Nokia E5 review: Textbook texter

Introduction

Email used to be a part of the corporate world and now it’s increasingly becoming an essential means of communication for the lot of us – not just the white-collar kind. So if you can’t fight it, the best thing to do is get yourself properly equipped – and the Nokia E5 is the right tool for the job. It’s no old timer either, it knows how to deal with those newfangled social networks as well.

The E5 has skill to match the E72 down to the last spec. OK, almost. Some features have sure taken a hit (what’s with the fixed-focus 5MP camera), but that’s something most people can live with considering the lower price of the E5.

Nokia E5 official photos

We found the Nokia C3 to be an excellent no-frills messenger. The Nokia E5 brings Symbian aboard, which accounts for many of its advantages – multitasking, Office document viewing and editing, free voice-guided navigation – you know the drill.

Anyway, here’s what the Nokia E5 has going for and against it, in short.

Key features

• QWERTY messenger bar
• Quad-band GSM/EDGE
• Tri-band 3G with 10.2Mbps HSDPA and 2Mbps HSUPA
• Symbian S60 UI, 3rd edition FP2
• 600MHz processor, 256MB RAM; 250MB user-accessible storage
• 2.36" 256K-color QVGA display
• 5 megapixel fixed-focus camera, LED flash
• VGA video recording at 15fps
• Wi-Fi b/g; DLNA and UPnP support
• GPS receiver; Ovi Maps 3.0 with free life-time voice guided navigation
• Stereo FM radio with RDS, Internet radio
• Bluetooth (with A2DP)
• Standard microUSB port (charging)
• microSD card slot (32GB supported, 2GB included)
• 3.5mm audio jack
• Good email and social networking support
• Office document editor; PDF viewer; ZIP file support
• Good audio quality
• Reasonable price
• Microsoft Office Messenger support
• Quick Business and Personal homescreen toggle

Main disadvantages

• Non-hot-swappable microSD card under the battery
• Camera doesn’t have autofocus
• Poor video recording
• Low-res screen isn’t very good for browsing
• No native Twitter and MySpace clients

The Nokia E5 is probably targeted at young people stuck in a corporate environment. Or maybe it’s caught in the trend of more and more companies betting on social networking to boost sales. Whatever the reason, the Nokia E5 has pretty extensive support for social networks and IM chatting to go along with strictly-business offerings like the Microsoft Office messenger.

Nokia E5 live shots

No matter how good touchscreen input has gotten these last few years, a good old physical QWERTY is still the real deal. Which is why QWERTY messenger bars like the E5 can survive in a world dominated by touch phones.

The high price associated with touch phones (at least the ones with a big enough screen to even consider heavy texting) makes the affordable Nokia E5 a sensible alternative – especially for users who think touchscreen doesn’t make sense in business.

On the next page we’ll take a look just how much you’re getting for the price. Make the jump to see what’s inside the box and a look into the hardware of the E5.