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Nokia launches Nokia 5800 Navigation Edition – with GPS license

Nokia today launched  Nokia 5800 Express Music  Navigation Edition,  with a Life time Walk and Drive license, which will act as a full functional GPS navigation device in your car/day to day life.  Apart from that there is no change in terms of hardware of Software specification.

Additionally Nokia is giving a stand for using the 5800 as GPS in a car. The Full touch screen devices are finding various different roles in our day to day life and this one will definitely interest those who are looking for a GPS/Music Player.

The phone is launched only in Black/Chrome unlike different colours of normal Nokia 5800. The phone also is launched with three variants one for US 3G, and one with Rest of the world 3G for  Europe,India etc. One more version without 3G and Wifi for China.

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Nokia 5530 Express Music Full touch screen Phone Review and Technical Specs

This post talks answers the following questions:

  • Nokia 5530 Express Music Review
  • Differenc between Nokia 5800 vs Nokia 530
Nokia 5530 - Express Music
Nokia 5530 – Express Music

Nokia 5530 is the slimmed down version of Nokia’s first Full Touch screen phone the Nokia 5800. So we thought it will be good to compare these two models before detailing out the review of the 5530.

It’s not only the features that have reduced in 5530 but also the dimensions. The newer Nokia 5530 is notably thinner and smaller than 5800.

In Length x Width x Thickness the phones are as below

Nokia 5800 – 111 x 51.7 x 15.5
Nokia 5530 – 104 x 49 x 13
Nokia N97 – 117 x 55.3 x 15.9

And one more important omission from the Nokia 5530 is the 3G support and along with it 3G calling. The 5800 has a inbuilt 8GB memory but 5530 comes with 100MB inbuilt and a free 4GB card expandable up to 16GB.

Other important difference we did notice is the battery performance between Nokia 5800 and Nokia 5530.

Nokia 5800 – Battery BL-5j – 1320 mAh – Powerful
Nokia 5530 – Battery BL-4u – 1000 mAh – Weaker

The 5800 has almost 100% more talk time and standby time compared to the Nokia 5530.

Nokia 5800 – Talk Time – 8 hours 40 Minutes Standby Time – 406 Hours
Nokia 5530 – Talk Time – 4 hours 54 Minutes Standby Time – 351 hours

The user memory has been increased from 81 MB in 5800 to 100MB in Nokia 5530.

Other than the above mentioned both the phones are almost identical. So let get down to the specifications and usability.

Nokia 5530 Red Front ViewNokia 5530 Red Back ViewNokia 5530 Red Side View

Usability :

The newer model 5530 has a more stable software (after several refinements in 5800) and the UI appears to be more consistent than the 5800, but the software itself is identical and very few other changes are visible. Some times it felt the touch screen is not very sensitive.

Technical Specification :

Size
Form: Classic with full touch
Dimensions: 104.0 x 49 x 13 mm
Weight: 107 g
Volume: 68 cc
Full touch interface

Display and 3D
Size: 2.9″
Resolution: 640 x 360 pixels
Up to 16.7 million colours
AFFS technology
Brightness control

Keys and input method
Touch screen with pen or finger input
Touch input methods
– Full screen QWERTY
– Alphanumeric keypad
– Handwriting
Power key
Volume key
Camera key
Keylock switch
Dedicated touch keys: send, end, home
Voice commands

Colours and covers
Available in-box colours:
– Black with red accents
– White with blue accents
– White with yellow accents
– Black with grey accents
– White with pink accents

Connectors
Micro-USB connector
3.5 mm stereo headphone plug

Memory
microSD memory card slot with hot swap, up to 16 GB (4 GB memory card included)
70 MB internal user memory

Power
BL-4U 1000 mAh Li-Ion battery
Talk time: up to 4 h 54 min (GSM)
Standby time: up to 351 h (GSM)
Video playback time: up to 3 h 45 min (QCIF, 15 fps)
Music playback time: up to 27 h

Communication and navigation
Operating frequency
Quad-band GSM 850/900/1800/1900
Automatic switching between GSM bands
Flight mode

Data network
CSD
HSCSD
GPRS / EDGE class B, Multi Slot Class 32 (5 Rx +3Tx, Max Su7m 6), maximum speed 177/296 kbps (UL/DL)
WLAN; IEEE 802.11 b/g
TCP/IP support

Local connectivity and synchronisation
Bluetooth version 2.0 (A2DP & AVRCP)
MTP (Mobile Transfer Protocol) support

Call features
Call waiting, call hold, call divert
Logging of dialled, received and missed calls
Automatic redial
Contacts Bar; speed dialling
Vibrating alert (internal)
Side volume keys (dedicated)
Mute/unmute
Contacts with images
Talking ring tones
Conference calling

Messaging
SMS
SMS storage: limited available memory (70 MB internal, 4 GB on memory card)
Contacts bar for up to 20 contacts
Multiple SMS deletion
Text-to-speech message reader
MMS (OMA 1.3)
Automatic resizing of images for MMS
Audio Messaging (AMS)
Common inbox for SMS and MMS messages
Distribution lists for messaging
Cell broadcast

E-mail
Supported protocols: IMAP, POP, SMTP
Support for e-mail attachments
Support for e-mail with filtering
IMAP IDLE support

Web browsing
Supported mark-up languages: HTML, XHTML, WML
Supported protocols: HTTP, WAP
TCP/IP support
Full web browser
Nokia Mobile Search

Image and sound
Photography
3.2 megapixel camera (2048 x 1536 pixels)
Image formats: JPEG
4x digital zoom
Autofocus
Focal length: 3.7 mm
Focus range: 10 cm to infinity
Macro focus: 10-60 cm
LED flash
Flash modes: On, off, automatic, red-eye reduction
White balance modes: automatic, sunny, cloudy, incandescent, fluorescent
Center weighted auto exposure; exposure compensation: 1/10000 ~ 1/5 s
Capture modes: still, sequence, self-timer, video
Scene modes: automatic, user defined, close-up, portrait, landscape, sports, night, night portrait
Colour tone modes: normal, sepia, black & white, vivid, negative
Light sensitivity modes: high, medium, low, automatic
Full-screen viewfinder with grid
Active toolbar
Dedicated camera key
Photo editor on device

Video
Video recording at up to 176 x 220 pixels (QCIF) and up to 15 fps
Up to 4x digital video zoom
Video recording file formats: .mp4, .3gp
Audio recording format: AMR
Video white balance modes: automatic, sunny, cloudy, incandescent, fluorescent
Scene modes: automatic, low light mode, night
Colour tone modes: normal, sepia, black & white, vivid, negative
Clip length (maximum): 1 h 30 min
RealPlayer
Video playback file formats: .3gp, .mp4, RealPlayer
Video streaming: .3gp, .rm
Landscape mode video playback
Video ring tones
Video editor on device

Music and audio playback
Nokia music player
– Playlists
– Shuffle
– Repeat
– Equalizer
– Use music as ringtone
– Assign song to contact
– Loudness
– Stereo widening
– Bass booster
Music playback file formats: .mp3, SpMidi, AAC AAC+, eAAC+, WMA. MTP support
Audio streaming
Dedicated volume keys
Dedicated touch music keys on Homescreen
Touch volume switch when using video player
Stereo FM radio
3.5 mm stereo headphone plug
Nokia Podcasting support
Nokia Music Store support
Ring tones: mp3, aac, 64-tone polyphonic
3D surround sound stereo speakers
Use music track as alarm tone

Voice and audio recording
Voice commands
Voice dialling
Voice recorder
Audio recording formats: AMR
FR, EFR, WCDMA, and GSM AMR
Digital stereo microphone
Text-to-speech

Personalisation: profiles, themes, ring tones
Customizable profiles
Ring tones: mp3, aac, 64-tone polyphonic
Video ring tones
Support for talking ring tones
Themes
Homescreen elements customisable

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Best Touch screen phones and good alternatives to Iphone

Well there have been so many new Mobile launches in the recent past with focus on providing the full touch screen UI. Both Samsung and LG have come up with quite few of them. And HTC has come out with improved models and finally Nokia has finally entered this segment. If you don’t want to be tied to a network and don’t want pay a hefty price (as much as $800 as in India for 16GB version), you should definitely consider one of the alternatives listed below. I have also included the price (as of Aug 2009) for a better understanding.

All the below phones don’t need a contract and are sold unlocked by Manufacturers at the mentioned price.

Samsung STAR – Rs 9500 or $210

Samsung’s basic full touch screen phone Samsung STAR is priced at $200 or Rs 9500/- . It has a music player, Camera ,FM and lots of free games. It has very slim look, but since this is based on Samsung’s proprietary OS, customizations and free apps are limited or Nonexistent.
Also the STAR 3G a 3G version of Samsung STAR is available for Rs 2000 more.

Nokia 5800 – $ 400 or Rs 18000

Nokia’s first full touch model a candy bar phone with all the features of S60 and 8GB memory with load of music and entertainment features. This model has many freeware apps written in Symbian and Java. But the main source of discontent is its inconsistent UI, where Nokia haven’t polished the innards of the Navigation. But this phone has a powerful OS which allows lot more customizations. Expect the newer firmware to improve the performance and tweak the UI.

Nokia 5530 –Rs 12000 or $230
A bare bone version of the Nokia 5800 express music phone minus the 3G and 8GB inbuilt memory. This phone will definitely capture audience as this is to be priced at 230$ or Rs 12,000.

Samsung Jet – Rs 20,700 or $450

Samsung Jet is the latest and heavily loaded Samsung Full Touch screen phone and it boasts the fastest processor among all the present generation phones at 800MHz ( Remember the Intel P3 processors ?? ) . It has 5 MP camera, Music player, FM, Games,Divx Player etc. Also it has very good metallic look. It is priced at Rs 20,700 or $ 450 . Again this runs on Samsung’s proprietary OS.

LG Cookie – Rs 9000 or $200

One of the cheapest Full touch screen phones in the market, LG Cookie is a value for money product with a good 3.2 MP camera , FM radio and supports up to 8GB memory card.

LG Arena – Rs 20,100 or $450

LG Arena is a fully loaded phone from LG with almost all the features of the Samsung Jet and more. It has inbuilt memory of 8GB expandable upto 40GB memory. 5 MP camera , Dolby digital Video , 3G video calling, wifi , 7.2 Mbps HSPDA connection, A-GPS and 3.5 mm Standard audio jack. But the OS is a proprietary OS.

Samsung Pixon M8800 – Rs 22,000 or $ 500

Samsung Pixon is a 8MP camera cum Full touch screen phone with a vivid 3.2 inches display apart from the usual functionalities like Music, Video, Movies, GPS, wifi etc

There are other higher end phones which will be covered separately in another article.