Photo gallery: Nokia E65It's rare these days for a mobile phone to impress us straight out of the box, but Nokia's latest addition to its E-series range proves that you can combine a fully functional business phone in a compact and attractive chassis. The E65 looks good and feels great, and is packed with enough features to lure both mobile professionals as well as the fashion conscious.
Design
The E65 marks a return to the stylish design of quality handsets such as Nokia's own 8800. Measuring in at just 105mm by 49mm by 15.5mm and weighing just 115 grams, the E65 is incredibly small given its list of features. Sliding the spring-loaded front panel upwards reveals a stylish keypad with well spaced buttons that have a solid feel. Push the slider down again and it snaps shut with a reassuring click.
The E65 includes several shortcut keys on its front for one-touch conference calls, muting and opening your contacts. There's also a "My Own" button you can program to load up your favourite application. Flip the handset over and you'll find a 2-megapixel digital camera surrounded by a leather-feel plastic surface. Strangely, for a 3G capable phone, the E65 lacks a second camera on the front panel for video calling.
The large 2.2-inch, 240 x 320 pixel display packs up to 16 million colours and comes with adjustments for the contrast and brightness. A sensor located below the power button can detect ambient light levels and adjusts the brightness of the keypad accordingly to save battery life. In the box you'll find a 256MB microSD card, connectivity cable, travel charger, carrying pouch and a mono headset.
Features
The E65 comes equipped with every connectivity feature you could ever need. There's support for quadband GSM, 3G, Wi-Fi (802.11b/g with VoIP support), EDGE, USB, infrared and Bluetooth version 1.2. Nokia has stuck with the S60 Symbian operating system, and this latest version is easy to navigate and has most functions located in the menu items you'd expect them to be.
Marketed as a business phone, the E65 comes with several office-based applications such as Quickoffice's document reader or Nokia's Team Suite organiser, plus you'll always stay connected with the instant messaging feature. You can't create Word or Excel files on the go, but this would be frustrating given the limited 2.2-inch display and lack of a full QWERTY keyboard.
When the work day is over, the E65 doubles as an entertainment system thanks to the inbuilt video or audio players and 50MB of onboard storage. You can sit back and watch MP4 files or listen to MP3/AAC tracks, but unless you plan to use the inbuilt speakerphone you'll need to purchase a stereo headset. The E65 also lacks an FM tuner.
To make life easier, Nokia has loaded the E65 with several voice command options, with voice dialling and voice controls for menu short cuts, keypad lock, and profiles. The phone also comes with the usual assortment of personal info managers including a calendar, contacts, to-do list, and notepad, all of which are accessible during calls.
Performance
Nokia's latest smartphone will please most users after a basic handset with a few added features but it's not entirely up to scratch as a fully fledged business model. Call quality was good but the speakerphone was too quiet even at maximum volume, which made it difficult to carry on a conversations whilst in the car or in crowded areas.
Images from the 2-megapixel camera were not up to Nokia's usual standard, turning out slightly grainy even in the highest resolution mode. It didn't help that most camera phones in this price range are now equipped with larger pixel CCDs, and that the E65 also lacked a LED flash or self-portrait mirror. You can improve image quality slightly by playing around with the white balance and colour tones, but we wouldn't rely on using the images for printing photographs.
Battery life was good, with the BL-5F lithium unit charging up quickly and going the distance even with our heavy usage. The phone lasted close to five hours on talk and almost a week on standby, which should be more than enough for most users.
Demanding business users after a replacement for their PDAs are likely to be disappointed by the E65 as it's better suited to general consumers after a stylish and compact handset with a few extra bells and whistles.
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