If you’ve seen the previous Communicators, you would know what to expect – a huge “brick-like” candybar phone. It is one of the biggest in size recently announced phones but that is a must, considering the capabilities it packs. It fits OK in the hand, but wearing in a pocket is a problem due to its size and you can forget about putting it in a shirt’s pocket.
The heavy weight is the reason to easily feel the phone with you, but as it is extremely well built, it gives the feeling of a high-tech device.
It gets bigger when you open it but this allows for housing the huge display and keyboard. Opening is done at two levels – first the display “locks” at 90 degrees towards the bottom part, which will be suitable for previewing of video file for example. If you will type text holding the phone in your hands, it must be fully opened, with the display and the keyboard sitting flat.
Being fully usable phone when it is closed, the E90 houses the standard combination of a display and keypad on the front. The
2” display is with QVGA (240x320 pixels) resolution and 16 million colors just like other Nokia smartphones. It is bright unit with balanced colors and excellent DPI (dots per inch) ratio. Outdoors with directly reflecting bright sunlight, the colors vanish and it gives greenish image, reminding of a grayscale display. Still, remains perfectly readable.
The
keypad also occupies small part of this side and this makes the keys average in size and tightly next to each other. If your fingers are big, two keys may press at the same time when in a hurry. Still, the step-like arrangement (thanks to the relief) makes them feel easily and as they press softly and with tactile feedback the keyboard is more than usable.
The heavy texting crowd will be happy to find the
QWERTY keyboard inside. It occupies 4 times larger surface, needed to fit so many keys. They are arranged in 5+1 rows, differentiated one from other thanks to the relief. The bottom 4 rows are for the letters and the characters, the fifth is for the numbers and the top one is with large shortcuts, as a whole very similar to a computer keyboard. The separate row for keys makes input of numbers much easier than if they are as alternatives, as on most Windows Mobile phones. The buttons press easily and with strong feedback but unlike most situated on a slider, the keys have bigger movement which feels softer on pressing. We think this helps for more convenient typing when it comes to large amount of text. Still like other wide keyboards one has to move his fingers over the phone when typing, which isn’t so with smaller keyboard like the one of the Q9h.
As we’ve said earlier, like a computer keyboard, the E90 has sixth row with shortcuts that will do what the name says – open a dedicated menu. The end left and right columns house keys including Ctrl (Control), Arrow (Shift), Chr (Character or Alt), Tab, Backspace and Enter. Here also are My Own (the second dedicated shortcut) and backlight on/off buttons. The combination of Chr+Tab will act as Alt+Tab on a Windows Computer – scroll through application loaded in the RAM memory. As on any other Symbian S60 phone, this can be done by holding the Menu button which is at the right end of the top row, next to the My Own button. About a dozen of keys have blue alternative characters on them, which means they will act as shortcuts. Pressing the key together with the Chr will perform the action.
The
internal display is a 3.9” wide-angle monster unit that will
increase the resemblance with a laptop. It is also pretty bright, but in order to save battery power we prefer to decrease the illumination. This can be done in seconds thanks to one of the shortcuts described above (Chr + Bulb button) which will change the 5 levels of the display brightness. The same key without the Chr will turn on/off the keyboard brightness, also performed for battery saving. The big screen is superb for previewing of videos and images and excellent for text and internet, where the 800x352 pixels resolution will show its advantages. 800 pixels width means you will open a lot of the internet pages without any or just with a minor scrolling in this orientation, which is huge advantage over QVGA displays which are more than 2 times narrower in resolution. Just like the external display, the internal one loses its color but remains perfectly readable in direct sunlight.
Let’s go back to the exterior and see what else the phone has. Unlike a lot of the contemporary smartphones which have a myriad of buttons positions on its sides, the E90 is limited to two shortcuts on the right and an Infrared eye. The upper button is the Voice Commands shortcut that is felt and pressed hard, while the lower one is raised and is for the camera but is not a shortcut, but just shutter key. Although autofocus is supported, the button is not two-stepped and after holding it for a few seconds it focuses and captures consecutively. As volume-control keys are lacking, the volume is adjusted by the D-pad.
The bottom houses the miniUSB connector, the Nokia charger port, 2.5mm stereo jack and the microphone hole.
Strangely, there are two pins between the charger and the 2.5mm ports, which should be used with a Desk-stand charger, but yet Nokia has to introduce one for the E90.
On the back are the camera and the LED flash. Rubber feet are positioned in the four corners, on which the phone “sits” when put on a table. They raise it a little so the music is played louder through the speakers, although they are on the back. The feet will be comfortable when you leave the phone watching a video for example, but are not good for typing on it. The E90 is designed to be held in the hand while you use it, otherwise is very uncomfortable to press the buttons.
Nokia E90
