My Ideal E90 Successor
Over the past couple of weeks I’ve been thinking about buying an E90 Communicator. As a Symbian S60 heavyweight, the E90 allows us to take advantage of its built-in QWERTY keyboard, WLAN capabilities and GPS chip. It also provides A2DP, a powerful 1500 battery, a MiniUSB port, and high-quality stereo speakers. Nonetheless, I just decided to hold off until another Eseries handset comes out to address the following issues.
- The E90 doesn’t come with a 3.5 mm audio jack, meaning I can’t use my wired headphones with it. Given its rather hefty price tag, I think this should have been added.
- The E90’s display firmly touches the keypad when the handset is closed. I’m a bit concerned about the damage this might inflict on the display, and am wondering why Nokia engineers didn’t elevate the rubber cushions in the corners of the lid to avoid this.
- The E90 doesn’t come with the small charger which you get with the N82 and the N95. The E90 would become a much more portable communicator if it had a miniaturized charger.
- The E90 doesn’t have a physical camera lens protector/shutter, and I don’t want to see the precious 3.2-mp camera lens damaged.
- Last but not least, the E90 has been out for almost a year and I’m afraid Nokia might introduce its successor shortly after I get mine.
Do you think my reasons are valid, or am I being too picky by ignoring the myriad capabilities of the E90 and focusing on these shortcomings?
May 6, 2008 at 11:04 am
I myself just went through all that dilema and then bought the E90! First of all a sucessor is not coming soon. The next Eseries are going to be the Liam and Dora and I would presume there will be a gap of at least 6 months before a new device gets out.
Next the screen can be taken care of by a screen film that will protect it from damage.
The 2.5mm jack can be overcome by an adapter, pretty small and the music is great, in fact it surprised me.
The camera could have done with a shutter yes, but the rubbers on the back of the communicator prevent it from coming in contact with the surface you keep in on - some consolation.
The charger, definately. I hate the huge thing it ships with. Fortunately I have N95 charger with me.
May 6, 2008 at 1:17 pm
Thanks, Vaibhav, for your excellent analysis and recommendations. I guess I should take another look at the E90 with your points in mind. Also, I can avoid the issue of “wired headphones” as these days I make heavy use of my Nokia stereo bluetooth headsets.
June 19, 2008 at 10:10 pm
Heck no ! Get E90 now ! Like i will this saturday (21-06-200
1)There is the headset of the 5700 phone which has 2.5 to 3.5mm converter. Alternatively u can use a bluetooth headset with 3.5mm jack
2)This has been fixed in the black version of the phone which i will buy !
3)So what, it has big charger. It’s more a problem of being more small chargers out there than there are big chargers as more phones come with small chargers. With a small charger, to phone would have probably weighted 2grams less. That’s irrelevant unless u plan to carry 1 million phones in your pocket !
4)Use this
http://www.zagg.com/invisibleshield/nokia-e90-cases-screen-protectors-covers-skins-shields.php
5)This is the only valid reason, but it might take a while !
June 20, 2008 at 6:38 pm
@Bytales:
These are all good reasons to purchase the E90, but I have two more issues to resolve. First, I’m not sure how the E90 performs when recording audio via ALON Mp3 Dictaphone. On the N82 it offers 22 combinations of sample rates and on the E51 it is 11. Moreover, the N82 microphone is simply awsome. Second, I’m a bit concerned about what Nokia might introduce in the near future. If Nokia comes up with the true E90 successor in, say, 3 months, I’ll have spent money on a so-called past-generation handset by getting the E90.