Nokia E71 Review

Interface, software and multimedia:

It’s wonderful to realize that there’s a notable intellect behind the good looks. In the E71’s case, the brains go by the name of Symbian 9.2 S60 3rd Edition, Feature Pack 1. Since this OS is popular enough, and we have discussed its pros and cons a lot of times, we won’t go into details again. We’ll just mention a few changes that make the difference between the new E-series models and the other Symbian phones.

The feature that made an impression on us at first glance was the switch mode from the standard home screen. It instantly reminded us of the classic story about the good Dr. Jekyll and the evil Mr. Hyde… actually the latest one we could think of is Dexter (the TV series). In other words it lets you transform your phone with the pressing of a single button. It’s a wonderful option for those people that work hard during the day and then occupy the clubs at night. Actually the feature lets you set two modes with different themes and applications on the home screen. By default, one of them is called “Business” (with e-mail, calendar, search, notes and others turned on), and the other one is called “Personal” (it focuses on the music and video player and for example a private e-mail).


What makes an impression is that the icons are different from the ones on the multimedia Symbian phones, but are still clear enough and you’ll easily get used to them. You don’t have any options for some strange main menu layouts (i.e. V-like or horseshoe-like) but this isn’t such a pain. Well, if the good business functions were missing though, the situation would have been worse.

Fortunately they are available. We’ll mention just a few important details here. First, you have a limitless number of contacts and search by first and last name, which can be done directly from the home screen by typing on the keyboard. Second, there are automatic settings for the popular e-mails, there’s no need to remember servers and ports for them. We managed to check our Gmail account in about 20 seconds after we began using the E71. This of course was also because of the full keyboard. Finally, the organizer functions can be described just as “nothing’s missing”. The wide screen provides enough space for you to view the calendar, set tasks and alarms. It also turned out to be very suitable for web surfing.


For high-speed connection to the global network the phone relies on HSDPA 3.6 Mbits/s or Wi-Fi. The Symbian browser is the best one for devices without a touch screen – it opens pages flawlessly and features a mini-map that makes viewing the larger ones easier. The good news is that the phone is usable in the GSM networks all around the world, but unfortunately the 3G is only available in Europe or Asia (or only in the USA, depends on the version).


The bad news is that the camera is pretty mediocre. In theory, a 3.2 MP shooter with autofocus and a flash should not be bad at all, after all this was the standard for a cameraphone two years ago, and some of the devices of that time still impress us with outstanding quality in this aspect (the Sony Ericsson K800 for example). Unfortunately, this is not one of those cases. The only positive side here is the interface, which resembles the one of Nokia’s top cameraphone- the N82, and offers a lot of features. The quality however, is light-years away and characterizes with unnatural colors, noise, noise and… that’s right – noise! The videos can record at QVGA resolution and 15 fps, totally giving you the opportunity to shoot the next movie about the previously mentioned Jekyll and Hyde. The lagging frames and grotesque figures, the self-changing colors are all built-in effects (actually they are missing in the menu, but one way or another they are always on), which will definitely counterpart for the appropriate atmosphere. In other words, “Brothers, in the name of God, don’t shoot!”



But why not listen to music? Through the headphones, of course, you wouldn’t want it any other way. The external speaker crackles a lot. Not that the headphones are wonderful, but at least are completely usable, in spite of the slightly sharp sound. This time, we didn’t go for Lil Wayne and T-Pain (as in our Carbon Arte test), but stick to the classic (Snoop Dog and Tina Turner). Thankfully the phone features a nice player with big enough album covers, user-friendly interface, equalizer and audio settings. You also get an FM Radio with the cool option of downloading a list with all the accessible radio stations in you region directly from the internet. And if this isn’t enough for your music needs, you can play samples and download songs and albums from Music Store.

The quality of the MPEG4/H.264 format clips you’ll able to play with the video player is really high, even compared to multimedia monsters like the Renoir or the Pixon. Too bad that the maximum resolution of the videos you’ll be able to play with the build-in player is 320x240, and DivX and XviD files are not supported. This can be easily resolved by installing the proper software. What exactly? Well, have you thought of Core Player for Symbian?




If you accidentally find yourself lost you can rely on the built-in GPS. It offers you the option to download maps, in order to shorten loading times. Localization is done in about 3-4 seconds (warm start) on a cloudy autumn day, which is a rather good achievement. The navigation itself is cool, even if you don’t need to go on a long business trip. For example, you can landmark the location of a nice place, which you don’t know how you’ve gotten to (and even less) how you’ve left.