Recently unveiled Nokia E7 is a communicator with wide QWERTY keyboard and this is what communicator has been today. At a first look Nokia E7 is really felt to be Nokia N8 with very similar metallic unibody, in fact we can say that the Nokia E7 is N8 with wide QWERTY keyboard and some new features. Nokia E7 release was delayed many times due to some reason and recently Somewhere in European countries the device has been available, for last few days the Nokia E7 has been available for Pre-order in US and India. It costs $679. Anyway let’s check out a short review about the device’s features and functionality.
Design and Functionality
As I mentioned earlier Nokia E7 is a wider version of Nokia N8 with its design and a slide out keyboard, the device has been covered with anodized aluminum casing. When you open the keyboard of the device it will remind you about Nokia’s old communicators with such keyboard such N900 or N97 though the keyboard is wider than those above mentioned devices. It stands similar to the n97 when slide out keyboard is opened. In the Market Nokia E7 is available in a variety of colors just like Nokia N8 from silver to flashy orange.
The Body of the device is relatively thin and has somewhat rounded edges with the top and bottom corners a chopped off to make room for ports and buttons — a USB port, HDMI, power button and 3.5mm audio jack is positioned on top while a slender Home/Menu button is placed at the very bottom of the front panel.
The quality that may keep the device separate from other devices released by Nokia is that it’s 4” AMOLED clear black display with 360 x 640 resolution, and support for 16.7 million colors. This is the largest screen on Nokia’s smartphones out there. Immediate below of the display you can see a sing Menu Button it also acts as indicator so it blinks when receiving calls or text message.
There is also a front-facing camera found next to the handset's earpiece – along with the light and proximity sensors close by.
Nokia E7 keyboard is wider and user-friendly after sliding out while remaining stylishly chic with its chiclet style buttons. Medium in size, anyway the keyboard is very easy to use and nor confusing while typing messages each buttons are very smooth to be pressed. Slider mechanism is similar to Nokia N97 as it’s positioned in a titled angle once fully opened. When closed, the touch screen has a virtual keyboard you can use to navigate and make calls or send text messages.
With design the Nokia E7 is more than satisfying, the aluminum unibody makes the device stunning and surely it will attract Nokia fans all around the world and has features that you may want for high-end Smartphone.
As you may know that the when it comes to user interface, the Nokia E7 is running on Symbian^3 firmware, to which the Nokia N8 was recently updated. If you have used previous version and first time using this new version of OS, of course it’s also easy to capture the user interface. There three homescreens and that can be populated up to 6 rectangular widgets.
When the phone is locked like N8 the device shows date and time without draining battery for screensaver. There is virtual keyboard, in portrait it shows numeric keypad that features plenty of rooms to move around with fingers. In Landscape the QWERTY keyboard is a somewhat decent offering but the small key makes tough to type texts. But anyway the device offer decent options in its own regards to type.
The icon for the Office suite of apps now has a prominent place in the main menu. Mail for Exchange is Nokia’s feature to help you stay in sync with your corporate email account, and it will also support Lotus Notes Traveler, which is still widespread in the business environment. Microsoft Office, we have Quickoffice Premier preinstalled on the Nokia E7, which means you can not only view, but also edit documents on the go now, free of charge.
Connectivity and Performance
Nokia E7 is powered with 680MHz ARM 11 processor and 256MB of RAM just like Nokia N8 but the Nokia E7 ROM is a little higher that N8 to 1024MB
Nokia E7 is similar to other GSM high-end devices available out there; you can make voice call around the world. It’s not tough to have a 3G connection through T-Mobile USA AWS band. The device also comes with 802.11 b/g/n Wi-Fi connectivity that lets you connected anywhere in the world. The device has GPS functionality can be used with Ovi maps and Bluetooth 3.0.
Interestingly free offline navigation of Ovi Maps is one of the great advantages for users with Nokia device and can be used almost all countries around the world. The Nokia N8 doesn’t feature FM transmitter that the Nokia N8 has, surely there is HDMI port that lets you watch HD videos on your TV and also feature USB on-the-go function to connect USB sticks directly with the Phones.
Unfortunately the device is stuck with 16GB of internal storage since there is no microSD card slot to expand the memory.
Browser on Nokia E7 is similar to Nokia N8, The browser isn’t a best one but it’s simple and works just fine. Fortunately, you can just hope on to Ovi and download Opera Mobile. On the browser some flash contents are loading since it support Flash Lite 4.0 but normally there is a slowdown in the performance of browser.
The 1200mAh internal battery isn’t at par with the earlier E-series Nokia smartphones like the E72. The 1200mAH battery is rated 5 hours of talk time in 3G mode that’s not impressive. The call quality of the device is exciting both in the earpiece and receiving end.
Multimedia
When it comes to multimedia and camera, photos taken by Nokia E7 is decent but not exciting one sice the camera is not auto focus enabled the device as I mentioned above the Images can never be like images taken by N8 but without doubt decent the way it offers functionality. The camera is built with LED Flash instead of Xenon.
Nokia E7 plays HD videos very smoothly and manages to load, while watching videos on AMOLED display with wide screen it’ really enjoyable and makes perfect combination in watching videos in full clarity so the Nokia E7 really keeps its strength in it. Nokia E7 is not away from the application pre-installed for editing videos and images just like N8, the editor offers plenty of settings and easy to edit your images and videos with many features that you may wish to add.
Verdict
For Nokia fans using Symbian should surely be satisfying with the features and performance of the device except the built-in browser and battery backup, with wide QWERTY keyboard Nokia makes exciting texting experience. But when it comes to US Nokia E7 unlikely to be successful since the most mobile users are talking about Android and iOS. Since Nokia has made ally with Microsoft the company could offer more great functionality with some customization of Microsoft WP 7. The pricing of the device is also a matter.
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