Nokia E-series is the core business and commercial series designed by Nokia for those who have their offices locked-up in their pockets, even while going on a vacation. In spite of having such competitor companies like I-mate, HP, Blackberry and HTC Touch, who are have been occupied in manufacturing business phones for so long Nokia’s idea of designing & separating a dedicated series for the businessmen was yet a confusing job. But Nokia, being the most charismatic cellphone brand today took the challenge seriously. It was although a hard job to start right from the beginning. Years back Nokia 6xxx series was considered as the best business series but with the channel of time the motive of the series faded and Nokia had the way cleared to announce the call for battle. And the company launched Nokia Eseries; the first wave was consisted of three phones Nokia E60, Nokia E61 and Nokia E70. Nokia E60 made its proper position in the market due to its candy-bar design and professional glance. Nokia E61 was a real competitor for the Blackberry due to its complex email features and full-qwerty keyboard. Nokia E70 being the boss of the first wave of E-series was unable to turn into the showstopper due to its folding faults. The results of the first series were a bit disappointing for the company. Yet there were a multitude of reasons for that out of which the most noticeable one was that Nokia E60 and Nokia E61 had no camera option. Although, businessmen don’t need a camera phone but just for the sake of expanding the series gradually the company didn’t accumulate any camera in the two models. On the other hand, Nokia E71 had a 2.0 megapixel camera (1600 x 1200 pixels) for capturing images to continue the everyday workflow. Well, this is all about the past now coming to the present.

About a month back Nokia announce the Nokia E71; this device is the successor of Nokia E61i, this Quad-band phone has a shiny mono-block design with full QWERTY keyboard having dimensions 114 x 57 x 10 mm, this device weighs 127 grams. The design of the phone seems like a more innovative form of Nokia E61i and Blackberry Pearl 8800 series. The phone has a metallic and glossy texture. The phone has 2.36” Active Matrix TFT (QVGA) display (320 x 240 pixels) which supports 16 million colors. Now coming to the major purpose of the phone, as this device hold the same motive of faster email and business solutions, the phone has the complete range of complex email features (sending, receiving with attachments). The phone has a rather simple email set-up. The phone has compatibility with Microsoft Exchange via Mail for Exchange, The phone supports IMAP (with Idle support), POP3 & SMTP email clients. Similar to Nokia E61i, this tool also supports Nokia Intelli-sync Wireless Email. The device has Integrated Nokia Mobile VPN too. As far as email is concerned, the phone is “rich”. As we move further we have some of the most compelling features. The most senior Eseries member E71 is an example of ideal design with simple construction. The phone has full QWERTY keyboard and dedicated one-touch keys (similar to Nokia 9300i) with predefined access to the common features (Home, Calendar, Contacts and Email). The phone has voice features which includes Speaker Dependent and Speaker self-determining Voice dialing. The textual input of the phone is assisted by auto-completion, auto-correction, auto-punctuation and learning capabilities. The Navi™ key has a notification LED light and has fast scrolling options.

Now coming to the actual reason of the cell phone itself, the telephone mode seems to be quiet strong as it has complex features. As far as the incoming calls are concerned the Any key answer & Automatic answer (with headset or car kit) option is available. Further, Nokia E71 has call waiting, call hold, conference calling, call divert, call timer (during & on end), logging of dialed, received and missed calls, fixed dialing number support, NDPTT (Network Dependent Push to talk), automatic redial, Speaker dependent and Speaker Independent Voice Dialing (SDND, SIND) options. Contacts with images, Vibrating alert (internal), Side volume and mute keys are also there to enhance the look, interface and professionalism. The support for VoIP (Voice over IP) is also provided by Nokia. Because of having a full-QWERTY keyboard messaging in Nokia E71 is a true pleasure and yet it’s a pleasant job to write emails, business reports, articles and notes in an instant. Nokia E71 has SMS features (with Multiple SMS deletion), Text-to-speech message reader, MMS, distribution lists for messaging, instant messaging with Presence-enhanced contacts & Cell transmit (network dependent feature). The phone is loaded with features which can support the user in every single business activity. The phone has locking features which include Device Lock, Remote Lock, and Data encryption (for both phone memory & micro-SD card). As I have discussed above that this phone is the successor of Nokia E61i. Nokia E71 has full HTML browser (with HTML, XHTML, MP, WML, CSS) which works over HTTP and WAP 2.0 protocols. The phone also supports JavaScript 1.3 & 1.5 versions.

Nokia E71 has an internal dynamic shared memory pool of 110 MB. The phone has a microSD card slot with Hot Swap facility. According to the manufacturer, the expansion limit for external memory is 8 GB. The phone has CSD (Circuit Switched Data), HSCSD (High Speed Circuit Switched Data) for faster data conversion over the air and with a compatible PC and other handheld devices, GPRS class A, multislot class 32, maximum speed 100/60 kbps (DL/UL), EDGE class A, multislot class 32, maximum speed 296/177.6 kbps (DL/UL), WCDMA 900/2100 or 850/1900 or 850/2100, maximum speed 384/384 kbps (DL/UL), HSDPA class 6, maximum speed 3.6 Mbps/384 kbps (DL/UL), WLAN IEEE 802.11b/g. The WLAN has security options which include security protocols, WEP, 802.1X, WPA and WPA2. The web-browser has TCP/IP support. The phone can also be used as a modem by using the Nokia PC Internet Access (compatible PC Suite required). This device is ideal for the local connectivity as well. Nokia E71 has infrared (max speed. 115 kbps) and Bluetooth 2.0 with Enhanced Data Rate, MTP (Multimedia Transfer Protocol) & A2DP. Bluetooth feature is further enhanced with preset profiles which include DUN, OPP, FTP, HFP, GOEP, HSP, BIP, RSAP and GAVDP. The phone has Network (LPR) Line Printer Daemon protocol (RFC1179) for connecting the device with compatible printer via Bluetooth and USB Port.

Now coming to the customization options, this is another Series 60 3rd edition device which has Symbian OS 9.1. Being a Symbian phone is a quiet charming thing for such a phone. The newest feature as far as customization options are concerned is the Home Screen modes option. The device has an option of switching the two home screen modes with customizable active standby views (including shortcuts, menu style, option placement & themes). The phone has a support for new applications. The phone comes up with Flash Lite 3.0, Dictionary, Quickoffice (Quickword, Quickpoint, Quicksheet), PDF Viewer, ZIP Manager, Download!, File Manager, Nokia Search & Nokia Maps already installed. The manufacturer has assembled an Integrated A-GPS in Nokia E71i.

It seems a quiet old and obsolete idea to say that a business phone can be completed without a camera, well Nokia being the hot-favorite for decades can do every possible thing to satisfy the costumers. In Nokia E71, The Company has provided a 3.2 Megapixel (2048 x 1536 pixels) camera with Autofocus and LED flash (with 1 meter range). The camera has focal length of 3.8mm and a focal range of 10 cm to infinity. The focal length seems quiet low for a 3.2 megapixel camera but the reason behind this is the sleek and stylish construction and design of the genius Eseries King, Nokia E71 itself. The camera has digital zooming capability (upto 4x) and has a macro-focus of 10-60 cm. The camera has flash modes (including red eye reduction), auto exposure (centre weighed) modes, capture modes, color tone modes and scene modes for outclass photography. The Viewfinder opens in Fullscreen with Active Toolbar. The camera has video capabilities which includes recording upto 1 hour in 640 x 480 (VGA) at 22 fps, 320 x 240 (QVGA) at 30/15 fps, 176 x 144 (QCIF). The video has digital zoom options too. The Video recording file formats are mp4, .3gp; codecs: H.263, MPEG-4 VSP & Audio recording format is AMR. The phone lacks recording in WAV format (well this feature was provided in Nokia 9300, 9500 and 9300i communicating devices). The phone has video streaming capabilities which include streaming of 3GPP, MP4 & RM (RealMedia) file formats. The normal ringtones can be replaced by Video Ringtones. Like the previous Eseries members Nokia E71 has music player & the music playback file formats are mp3, WMA, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+. The phone has Visual FM Radio (having the range of 87.5-108 MHz). This device has a 2.5 mm Nokia AV connector. It could have been a better thing if it would have a 3.5 mm connector but of course, this device doesn’t belong to Nseries. The device further has Nokia Podcasting support and synchronizing music with Windows Media Player is also available.

The phone has an advanced phone book with multiple entries option, clock (analogue and digital), alarm clock with ring tones, reminders, calculator with advanced functions, calendar with week and month view, converter, active Notes, to-do list, PIM information viewable during call.

It concludes that Nokia-E71 is a highly professional and ideal device for people on the go. Moreover, it has basic, higher and even complex features to persuade the requirements & needs of businessmen who want to have their offices traveling with them in their pockets.