Nokia tells Michal Jerz to remove his E90 information; I find it anyway

Nokia (NYSE: NOK) didn’t want this information on his site, but Nokia forgot the best thing about the net. Once someone reads it, the information doesn’t die. So here it is, I won’t name my source, but trust me this is what got Michal in trouble:

I spent an hour today playing with the new Communicator. The rumours
are correct – it’s called E90 and the product code is RA-6.

What can I say about it? GEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEZ, it’s BEAUTIFUL! I wish I
could simply show you the pictures but I can’t do this. The product is
still strictly embargoed and I’d probably be in trouble if I published
its photos. I actually haven’t taken any pictures because I was afraid
that I couldn’t resist showing them to you (and getting in trouble)
That’s the disadvantage of running an official and legal website based
in a civilized country – you can get sued anytime. Unlike anonymous
hacker portals based in countries where "law" is a word from a foreign
language… they can review early prototypes and nobody can do anything
to them as nobody can find them So, for now, my description has to be
enough. Hopefully I will be able to get a review unit from Nokia when
they become available and prepare the website and a professional,
detailed review for you all….

First of all, as I wrote, the device is BEAUTIFUL! The best looking
Communicator ever. It’s wider than 9500 but shorter and thinner. It’s
more square’ish than the 9500/9300. It’s got FANTASTIC hinges that feel
extremely solid and look very stylish. They’re located on both ends of
the device and they’re very large. The external casing of the device is
silver plastic while the hinges are shiny like chrome or nickel plated
- superb! The whole inside of the device, including the keyboard, is
black plastic, which looks really GREAT.

The device is based on S60 3rd Edition (3.1, Feature Pack 1). It’s a
clamshell like all older Communicators and it has two screens. The
external screen is 240×320 (it’s a typical S60 3rd Edition screen)
while the internal screen is……….. 800×352 pixels!!!! YES! It’s
large and it’s of fantastic quality! It shows the same UI as the
external screen but in a different resolution which looks like three
E61 screens in a row The nicest thing is that all applications can be
run on EITHER of the screens. You can launch a program on the external
screen, open the flip and continue working with the program on the
internal screen. And vice versa! No more restricted, almost useless
cover UI which can’t do anything but phone calls and access to
SMS/contacts. Now you get FULL access to the entire OS from BOTH sides.
The UI and all applications automatically rescale themselves to the
right resolution. The internal screen is NOT touch sensitive.

The keyboard is VERY convenient. As I wrote, it’s black. It’s more
square’ish than 9500’s keyboard because the whole device is wider, the
keys are bigger and are much more convenient than in 9500. In general,
typing experience is the best of all Communicators released so far. The
Enter key is big and square. The 5-way key (or is it 9-way key? I don’t
know) inside looks almost identical as the one outside. It has a
separate shiny silver "ring" for directions and a separate black
central button. It’s twice larger than 9500’s rocker key. FINALLY a
truly convenient controller!

The inner screen has four buttons, but unlike in 9500/9300 there are
two large buttons on each side of the screen. And again, it’s much more
convenient than having all buttons on one side.

The E90 has a built-in GPS (it’s a normal GPS, not AGPS). I couldn’t
check it, but it is said to be supporting HSDPA. Besides that, it’s
obviously 3G/EDGE/WiFi. Its USB port is finally a standard mini-USB! I
couldn’t check memory size or CPU type/speed, but I believe that it is
ARM11 (OMAP 2420) based and has a clock speed of 330 MHz or more.

The device has two cameras, one high resolution camera with LED flash
on the back side (sorry, I had no time to check the resolution, but
it’s definitely several MPix) and the usual low-res cam for video calls
inside, on the left side of the internal screen.

The UI inside and system applications look like S60 3rd Edition, the
device has the standby screen known from the latest S60v3 phones
(including the active part) and also the typical S60 menu with folders.
Applications like Contacts, Calendar, etc. are tweaked for the high
resolution of the internal screen. I mean, on the external display they
look and work like on any "normal" S60 3rd Ed. phone e.g. N80, but on
the internal screen they make good use of the much increased resolution
and screen area. For instance, Contacts have the list of your contacts
on the left side while the selected contact data is shown immediately
on the right side, like in older Communicators, so there is no need to
click each contact to open it’s card and then go back to the list. I
had no time to check all system apps in detail but it looks that all
system applications including Calendar etc. will be much extended
compared to standard S60 3rd Ed. phones and I’m sure that they will not
be lacking functionality or ease of use compared to older
Communicators. I know that this is what some people were afraid of.
Don’t be. The unit I tested didn’t have full set of applications, for
example the Office folder was still empty, which is the best proof that
Nokia works on the applications for the new Communicator and not just
takes them from the existing S60 devices without any modifications.

Well, that’s all for now. I’ve heard that the E90 will be announced
either in December or in January and it’s supposed to be launched in
Spring 2007, so it’s really soon!

You know that I am a big fan of the UIQ platform and the P990, but
after playing with the E90 today all I can say is: goodbye P990,
welcome E90, my new LOVE! Yes, it’s the best Symbian OS based device
I’ve seen (at least when it comes to how it looks and what its tech
specs are; it’s too early to judge its stability and functionality of
the system software).

P.S. Oh, I forgot, it supports Micro SD cards. The card slot is on the bottom, close to the USB port.