This article is more than 1 year old

Nokia E55 smartphone

Does the business for the Qwerty customer?

Playback through the supplied headphones is tinny and thin, and the bass setting on the six-setting graphic equaliser doesn’t do much to improve it. The midrange and high-end are impressively clear however, with a fair degree of detail. The 3.5mm headphone jack makes upgrade easy though, and there's stereo Bluetooth on board for connecting wireless headphones. You'll need the wired variety for the FM radio, which uses the cable as an aerial.

Nokia E55

USB charging suggests the end for Nokia's ubiquitous PSU connector

The latest version of Nokia PC Suite is easy enough to use, despite being a bit clunky. Drag and drop your content onto the phone and it will automatically assign its place in the phone's memory according to the type of file it is – music files go in the music folder, video to the video folder etc, though other data files such as Word docs tend to get dumped into the Others folder. It offers the option to convert some media files for playback (it can handle MP3, AAC and WMA audio files, as well as MP4, H.264, H.263 and WMV for video) too.

There's a full version of QuickOffice, which allows you to view, edit and even create Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents as well as a PDF viewer and file zipper. Additional app downloads are also available from Nokia's online shop, though the selection is paltry compared to what's on offer for the iPhone or Windows Mobile devices.

Nokia's stats promise talk time of up to eight hours and standby of up to 29 days. It didn't measure up to this in practise (they never do, do they?) but it still managed an impressive three days of moderate use before we had to hook it up the mains, which is pretty good going for a smart phone.

Verdict

The Nokia E55 is an extremely neat and powerful business handset. The SureType-style keyboard layout is a practical compromise between Qwerty and standard numeric keypads, though the keys could have done with just a smidgeon more feedback. Messaging is up to par, as is the browser once you've taught yourself the shortcuts. Camera and media player aren't among the best, but they're far from the worst and easily pass muster if you don't intend either to be the main focus of your phone. ®

More Phone Reviews...


LG GD910
Watch Phone

Samsung
S8000 Jet

BlackBerry
Curve 8520

HTC
Hero
85%
Nokia E55

Nokia E55 smartphone

A top notch business phone that does most things very well – shame the keypad isn't more responsive.
Price: £275 RRP

More about

TIP US OFF

Send us news


Other stories you might like