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Nokia E72 Initial Thoughts

on November 29, 2009 – 11:47 pm12 Comments

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Its been a few days with the E72 and we are really impressed with this phone. You must have seen the unboxing video and the Camera samples. We are working on a full blown review of the device and this is just a round up of our initial thoughts

Things we love

  • The Build Quality is just amazing and it feels really nice to grip this device. The judicious use of metal is worth appreciating. The Volume rocker keys are made of metal.  The microSD card slot and USB port are covered with plastic.
  • The SIM Card tray is the best we have seen on any phone
  • The QWERTY Keypad is pretty good and it feels great to type on.  The feedback from the keys is really nice. Also we love the Bluetooth and Torchlight shortcuts.
  • The 5 MP Camera might not have Carl Zeiss optics but just check out the proof of the Camera performance. E-Series users can finally take pictures which are worth sharing !  We really hated using the T-key on the E71 to focus. You can touch the Optical Navikey to focus on the E72. Although it has a small learning curve, it’s pretty cool.
  • The Optical Navikey is actually a tricky feature. Some users might love it but some users might barely use it. We had been spoilt by the E71 and ended up pressing on the joystick rather than using the new Optical scrolling. But later we discovered that this Optical Scrolling thing is actually pretty useful when scrolling through lists or when going from tab to tab like in Gravity for example.  The integration of this key with the Camera application might make focusing easy for most users and might irritate a few. Luckily Nokia has given the option to disable the Navikey if you wish to do so. You can also adjust the sensitivity
  • USB Charging  in addition to a normal 2.0 mm pin charger is actually a brilliant move by Nokia. This was first seen on the E75.  While charging over USB is slower its better than being left with a dead battery.
  • 3.5mm Audio Jack – When E63 was launched  was launched with this Audio jack it drew E71 users  crazy. Luckily Nokia has not disappointed us with the E72. You can plug in your iPod earphones or even a BOSE if you wish. The audio quality over headphones was actually loud and decent. Also you get a decent pair of ear phones in the retail package.
  • Nokia Messaging actually works
  • 600 Mhz CPU is amazing for multitasking
  • Snappy UI due to S60 3rd Edition FP2. It’s still Symbian but feel
  • Loads of Free Memory
  • The Torchlight – This feature is damn useful when you have a power cut or you are inside the garage searching for the  keyhole.
  • Uses the same battery – BP-4L 1500mAh as the E71 and N97
  • Power Saving mode

Things that fail to impress us

  • Call and Call end keys lack the Green and Red color found in most phones even the E71 and E75 got it right .
  • No Dedicated Camera key – You gave a pretty good 5MP Camera but no dedicated camera key. How about using the Voice memo key to fire up the Camera ?
  • Space bar is a little short – This should not affect most users but coming from a E71 which had a large space bar took us a little time to get used to this.
  • Loudspeaker is at the back of the phone near the camera. Although the speaker is louder than the E71 we would have loved to have it somewhere else other the rear. We assume this is due to the 3.5 mm jack on the top.
  • No TV out ( may be we are asking for a bit too much)
  • Really short data cable ( Do all Business users connect the phone only to a laptop ? )

As you can see the positives clearly out weigh the cons !  Stay tuned for a full review coming up on FoneArena soon.

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A team of mobile geeks

  • apaul

    loud speaker is actually very poor….thumbs up Nokia for making this, though it didnt make the splash E71 did when it was launched

    • http://www.fonearena.com Varun Krish

      Well E72 will sell more than E71 due to the batter Camera

  • Mike Butler

    Well after reading your description I will not be upgrading from my E71. A 5mp camera seems to be the only real improvement apart from the extra memory – all the other changes are pretty cosmetic, but obviously a step in the right direction overall. To be honest I’d rather jump up to the N900 or even the X6 for a few extra pounds rather than buy this. I can’t see many people forking out an extra £130 over the current E71 price just for a larger camera and extra memory. The E71 remains an amazingly good and reliable phone. By the way there is nothing wrong with the messaging on the E71 either.

    • http://www.fonearena.com Varun Krish

      Mike ,

      Glad you found the description useful.

      Another important change is USB Charging which is very useful incase you want to charge your phone using your computer.

      Well, I meant to say Messaging comes preloaded on the E72 and works fine. I had a lot of trouble getting it to work on E71.

  • barry

    I’ve been using an E72 for a little while, and find that I really enjoy the smooth, natural feel of using the optical joystick feature, which I have set to maximum sensitivity.

    On the subject of headphones, since you mentioned Bose, have you tried out Nokia’s own BH-905 noise-canceling headset… I had the opportunity to try these out on a recent 12-hour flight (yes, with a wired connection), and found them very nice, indeed.

  • Vedant

    Hi Varun.
    I wanted to know about the music output of e72 as i am not a business user but still like this phone.Also which phones would you recommend for a user like me who is more into multimedia in the range of 20000-23000 ???
    Reply ASAP
    thnks..

  • Kunal

    Horrible loudspeaker

    • Vedant

      music volume is bad too..??

  • AKS

    E72 Bad Things:-
    - It does not auto recognise capital alphabet like E71
    - When u type fast it skips some alphabet
    - When u insert a Image in a word sheet it doesnt recognise
    - Whenever u restart ur phone most of the times u lose your email setting.
    - Web browsing is slower than E71
    - You cannot underline or use bold or italic through shortcuts in word like Ctrl U, B, I like E71
    - This phones hangs now and then like a windows based.
    - Contacts shortkey does allow u to add new contact after long hold.
    - Basic Barcode reader is missing.
    - Web Feeds in missing in he bookmark list, u need to go to setting and find it.
    - Mailbox clock switches the date at 12 noon. So u get the mail dated to next date.
    - Memory card in setting is missing which was usefull in E71, like format etc.
    - Nokia has saved it time by not making new O.S. Has used N-Series user interface which does match with the E-Series User Interface.
    - Optical Key not at all usefull
    - The System is so slow that even setting come very slow, and if u try to select things fast then it leaves you back to the home screen including surfing mails.
    -Battery Backup is only about 1 and half days, and more worse is that u cannot trust this phone as day 1 it shows full battery, and second day you wont even come to know when it comes from full to drain.
    - Even if Wi-Fi server is not found it still says Hidden Wi-Fi found.
    - In Opera 10 Browser u cannot use ‘U’ it only uses *
    - Even space bar key hangs now and then and to use it we need to restart the phone.

    People please tell Nokia to find a way out of all this..

  • maria

    e72 is definetly better than e71.

  • SANJAY SINGH

    In my E72 web browser closes any time. Any idea …tell me…please

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_LY4I4HKB4U2UKAJP2KO622U5AI Narendranath Mvadhyar

    I will wants to buy a handset like MP3 Player and for Email  and 5MP Camera .Which is the best one from Nokia,Sony Ericsson, Samsung.