It’d been a long time since I’d used a Nokia handset, so I decided to spend a while—pretty much the last 12 months in fact—with a Series 60 Nokia N70. I now need to get this off my chest: I hate this handset, and I just don’t like Series 60.
I’m starting to wonder if Sony Ericsson have re-wired my brain away from the Nokia UI.
I quite liked Series 40, and it’s still highly usable despite often looking dated. And I’ve really tried to get into Series 60, but none of the Smartphone Hacks have helped, and none of the applications (including Lifeblog) and none of the 3G features (like mobile TV) make it worth the pain.
The handset itself is actually pretty feature-full (2 megapixel camera, 3G, bluetooth etc…), but it runs too slowly for my liking. Writing messages is slow and clunky; making phone calls from the address book is overly awkward, and the functioning of the navigation keys next to the big red hang-up button means you will quit an application by accident at some point. I challenge you to use voice dialing without accidently calling someone random from your address book.
At least the N70 syncs well with iSync, once you know the magic incantations. I’m being pushed into the arms of other handset manufacturers….
Thank you for listening. That was therapeutic for me.
