Nokia (NYSE: NOK) will be releasing new color options for its popular E71 smartphone. The full QWERTY keyboard-equipped device has been spotted in black and red at this year’s Nokia World in Barcelona. As you can see from the image above, the E71 keeps rocking even in new color. And with additional color options, the Finnish giant will certainly make more people love the E71. Not that I don’t love it in current colors (white and grey), it’s just that having a device available in multiple colors is always a good thing, especially for those that are more fashion-oriented and primarily care about the form rather than function. For those people red could be the color of choice, as it’s one of those “statement colors,” right?

[Via: E71blog]

Sometimes you can have the best of both worlds. The Nokia E63 is Espoo’s latest S60-powered smartphone that has been given the honor of bringing the Eseries lineup to the entry-level market. Packed with many of the high-end smartphone features that have earned the up-range Nokia E71 accolades from smartphone fans around the world, the Nokia E63 offers the best of both worlds – high technology and an affordable price tag.

The Nokia E63 has just passed through the FCC on its way into waiting smartphone users’ hands.

The Nokia E63 sports the same QVGA screen (320×240 pixels), Symbian S60 OS, WiFi, Bluetooth, 2.4-inch screen, FM radio, quad-band (850/900/1800/1900Mhz) GSM radio and 3G (HSDPA) data connectivity (varying by regional variants) that make the Nokia E71 the competent smartphone that it is.

But, to shave some heft off the Nokia E71’s price-tag, Nokia gave the E63 a lesser 2-megapixel camera, omitted the GPS receiver, and wrapped the entire package in cheaper plastic parts. The result is a seriously capable smartphone that looks a lot like its bigger brother Nokia E71, yet manages to keep its price-tag slim and trim.

With the FCC’s official blessing, the Nokia E63 should makes its way to US shores in due time.

FCC – Nokia E63 approval

[Via: Unwired View]

My last day with the Nokia (NYSE: NOK) E71 is approaching and I wanted to use another opportunity to rant about it and answer the single most important question of those interested to grab one for themselves.

In a nutshell: buy it!

As I said it before, the Nokia E71 is the single best Symbian phone released to date. It has everything you could possible need, including WiFi connectivity, full QWERTY keyboard that is easy to use, built-in GPS, and a great Webkit-based browser. Calendar also rocks, but if you want something even better – you can always install some third-party app like Handy Calendar.

On the other hand, if you don’t need a GPS and 2 megapixel camera is good enough for you, maybe the newly announced Nokia E63 will do the job for you. You should know, however, that it’s more plasticy than the E71 and once you get used to the navigation and other location-based services, you’ll never want to go back.

Back to the E71. It was my pleasure to use for almost two weeks and, boy, will I miss it. I already have the Nokia N93 and iPhone, so personally, I won’t buy it. However, if any of those two stops working — the E71 is on top of my list. At the moment, though, I’m happy with what I got and my gadget fund is set to be used for some netbook purchase…

That’s about all I wanted to share about the E71. It goes back to Nokia’s WOM World within days. Life without it won’t be the same.

Just when we posted about new firmware being available for the Nokia E66 and E71, another ESeries device got an upgrade, too. It’s the Nokia (NYSE: NOK) E51, which with the new software version should be even more faster and reliable to use than ever.

Unfortunately, there is no change log at the moment, so we don’t know what exactly was changed. However, according to Symbian-Freak, users will see some of the applications loading much faster. They mentioned that Nokia Maps 2 is now loading very fast. On the down side, though, Flash Lite 3 isn’t included in the update, meaning you’ll still need a dedicated app to watch YouTube clips.

As always, we advise to have your firmware up to date. Start Nokia Software Updater or Nokia PC Suite and take it from there…

[Via: SymbianFreak]

Today Nokia (NYSE: NOK) officially unveiled the E63 smartphone, the one we’ve already seen in the wild for few times. Touted as the mass market messaging device, the E63 resembles the Finnish giant’s E71 model, which I’m currently testing. However, unlike the E71, the newly announced device lacks GPS, has 2 megapixel camera as opposed to E71’s 3.2 megapixels, and is more plasticy, but has somewhat improved keyboard — “CTRL and “CHR” now have separate keys and so do “@” and “/”. As for the size, the E63 is slightly thicker than the E71: it measures 113×59x13 mm/126g as opposed to the E71’s 114×57x10 mm/127g. The extra thickness was properly used and the new device has a “more regular” 3.5mm audio jack (the E71 has a 2.5mm jack).

Rest of the specs seem unchanged, and include a QVGA screen (320×240 pixels), Symbian S60, WiFi, Bluetooth, 2.4-inch screen, FM radio — even though we’re still waiting to see the E63 hitting the Forum Nokia website, when we’ll know this for sure.

Also worth noting is that with each E63 purchase, users get a free gig of online file storage at Files on Ovi.

The device will be available in ruby red or ultramarine blue for 199 EUR, before taxes and subsidies.

UPDATE: The Nokia E63 will be available in three versions, with one sporting proper 3G frequencies for AT&T (NYSE: T) (E63-2):

• E63-1: Quad-band EGSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 900/2100
• E63-2: Quad-band EGSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 850/1900
• E63-3: Quad-band EGSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 850/2100

Nokia (NYSE: NOK) has released new firmware upgrades for their popular E66 and E71 enterprise series smartphones. The update brings a number of performance improvements, including camera viewfinder orientation, Mail for Exchange synchronisation and browsing. In other words, bugs have been fixed, some of the pre-installed apps updated, and the devices are more stable overall.

As always, Nokia (and IntoMobile for that matter) urge you to keep your firmware version up to date. You can already upgrade your E66/E71 from the Nokia Software Updater or through Nokia PC Suite.

If you care to know more on what’s changed, Symbian-Freak has full change logs.

Today I’m writing you about my E71 crashing experience. This hasn’t happened actually today, but I need to inform you about it, nonetheless.

I managed to crash the E71 two times:

• First time it was when I opened Nokia (NYSE: NOK) Maps and wanted to close it quickly, so I could do some other thing on the phone.
• Second time the similar scenario happened with a browser being open and I needed to close it within seconds.

In both cases, the phone blocked and a restart was needed. Now you could say it’s a big deal, but I don’t think so. Both Nokia Maps and S60 Browser are resource hungry apps and if you use them regularly (i.e. open them, do what you need and close them), nothing happens. To be perfectly honest, I’ve no idea what caused the phone to crash – it just happened.

Again, I must emphasize I don’t see this as a problem. That’s two crashes for a week, which is not a big deal for any smartphone, and in both cases it was me who tried to quickly open an app and then close it before it was properly initialized. Besides, the phone works perfectly all the time.

I’m eager to hear any comments you may have? Do you happen to know what caused the crash? Do you have some similar experience with the E71? The comment form is all yours…

Two more apps are installed on my Nokia (NYSE: NOK) E71. They are GMail and Calcium.

I’m sure you’re aware the new version of GMail mobile app is out now. Using it on the Nokia E71 is a true pleasure. Sure there’s Nokia’s email client, but I simply love Google (NSDQ: GOOG)’s mobile app. It may not be a native client (it’s Java), but it’s super fast and because it kills all the HTML and graphics (which is just the way I like on a mobile phone) – it saves bandwidth. That being said, I’m glad to report I made the “Messaging” key open GMail app and I love it!

The other app I installed on the E71 is Calcium. If you’re not familiar, it’s a simple calculator that uses D-pad for basic operations. The built-in calculator sucks, big time. Nokia is aware of that problem, hence they’ve recently released Enhanced Calculator for S60 through their Beta Labs. I’ve tried that one prior to installing Calcium, but it doesn’t render well on a landscape screen. Plus, it’s slower than Calcium — it takes about a second or two to open it. Guess, that’s because it’s a Java app. To be fair, Nokia’s new calculator is way more powerful than Calcium which has only basic functions — but it’s the basic functions I need in 99% of cases.

I’ll probably install some simple finance/expense tracking program. Looking at some options and I’ll get back to you as soon as I figure something out. Stay tuned in the meantime…

As promised, today I’m connecting my Stowaway Sierra Bluetooth keyboard to the Nokia (NYSE: NOK) E71. The pairing went expectantly well, just as it did with my Nokia N93. However, the E71 responds much faster, thanks to the newer version of Symbian OS and S60 — it runs Symbian OS 9.2 with S60 3.1 (Feature pack 1) as opposed to N93’s Symbian OS 9.1 with S60 3.0.

As I said in my introductory post, the Nokia E71’s keyboard is super easy to use. However, having the full-sized keyboard is even better.

Now that the duo is working perfectly, I want a bigger screen on the E71. That would certainly make the device larger, and I guess Nokia’s idea is to have a separate Internet Tablet device for such a purpose. Or maybe that’s just the way I’m using my N800.

Anyway, I’ve typed this whole article on the E71, hence proving it is possible to do an actual work (writing) with a mobile phone and Bluetooth keyboard.

That’s it for today. Stay tuned for more…

Today I’m playing with the apps. Not the regular ones that come with every Symbian S60 device, but with few apps that Nokia (NYSE: NOK)’s WOM World folks pre-loaded on the E71 that was sent to me. Without further ado, let’s start:

• First comes the Advanced Call Manager, a handy tool for those that receive tons of calls every day and need some way to get through the clutter. The app allows creation of black, white and custom lists, and setting of an appropriate action for each of the lists defined. For instance, you can reject, divert calls, or mute the ringer for those in the black list; or send personalized SMS or play personalized greeting for those in the white list. I can see this being handy for many folks, but since I don’t receive that many calls, I doubt I’ll be using the Advanced Call Manager.
• Then there’s We:offset, a Nokia’s application designed to help users do their bit for the environment. Basically it’s a mobile CO2 emission offsetting tool. As I’m trialing the E71 for two weeks, again this won’t be something I’ll use. However, if you’re an eco-aware person (and everyone should be in this time) who at the same time travels a lot, this will be a neat reminder-app to keep you always in the loop on how much greenhouse gases your travels produce.
• Finally, there’s SkyeQuiKey – a must-have for every E71 owner. The ultra-useful application lets you quickly find Contacts, Applications, Bookmarks, etc. using direct key presses from the device’s idle screen. Now when I need to call someone, I just type first few letter of the person’s name and voila – I get his name on the screen. It’s that simple!

That’s it for today. Tomorrow I’ll be pairing the Nokia E71 with my Stowaway Sierra Bluetooth keyboard in order to write an actual article with it. Stay tuned…