09 December 2008

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
Gets The Hands On Treatment!

Where to start? Some background information on myself? Not a fan of touch devices, in fact I loath it but 5800 is the first Symbian S60 5th Ed available on the market, so it’s a must for me.

I also did just purchase the Nokia N85, along with it I’m a current Nokia N95-1 users, with a looong history of Nokia devices. Also to mention their is an iPhone user in my home, good for personal experience and comparison.

Also my reviews are not of your typical day-to-day review. I don’t waste time going into unboxing, what’s available, nor do I give a boring repeat of what’s been viewed and reported on the space, especially not to praise and speak of its capabilities.

I'll directly get to the point, what are its flaws, what’s missing, and can or should be done! No, not like your poorly, bad viewed reports done by the likes of Engadget, Gizmodo, CNET, those valley loving biast PC based Loosers. I am clearly not knocking down on the device, nor will I praise its ability (So if I don’t mention it, it means it does it & very well)

Constructive, Critique, Review

Display: OK about time Nokia, an improvement in resolution, also an increase in size (IMO, size doesn’t mean much to me). Automatically feel the presence of an improved resolution, with more crisp, bright, softer color feel on the eyes.

It drastically improves your day to day use and browsing experience. Now when I compare it to the OLED on my Nokia N85, there’s a difference that only depends on your preference. Sharper, striking looks, more vivid and especially on your gaming and video experience. So it all comes down to you. Do you prefer touch? Non-touch? Video & Gaming.
In my choice it would be the OLED, with higher resolution (It still does make up for the lag) and a non-touch device. Gaming don’t care, Video growing into it.

Touch: What EVERYBODY wants to KNOW!!!!!!! Verdict...........FAIL! Now some of you are jumping to conclusions was it the resistive screen? It should have been Capacitive? Or this guy is a Fool. Neither (but id still speculate the third point :P )

As stated I am not a fan of touch. Being it resistive screen, it plays to my advantage to a touch pressure display. I can’t stand tapping on a cold hard glass. Unfortunately Nokia didn’t play resistive technology out to it fullist potential. Perhaps much needed firmware up will do the trick.

Some icons and symbols require many hits to register, especially smaller symbols which are 80% of the time hard to hit & register correct with a finger. While on a styles I give it a 100% rating.

I do enjoy on some level of their choice in the system it follows. Such as selecting an icon only highlights it, emulating the d-pad effect, which is why so many report a double click needed. Not true per say, you clicking on selection, than followed by an execute click. BUT MAINLY why I say fail, is for no follow through by Nokia, and decently becoming a trend for them. INCONSISTANCY!!!

While some improvements are needed for the touch system, it still works very well, but here are the points that utterly puts it to a fail.

1.) Scroll: Via web browsing it requires "Upword" movement to page down and vica versa. VERY VERY VERY slow, page scrolling. Up, Down, Left, Right. Does not register all the time, many occasions it activate a link and most important scrolling requires a swiping motion of repetitive thumb scaling; place thumb, scroll, remove thumb raise it a level, then place thumb and scroll again. A mini pop up displays comes about to show in which direction you are scrolling, but no direct manipulation.

Now enter the main menu system or any other system application, a complete and different system. Scrolling now requires "Downword" movement to page down (more natural IMO) and vica versa but they also made it easy by making it seamless. Meaning now just slide my finger to the top or bottom, uppon reaching the button of the display it will automatically scroll down (or up depending on my position) while keeping my finger in place.

2.) Selection: As mentioned before when selecting icons or choices, its not followed by an action but in fact highlighted to emulate a d-pad(I like it). Well they all follow the same rule except an application, mainly located under the Apps Icon. mention. Once clicked its "highlighted" & "activated"

3.) Design: Design??? Why?? Yes, if you take a careful look (for those who have not used the device) on the outer end on the screen, it is wrapped around With a chunk of plastic, not like say run your finger across an n78 or n85, where the screen is smoothly placed out to the edges. It just causes great irritation and poor experience, to find your self knocking on the end of the screen every few moments.

Onto the OS

Building on previous Symbian, its core still remains. Efforts have been made to make its user use effortless. UI changes plus minor structural changes. Sports like any other N-Series or Symbian 3rd would. Icons changed to match their Ovi theme (about time) and moa updated. But it still does not hit close to him with their User friendly interface, well not good enough.(Me personally I don’t care, give me Symbian 2nd ill still be happy, its the new users I worry about)

Active standby screen, we are all aware it sports a 3 choice home. They have done a well job including the media key. One major failure I see is under the "Home shortcut" choice, you are only givin 4 shortcuts. That’s not the major failure, but as with the "basic" and "contacts bar" choice, your left with no shortcut choice.

This is where I see the failure on the bottom end of the home screen they have well placed two icons, one for dialer and the other for contacts. A message has been left out. Ok so what you can put it as a shortcut, one out of your active display choice.

Click one on menu key, follow by one click on messaging........After your done, you can choose to press the end key to finish or end up clicking exit, followed by another click to exit menu. What I’m trying to say beside it becomes tedious, its your 2nd most important form of communication (some 1st). A third icon could have been placed on the bottom of the screen for quick access.

Plus or Minus? Depending on your view. By standard clicking the end key takes us to the home screen out of whatever page, app, view we were in. Return to it by anytime by selecting "Open selections" (hold menu key). This scenario has changed. End key will now cancel any of your open activity. The only means of keeping your activity open is by selecting the menu key. New users will benefit from it, maybe old as well. For example every time my bro uses my phone (hes an iPhone user, till Nokia gets a touch device correct) I have to close the open apps after him, because what he knows (and any other user for that matter) press end key and it will close your actions. Me personally it’s a minus.

What’s missing??? Ah well besides your regular not supported yet stuff from Nokia not really much.........................Unless you call a NO ZIP MANAGER expectable!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Internet radio not on the device (Isn’t it a music device, god how can they can new users with it being their first time exp). Firmware update I guess.

.SIS/.SISX:
"To Be or Not to Be" Comes to mind hear. Yes it will work. Yes its backward compatible. Yes it can be ported to 5th with UI scaling. No, some .sis will install, some wont. The ones that do either don’t open or opens and you are left with no means or input. Yes, it works only if scaled to 5th UI

JAVA:
You’re better of with java for the moment. Works fine, installs fine. It only uses half the screen while the other half will be a virtual d-pad.

Widget, WRT, Web-Run-Time
NO NO NO, Again same as .SIS, must be ported over to scalable 5th
Under the download, they offer AccuWeather, and it is beautiful. (A touch version)

NOKIA MAPS:
Very Very Very Good. :)

Conclusion:
I'll say it again, my intentions is not to beat down on the device. When look for a review I don’t wanna hear how good it is, I aint stupid ill read the specs an ill speak for myself. But I do look for a review that points the flaws in an unbiased non-negative way, this truly delivers the best review. I learn what I don’t know.