Nokia E5: Messaging made easy

MANILA, Philippines – Simplify. Simplify.

It must be the catchword of my life at present. And to make my life simpler this means that I work on giving up things that clutter my everyday life.

Looking for what is important to me at this stage in my life is not that easy. Yet, I do know that the value I had for having the latest of something is not as important as it used to be five years ago.

Don’t get me wrong, I still love checking out the latest gadgets, but picking out the ones I really need have become more important than getting the ones that I just want.

Just recently I got to test the Nokia E5. I liked it at first sight. It is one of those full QWERTY keypad smartphones. No, its not touch screen and it was a breeze to learn to use.

I read that the Nokia E5 is among the latest messaging phones released by the Nokia. I really like that the QWERTY keypad was easy to use and there was enough space for my fingers — which are quite stubby to get a hang of texting. I also liked that when I loaded my SIM and did a little surfing and checking out my e-mail it was easy.

Believe me, the best cellphones available in the market today are those that make using them easy. If there are too many things one needs to learn in order to get a cellphone up and running, the less likely it is to be liked by more users.

The Nokia E5 is equipped with a five-megapixel camera, 3G connectivity, Wi-Fi, MicroUSB, MicroSD card slot, and a 3.5-mm audio jack, among others — all the musts when it comes to the cellphone that most users look for nowadays.

Looking good

I really like the attractive and sexy look of the Nokia E5. I must add that the phone is no clunker, rather it is actually quite slim and light. Matter of fact, when I slipped it into the pocket of my pants I almost forget it was there.

The E5 measures 115-mm tall, 58.9-mm wide and 12.8-mm thick. It weighs around 126 grams. It has a 2.36-inch display with a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels. 

I had no problems with reading my text messages and even e-mail on the E5 whether I was inside the office or outside under the midday sun.

The navigation keys are a four-way square toggle with middle select key, two soft keys, dedicated shortcut keys for accessing favorite contacts and messages, and the Call and End/Power keys. The keys are large and tactile, which offer better feedback.

If you are a techie cellphone user or if you have been using the Nokia cellphone you will be happy to know that the E5 runs on the Symbian OS v9.4, Series 60 release 5 and S60 user interface. The menu system, icons and interface are really very well placed. I was able to access my contacts right away which made calling or texting them a breeze. Any updates from Facebook and Twitter can be set so that it is displayed on the screen. Really cool. 

Time to connect

The Nokia E5 Web browser is really good as it supports full HTML as well as WAP 2.0. It supports Flash lite v3.1 and RSS feeder. Aside from Facebook and Twitter, the E5 makes it easy to reach Instant Messaging for Yahoo! Messenger, Google Talk, and Windows Live Messenger. Of course, one can also create and manage all your e-mail accounts, including Ovi Mail, Gmail, Yahoo Mail and other e-mail accounts (SMTP, IMAP4, and POP3).

Lest you begin to think the E5 isn’t cool, think again. The E5 comes with real multimedia player. The interface is simple and supports almost all-popular audio and video formats, except Divx and XviD video formats. You can download plenty of songs from Ovi Music. It also features FM Radio with RDS feature and Internet Radio.

Go ahead, shoot

I enjoyed taking shots of the latest member of my animal family. She is Pepsi, a stray kitten I picked up and decided to adopt. Pepsi is a cutie and since we just got her a new collar I had to tack lots of photos of that significant event. As anyone who has tried to take photos of an animal knows, it isn’t easy.

I got the Nokia E5 and put its five-megapixel camera to work. It was really fun and also quite tiring, as I had to catch Pepsi just at the right time. I must say that my efforts paid off as the shots were really cool. The camera features Autofocus, 3x zoom, scene modes, manual exposure settings, color tones, light sensitivity modes, still image editor, and show viewfinder grid. It can record videos, too.

Last word

Here are my five top fave things about the Nokia E5:

5. I really like the metallic back cover. It gives the phone a two-tone look, which I prefer to a monochromatic or flat black color.

4. It handles e-mail and office work with lots of class. It is easy to configure the e-mail accounts and that is really a big plus for me.

3. A really cool QWERTY keypad. Although it might look small, it is really big in getting the texting and messaging done. The dedicated messaging key next to the D-pad is a cool and useful addition. 

2. Makings calls are easy. I really like that it is so easy to get to the most important folks on my phonebooks in just two presses on the keyboard. When I really have to reach important people, this is truly great. 

1. Personalization is so Nokia. Some creatures of habit will fall in love with the fact that Nokia E5, like all other Nokia cellphones come with the familiar, everything that we have grown to love in a Nokia. Setting it up just the way I like it with my fave wallpaper, tones and screen shots was easy and so much fun.

The Nokia E5 has something new, something old, yet it keeps what we have always relied on with Nokia cellphones.

Just great.