Product Reviews

PDAs/Phones

Nokia E50 [Computer Buyer]
COMPANY: Nokia	PRICE: �0 ( from free depends on contract)
RATING:	ISSUE: 189 DATE: Feb 07
LATEST PRICES: £199.75 (1 Retailers)

Verdict: Despite the lack of 3G data, this is a powerful smartphone which is very good value on contract.

While manufacturers such as HTC and Palm make smartphones based on the Windows Mobile operating system, Nokia's smartphones buck the trend and use Symbian Series 60. The E50 is a budget handset that runs Series 60 3rd Edition.

This device is mainly aimed at business users, so its design is understated and smart. Previous Nokia smartphones have had terrible keypads, but the E50's large keys are comfortable to use and are raised in the centre for easy typing. The only problem is that the clear button is very close to the hang-up key, so you sometimes get booted back to the home screen in the middle of typing a message. Voice quality is very clear, though there is a slight background hiss.

Symbian Series 60 3rd Edition is a big improvement on the previous version. It supports higher screen resolutions, so instead



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of the 176 x 220 resolution display on phones such as the N70, the E50 has a 240 x 320 pixel display. The screen is very clear and bright, although text on the home screen is rather small. The extra resolution also leaves more room to display web pages and the E50 has a superb web browser, capable of displaying web pages either in their original format or reformatting them to fit the screen. You use a pointer to navigate and the browser scrolls smoothly through graphics-heavy pages. Unfortunately, the E50 doesn't support 3G data, so you're limited to slower GPRS speeds when browsing.

You can set up the E50's email client to use any POP3 account and the phone supports most attachment types. There are built-in viewers for Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents, and you can also view PDFs. As it's primarily aimed at people who want a no-nonsense, compact smartphone, it's not equipped with a camera and provides a mono handsfree kit instead of stereo headphones.

The supplied Nokia PC Suite software synchronises your contacts and calendar with Outlook using the supplied USB cable, and if you don't have Outlook, you can edit and backup the phone's contacts with PC Suite's contacts editor.

Nokia user guides, reviews, FAQs and downloads at Know Your Mobile

By Chris Finnamore

SPECIFICATIONS:
SCREEN 240 x 320 pixels MEMORY 70MB internal, micro-SD card slot BATTERY 4 hours talk time, 7 days standby SIZE 43 x 15 x 113mm WEIGHT 104g PRICE From free to �20 on T-Mobile contract