Having been using the Nokia E71 for a little while now, Steve Litchfield delivers his verdict - what's new compared to its predecessor, the E61i? And how close does the E71 get to being the perfect smartphone for the modern professional? With predictive text and a wealth of other tweaks to S60, the E71 certainly delivers more than you'd think at first sight.
Read on in the full article.
Great review Steve!
Interesting on the word completion feature, there's something similar on the Nokia tablets and I did wonder if they'd ever use it on the phones.
Also fascinating that they've upped the multimedia features by including such a good camera, and compatibility with things like podcasts. Most interestingly, as the N71 has Nokia Music Store built in along with several games, I can't see any reason for it to be excluded from the N-Gage platform, as that's just as much pure entertainment as a music store.
"The Messaging application itself is largely unchanged from earlier devices which is something of a dissapointment "
FAIL.
Next, please.
Holy noise and purple Batman!
I was SO looking forward to this phone since with all those features it would have been a near perfect device for blogging my upcoming half year trip around the world. But then I clicked on the camera samples and .... WTF?! Hey Nokia, 2001 called, they want their crappycam back.
Am I the only one constantly puzzled about all companies' incompetence when it comes down to produce a no-crap device? Seems like some random (yet for my purposes essential) feature is messed up on each phone these days. So now I can choose tween going windows mobile or doing mobile blogging without qwerty. Sheesh, thanks Nokia.
It's strange that this uses FP1 whilst the N78, launched earlier, uses FP2. The multimedia stuff is a little disappointing too, I was hoping it'd be an all-rounder to replace my N82 and Blackberry with 😞
It's strange that this uses FP1 whilst the N78, launched earlier, uses FP2
The version they use depends on when product development starts, not when it ends.
If Nokia started work on the N71 a long time before the N78, it would make sense that the N71 is based around an earlier version of S60v3.
I'm a long-time Nokia user, for better or worse.
I upgraded from E61 to N95 8GB because I wanted HSPA and and a less sluggish device -- that has worked well enough -- but I just cant get along with only 9-key number pad anymore... it's so painful to input text, and how often do we really dial numbers manually anymore?
So I need a small qwerty with HSPA. E71 looks a good from that perspective.
Thanks for the great review! Despite some really good things - such as the calendar tweak, modes, home-screen quick contact search, installed podcasting and share on-line apps - it is no home-run for me. Particularly, the multimedia part is slightly disappointing.
I realise that my wishlist is odd, and have to congratulate Nokia on a really good all-round device!
More of the same boring screen resolution... I�m tired of that! None evolution at all, phone after phone😡
Seems like a perfect replacement for my battered E61.
Battered because I stupidly did not zip my pocket whilst on a large roller coaster on Part Aventura leading to it flying out.
Surprised because someone handed it in.
Even more surprised that the only damage was chunks missing out of the aluminium cover and my memory card was missing. It works perfectly. Tough things these Nokias!
It�s a nice device but I prefer the E90. The E71 is very interesting in the most areas but the camera department is a dissapointment. I like the E90s abilities in this sector so I thought the E71 would be identical.
The software additions (contacts etc) is good but they could have used the E90 style in more apps.
A question: what is the theme used in the reviewed E71? It looks like the good old 6600 and S60v1.
"For video recording, capture is at the new 'phone' standard of QVGA at 15 frames per second"hmm,gsmarena spec sheet says that it has VGA video recording @ 22fps.Any comment on this.
Sounds like there are several potential customers for a consumer/Nseries qwerty handset among the commenters already. From the live feed: "why no consumer qwerty? Consumers are using qwerty more, but geo specific. More products. Yes. No specifics."
Maybe they could approach it from the blogging angle, huh.
http://europe.nokia.com/A41146123
it states clearly "640 x 480 at 22 fps"
Any chance we'll see some of these innovations on the e90? I quite like the idea of predictive text on the E90, and VPN would be a dream come true, albeit 3 days too late (don't ask...).
Steve, I used to me Nokia E61i keypad and I type with both hands. But in new E71 there's no space between buttons and the device itself is not so wide to use it with two hands. Is it much less comfortable for both hands operating or not?
nj7 wrote:More of the same boring screen resolution... I�m tired of that! None evolution at all, phone after phone😡
They've made a few 352x416 devices like N80. I have E60 myself, which is like N80 without a camera - or so I thought when buying it. Too bad about not getting some of the Nseries software...
352x416 has been left alone for a while. They probably decided to standardize on 240x320 and 320x240 so that their own UI designers and 3rd party app/game developers would have an easier time. I can tell you that at 352x416 and 247.7 dpi (2.2" screen) some applications use too small fonts or images to be comfortable. Mostly I'm happy though, and for the sake of web browsing I'm very reluctant to move to a smaller resolution.
Top Nseries handsets have 2.8" screens right now. I think QVGA is getting pretty limiting and would expect Nokia to use some bigger resolution within half a year to a year. It'll be interesting if they decide to continue with 352x416 once more or go for something like 320x480 which scales much nicer from QVGA. iPhone also uses 320x480 (at 164.8 dpi, 3.5" screen) and I might get one just for browsing - would have to also carry a Nokia for several other things though.
For that screen size I would expect 640x480 and nothing less. Still a rather nice hardware, despite the outdated resolution.
Steve's attending the launch event today, so he's not around, hence his normal replies on phone issues isn't as fast today. Rest assured when he's back I'm sure that he'll address them as best he can.
in the meantime, the screen resolution is always a strange one - I do remember feeling a bit depressed when the jump from 176x208 to QVGA didn;t give me more info on the screen, just nicer fonts thanks to more pixels - the pixel density may be bigger but the physical screen sie is still the limit IMO. I think when it comes the next jump will give more clarity in pictures and video, but not ness. in the contents displayed on the screen.
There's no word on firmware updates to the E90, or what could be included, so anything written wouuld be speculation. It would be nice, but then getting XXXX on YYYY device is always nice
If it gets BlackBerry Connect, I'm in... sounds like there's no agreement over this yet though 😞
Nokia clearly decided not to compete with Apple on the visual appeal of the GUI. These icons look like Windows 3.1 vintage designs (or Windows 2000, at the most).
Yes, interaction design is hard, but icon design is easy because you can plop any graphic into that slot of the UI. Furthermore it's cheap to, e.g., outsource icon design to a great Russian artist. Do you know if the screen offers limited color depth? It doesn't seem so from the appearance of photos, which seem to have at least 16-bit color depth and thus should allow for beautiful icons.
Well I'd began to think this would never get released, and just when I'd almost decided to get an iPhone, but sod that. It the E71 for me 😊
(and I like the nice simple icons and theme)
Great review.
I see you posted it should be available now. Does anyone know where you can order one now in the US? Nokia's site states it is coming soon, and is not taking pre-orders.
Does anybody know what colours are would be available? I like my silver E51 with black keys. I not so sure about the silver/white keys....
zomg 4cm macro! Is it automatic (like no need to select anything after opening the camera), or do you have to still go select macro mode when you're taking a picture from 4cm distance?
Is the voip functionality the same as on E51?
I'm very tempted by the E71 but will E-Series ever have categories support??
This is why I currently use my M600i over n95.
Ok so there is no sync but at least on the device I can see things by category.
Unregistered wrote:Nokia clearly decided not to compete with Apple on the visual appeal of the GUI. These icons look like Windows 3.1 vintage designs (or Windows 2000, at the most).Yes, interaction design is hard, but icon design is easy because you can plop any graphic into that slot of the UI. Furthermore it's cheap to, e.g., outsource icon design to a great Russian artist. Do you know if the screen offers limited color depth? It doesn't seem so from the appearance of photos, which seem to have at least 16-bit color depth and thus should allow for beautiful icons.
Perhaps it's worth more to them to have the icons recognizable for people coming from their S40 feature phones? The smartphone percentage out of total mobile phone market is still fairly small after all. Just a thought.
Worst would be to have fancy icons that don't convey any meaning and are thus hard to memorize. It's possible to strike a good balance/combination of course.
Steve - it's FP2 so why no mention of the new calendar app or smooth screen transitions?
"Nokia clearly decided not to compete with Apple on the visual appeal of the GUI. These icons look like Windows 3.1 vintage designs (or Windows 2000, at the most). "
Icons can be changed through custom themes. Personally I love the retro icons. Reminds me a lot of BeOS. If someone can back port the E71's default theme and release it as an SIS package, I will not hesitate to install it on my E51.