but not a huge lack. It's also not a routinely-available feature on smartphones (unlike cut and paste & MMS), eg it's not on my pearl.

Now, compare your list to mine:
On the one hand, conference calling and visual voicemail -- these seem like pretty fundamental benefits for a phone.
On the other, copy and paste, sending a picture via MMS and video -- these seem like "somewhat nice to have". I realise YMMV, but the question is, whose mileage is more typical of what people in general want from a smartphone?

Re:Not an iphone rival

[ssstraub]

I'll give you a feature: Completely automatic OS-level updates.

Are there other cell phones that do that? Heck, are there other cell phones that are OS-upgradable period, without using "cooked" ROMs, visiting your carrier, etc? It has always seemed to me that what you get on day 1 is what you get for the life of the device, and if you want a new version of the OS software, you are required to buy a new device!

I had a Motorola phone with some ridiculous bugs in the OS, out of the box, and I had to deal with them the entire life of the device. I knew there were actually newer versions of the OS "in existance", but there sure as hell was no easy way to get them on my phone.

Re:Not an iphone rival

[UnixUnix]

OK, I'll withstand the bite :)

Is it that hard to click Phone... Menu... Help ... Conference Call... Making a Conference Call ...and read:

1. During a call, press the SEND key

2. Type a phone number or highlight a contact

3. Press the SEND key

4. During the second call press the Menu key

5. Click JOIN

You might also simply go to a BlackBerry Bulletin Board and ask.

Just don't pay any heed if you see me there mentioning videos such as

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kNMOMayDeqs

We do poke fun at iPhones :)

Re:Not an iphone rival

[mdwh2]

MMS works fine for me.

On the other, copy and paste, sending a picture via MMS and video -- these seem like "somewhat nice to have".

When it comes to ease of use, copy and paste is fundamental. Ease of use is not just about how easy it is to work out how to use a feature, it's about features which make everyday use easier.

The claim being put forward is that the Iphone is easier to use - if it misses out on fundamental ease-of-use features, then sure, you can say that it's merely "somewhat nice to have", but it's no longer true that the Iphone is easier to use. Rather, you've relegated ease of use to "somewhat nice to have".

(And given these features are standard on cheap phones, why would I pay more just to settle for "somewhat nice to have"?)

I realise YMMV, but the question is, whose mileage is more typical of what people in general want from a smartphone?

I don't know - is the Iphone the only phone that does conference calling or visual voicemail? If so, you can reasonably claim those as something unique about the Iphone. If not, I'm not sure what the point being made is...

Re:iPhone rival

[RiotingPacifist]

please do...
Being able to charge it once every week, on any modern Nokia charger (absolutely any Nokia charger if you keep the tiny adapter with you)
Not having to go with O2/rip of American phone company
Not being DRM ridden

Symbian Signed

[tepples]

allow non-Nokia authorized software to run on it Even with that Symbian Signed stuff that Symbian and Nokia have implemented?

Re:Symbian Signed

[Terrasque]

You can turn the "Signed required" off if you want. You will only get a warning on unsigned programs, but can still install no problem.

In fact, signed was turned off BY DEFAULT on my N82 phone. Go figure.

Re:Symbian Signed

[tepples]

What you wrote:

You can turn the "Signed required" off if you want. What is more likely in North America, home of Slashdot:

Your provider can turn the "Signed required" off if it wants.

Re:Symbian Signed

[CharlieMurphy]

You obviously havent used a series 60 v3 phone...

Re:Symbian Signed

[Terrasque]

N82 About screen : "This product is based on S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 1 software". I guess that mean that it's not a v3?

Also look here : http://s2putty.sourceforge.net/installs60v3.html - And I have that program installed. And as I said, that option was already turned to All. Note that this is an N series phone, and not an E series phone.

Re:Looks good, but battery sucks

[AliasMarlowe]

The E70 has a nice enough keyboard - it's actually usable unless you've got sausage fingers.
However, its alleged camera is a worthless grainy noise generator, even in good lighting: a waste of components, mass, space, and power. Why do camera makers use a 2 megapixel detector with optics that would barely justify a quarter megapixel?
Unfortunately, the E70's battery life is also pathetic. It almost lasts a week, provided you don't use the device at all. If you make/receive several calls per day, then it needs to be charged after about 2 days, and if you use it much for web access or GPS or anything else which lights up the screen, then it lasts about a day (if you're lucky).
It is my misfortune to be afflicted with an E70 at the wishes/command of my employer.

Cool but can we expect quality this time?

[Anonymous Coward]

I have owned several Nokia phones over the years. The earlier phones were very stable and also durable against all kinds of abuse.

I recently purchased a Nokia N82 S60 phone and I am very disappointed in the software. I really like the look and feel of the OS and was first pleasantly surprised. But more and more bugs surface and the performance of the UI is sluggish compared to other phones.. The N82 is supposed to be a business phone. I don't see a lot of business men staying with Nokia when they now get a phone that locks up on receiving calls and drops words in text messages (latest firmware rev as of writing this) or drains the battery (couple of months old firmware that came with the phone). The same problems apparently follow the N95 which is geared towards people who need a multimedia experience.. If Nokia doesn't get their act together on the software side I foresee a sharp decline in their sales.

I don't know how much of Nokia's revenue that come from phone sales. But if phones, compared to infrastructure, is a big part of their business I would stay away from their stock.

kid

[Anonymous Coward]

I already had gray hair for about 20 years at that point. Now, don't get off my lawn, grab that mower and start pushing!

I'm tired of thin phones

[slapout]

Give me one that I can hold easily!

A keyboard...

[skingers6894]

"A keyboard...how quaint" - Scotty

Touchscreen? Already???

[Anonymous Coward]

Nokia also gave a tantalising hint about its plans for an iPhone rival, with its senior vice president saying, "we will have touchscreen devices coming this year"."

Sweet! So Nokia will finally offer something to replace my four year-old Palm Treo 650? What an accomplishment.

It only took a few months for 37 different Chinese companies to come up with an iphone competitor (a few of them did it fairly well), so it's nice to see that being dead last hasn't stopped Nokia from entering this market. This is sort of like when every company you'd heard of, and some you hadn't, began pushing flip-style phones, and Nokia still didn't have a decent one.

undo mod

[ploss]

fdsvc cdss s s cdd cd

Handle with care

[The MESMERIC]

Or you may end up with a stinging paper-cut.

Full review added to original story.

[Barence]

The full review of the Nokia E71 is also now online.