The Nokia E Series, since its inception over a decade ago now, has earned itself quite a reputation – particularly with business and professional users.

However, the growth in smartphones over the past few years has meant that more and more phones – like, the iPhone, HTC Hero, and the BlackBerry Bold – are coming onto the market and taking a piece of the E Series’ action.

On first impression, the Nokia E72 isn’t a bad looking device. It feels light in the hand, has a nice metallic-silver lining and a full Qwerty keyboard, which will certainly please users that have no intention of getting on the touchscreen-train.

That said, it does look a lot like a BlackBerry, which is a bit of a shame, since Nokia used to be something of an innovator within the telecommunications industry.

However, nowadays it seems its designers’ are happy to just follow convention and lift ideas from their contemporaries.

As we said, the Nokia E72 is quite a good looking device and this will certainly score it some points with professionals that demand both sharp style and functionality.

In this respect, the E72 is a good handset. Plus, it has all the functions, such as email, internet, and office applications, that you’d expect from a device aimed at business and professional users.

Once you have the phone switched on you can begin setting up your email accounts, which is done in several easy steps in the devices built-in Set. Wizard.

The E72 supports the following email clients: Gmail, Yahoo, Hotmail, and Mail for Exchange. And while the support is adequate, the Nokia E72’s screen is rather small, which does make viewing emails a bit of a chore – especially if you’re used to a larger screen.

As with most Nokia smartphones, the home screen layout is fairly uniform.

You have the time displayed in a digital clock on the left, the day and date in the top right hand corner and a list of icon links to messages, email, media, browser and pictures taking centre stage.

Again, this layout is perfectly adequate, everything you’ll use regularly is easily accessed, but it certainly won’t win any prizes and, unfortunately, this seems to be a running theme with the Nokia E72.

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If you like the idea of the Nokia X6 but think that prices of £449 SIM free for the 32GB Comes With Music Edition and £299 SIM free for the 16GB version are on the steep side, then you might want to give the £129 SIM free X3 a second glance. The price is a very clear indication that this handset plays, er, second fiddle to the X6, but it might offer all the musicality you need.

There are some nifty features for music fans. Arguably the most important of these is a 3.5mm headset jack sitting on the top edge of the chassis. This is the ideal location for a headset jack, as it minimises the chances of pocket snagging when your headset is attached.

The provided headset is a somewhat chunky affair with industrial strength cabling – perhaps to help the earphones last longer than usual as they are squished in your pocket rather than neatly wound. The rounded in-ear buds are a snug fit, and the sound quality is good enough for everyday use. Still, we’d have preferred a two-piece headset so we could use our favourite, high quality earphones to bump up the sound output quality that little bit further.

There is an equaliser which has a just a few presets. At least they have a noticeable effect on sound output and you can save two personal presets.  

The X3 sports three front buttons for playback control. These sit down the left side of the screen. They are quite neat looking, though we’d have liked the right side to have three shortcuts too – maybe user programmable, rather than a simple filler strip. We aren’t convinced about the ‘music light’ either. This is basically a pulsing white light that sits in the large D-pad when music is playing. We turned the feature off.

There is an FM radio and you can use the music controls to manage this too, flipping through stations easily. The radio has RDS support and there are 20 presets. You can use the radio without having the headset plugged in as its antenna is internal.

There isn’t a great deal of built in memory for storing music – there was just under 14MB free on our review sample right out of the box. The X3 supports microSD cards, with the slot on the left edge of the casing under a solid protective cover. You get a 2GB card with the phone. Clearly if you are a music fan you are going to want to boost this by purchasing a higher capacity card, and Nokia says the X3 supports cards to 16GB.

Physically this is a fairly nice handset. It is a slider, measuring 96mm tall x 49.3mm wide and 14.1mm thick with the slide closed, growing to just over 120mm with the slide open. The slide mechanism is smooth and delivers a good ‘clunk’ in both opening and closing the phone. The keyboard is flat with dividers between the keys so that you can find what you want fairly easily. It might not suit speed-texters, but the rest of us should find it OK.

Build quality is average, with plastic used throughout. The red and black colour scheme of our review sample was OK but not especially innovative. You can get a blue/black alternative.

The screen is fairly small at just 2.2-inches, and its 320 x 240 pixels are very much entry level these days. There’s nothing wrong with it in terms of brightness or clarity, but if you want to do media rich stuff like Web browsing, you might want to look elsewhere.

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The Nokia N900 is the Finnish manufacturer's flagship handset, so it's no wonder the camera is pretty impressive. We put it through its paces to see just how good the snapper's output is.

The Nokia N900 is the first device to operate on the Linux-based Maemo OS, and any new OS can cause issues even if you are the most tech-savvy person in the world.

We've put together a list of all the shortcuts to help you along the way.

General shortcuts

Conversations

• Tap and hold on a text message = You get the option to call the person
• Swipe-from-left (as in browser) allows selecting and copying of message text.

General gestures

• Long press on Task Switch icon = Brings you back to desktop

• When getting a incoming call, turn over the device so the screen faces down towards the table surface = Silence an incoming call

• From the phone app drop down menu "turning control" allows you to set orientation, but also set it to launch the phone app when you turn the device to portrait. Seems to only work from the desktop.

Xterm shortcuts

• Ctrl + I = Autocomplete filename

Web browser shortcuts

Web Browser Gestures

Email client

RSS Reader

• Ctrl + R = Refresh the feed

Adapted from our sister site, Know Your Cell

The Nokia N900 is a new flagship Nseries handset from Nokia, and it is the company's first smartphone to run the Linux-based Maemo operating system.

Because this is a first for Nokia, relatively frequent firmware updates are expected. Fortunately, the N900 is more flexible where OS updates are concerned than any other handset on the market today. In this guide, we'll show you four different ways to update your N900's software.

Always backup all of the data on your device before attempting an update. It is also recommended that you connect your handset to a power source prior to performing any updates.

Over the Air (OTA) Update

1. From the phone's home screen key in *#0000# or go to Device manager
2. Select Options then Check for updates
3. Follow the prompts on the screen to complete the update

Update via a Windows PC

1. Download and install the Nokia Software Updater
2. Connect your N900 to your PC with the supplied USB cable
3. Open the Nokia Software Updater application
4. Follow the on-screen prompts to update your device

Update via a Mac

1. Download the 770Flasher tool
2. Download the latest available N900 firmware image
3. Turn the N900 off
4. Connect the N900 to your computer via USB cable (with the device turned off)
5. Run the 770Flasher application
6. Drag the firmware you downloaded in step 2 to the 770Flasher application (you will get an error regarding a USB device not being found, ignore it)
7. Turn the phone on
8. The update process will now begin automatically once the N900 boots
9. You are safe to disconnect your phone from the computer when you see the normal desktop reappear on the N900 display

Update via a Linux PC

1. Download and extract the Linux Flasher tool
2. Download the latest available N900 firmware image
3. Turn the N900 off
4. Connect the phone to your computer via USB cable (with the device turned off)
5. Open a Terminal window and run 'sudo ./flasher-3.5 -F -f -R' (you will get an error regarding a USB device not being found, ignore it)
6. Turn the phone on
7. The update process will now begin automatically once the N900 boots
8. You are safe to disconnect your phone from the computer when you see the normal desktop reappear on the N900 display

Adapted from our sister site, Know Your Cell.

We've just revied the Nokia N90, but if you want to see more of the Maemo-based device, take a look at our complete galley to see the device in all its glory.

Nokia’s N900 is an interesting kettle of fish. Part mobile phone, part singing and dancing mobile computer, it is the logical successor to the N810 Internet Tablet in format and ambition.

But it is so much more than the N810 ever was, largely because it sports a new operating system which is designed to cater for developers’ flights of fancy.

We think you’ll need to be a bit of a geek to get the most out of the N900, but if you are prepared for that, it could end up being a really useful little device.

The tech specs are very impressive, and there are a few surprises among them. This is a HSDPA supporting device with GPS and Wi-Fi both built in. Maps is supported, naturally enough. There’s a 3.5mm headset slot and you can put the provided TV out cable into this slot to send content to a large screen.

There is a front camera for video calling and a main camera which shoots stills to 5 megapixels and video to 800x480 pixels. The camera has a sliding lens cover, and around it is a frame which incorporates a little kickstand. The stand feels a bit fragile, but it does its job of holding the N900 at a suitable viewing angle on the desk well enough.

There is 32GB of internal storage and a microSD card slot for adding more memory. Alongside the Wi-Fi is Bluetooth and an infra red port. We said that the N900 was built with more than half an eye on developers, and suppose the IR port is there for them to take advantage of. Universal remote controls are an obvious route to take.

The N900 is all front screen, with 3.5-inches of superbly bright and sharp 800x480 pixel display taking pride of place. There is a slide-out keyboard whose keys depress well and give a subtle click which helps with speed and ease of use, but the spacebar is not centrally located and the whole keyboard is a bit too small and fiddly for our liking.

The screen is resistive and Nokia even provides a stylus that slots into one corner of the N900’s chassis. That might not inspire confidence, but in fact we didn’t need to call on it at all during testing. I t might just be there in case developers come up with apps that use complex, detailed, fiddly graphics.

The N900 is a bit chunky and heavy at 110.9x59.8x18mm and 181g, making it something of a bit of a chore to carry around. And it isn’t as easy as usual to make an ordinary phone call. There are no Call and End keys on the fascia.

Instead you need to get into an on-screen dialler, or your contacts app or put a contact onto one of the four Desktop screens you scroll through by fingerpanning. You can customise the Desktop screens with widgets, shortcuts and themes too.

If you go to the dialler via the applications menu the screen kicks into tall format – rare as it is intended to be used in wide mode most of the time. This is a real break from convention, and there were times we hankered for a tall format screen.

What really makes the Nokia N900 different from the rest, though, is its Maemo 5 operating system. Based around Linux it is this which is meant to endear the N900 to developers, and encourage huge numbers of third party applications to be produced.

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The X6 is the latest music-friendly handset from Nokia, bringing the Comes With Music subscription to a much flashier phone than the 5800.

The Nokia X6 a good looking phone, but doesn't come close to the wow-factor of top-notch models like the iPhone. Our review copy had a slick black and glass front, with a blue clear strip along the top and bottom and just three buttons for easy menu access. However, the back looks like it belongs to a different phone, with cheap feeling – albeit light – pearl plastic (another version is black with red contrast).

The 3.2-inch glass touchscreen is stunning, allowing beautiful colours while managing to avoid picking up too many fingerprints and face smudges. It's capacitative, and vibrates slightly when a key is pressed, letting you know it's felt your touch.

It is relatively light at 122g, especially given its dimensions. While hardly a brick, the large screen and 13mm width means it's not going to fit in everyone's pockets.

Aside from the main menu keys on the front under the glass screen, along one side there's also a dedicated volume control, one-touch camera access, and key lock slider. Back on the front, there's also a touchscreen tab above the main screen for easy access to music playlists and more.

The main five megapixel Carl Zeiss camera is fitted to the back. Not only does it feature a powerful dual-LED flash, it has a light – handy for taking snaps in dark locations without whiting out your subject with the flash. There's also a weaker camera on the front, which took pretty grainy shots, especially compared to its stronger sibling on the back.

As both take video, the fixed camera is likely targeted to video conferencing over IM, and is definitely decent enough quality for that. The video also takes advantage of the double-LED lights on the rear, so you can take decent quality clips.

Clips and pictures can be edited right on the phone – add music or text to videos, crop photos, and then upload them straight online. Despite the phone being a bit slow to load some apps, it's quick enough with editing video.

The Nokia X6 is designed for music lovers. It comes with a year's unlimited subscription to Nokia's Comes With Music, so you can download all you like for free, and features a whopping 32GB of built-in memory, so you'll have room for it, too.

If that's not enough tunes for you, it also picks up FM stereo.

Sensibly, the Nokia X6 features a standard headphone jack, so there's no messing around with adaptors, and decently strong external speakers – expect to be annoyed by teenagers blasting tunes out of this handset next time you take the bus. At least it won't be as tinny as other phones' speakers.

It'll even last for the longest bus rides out there, promising 35 hours of playback time.

While music is the Nokia X6's reason to exist, it's also decent on the web browsing front, featuring full Flash and built-in access to social networking sites like Facebook as well as Nokia's Ovi service.

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Nokia has dominated the phone market for what seems like an eternity, and while the spotlight has moved from their Nseries phones to iPhone and Android devices, Nokia is still clutching onto the top spot.

Even Nokia has admitted – in its tactics – that Symbian is no longer where it’s at for top end of the smartphone market, having revealed that it’ll be using the Maemo OS for future Nseries phones. However, the N97 Mini is stuck in Symbian station, but does it have enough strong points of its own to mitigate for its ageing operating system?

Well, yes and no.

As the ‘Mini’ of its title suggests, the N97 Mini borrows its design from its bigger brother, adopting a rather fierce slide-out Qwerty keyboard – you could chop a finger off with that thing – and a resistive touchscreen. However, compared to the full-sized N97, the Mini has a 3.2-inch screen instead of a 3.5-inch one and no D-pad on the slide-out panel.

What you do get for your cut-down size is a much more pocketable feel. Where the N97 felt ungainly, the N97 Mini is a lot sleeker, even if it’s not hugely reduced in pure dimension terms.

In spite of the reduced size, the Qwerty retains all of the good points of the N97's Qwerty. In fact, the lack of a D-pad makes it all the easier to reach across the keyboard with your two thumbs. Still, there’s not much feedback when you press a key, so you need to keep your eye on the screen more than you would with a more clicky keyboard.

The spacing of the keys is excellent though, with a discrete gap in between each and a handily placed space bar that rests just under your right thumb. We found our fingers resting far more comfortably over the N97 Mini’s Qwerty than that of the original N97.

Slot the Qwerty back in under the screen though and you’re back to a familiar, relatively unresponsive touchscreen. As the Nokia N97 Mini uses a resistive screen, definite pressure needs to be applied for the screen to detect your finger.

Plus, unlike the popular Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, there’s no bundled stylus, so you’ll have to operate the N97 Mini with your fingernail to get anything approaching a sense of responsiveness.

That Nokia has opted for two touch panels rather than real buttons for the softkeys doesn’t help either. As Symbian doesn’t exactly run like greased lightning on the N97 Mini, any lag on these buttons, of which there is some during the sort of everyday tasks you’ll be doing with your phone, feels like yet more laggy unresponsiveness. The resulting sense of sluggishness really doesn’t help you foster feelings of love and affection towards the N97 Mini.

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Despite having been marketed exclusively to enterprise users in the past, Nokia has made a concerted effort in recent history to expand the appeal of its Eseries line.

Sleek new designs, slender profiles and a more complete feature set have replaced boring and bulky Eseries handsets of years past.

The E71 ushered in Nokia's new Eseries breed and the trend has been carried forth quite well by the likes of the E63, E66, E75 and others. The Nokia E55 is the Finnish handset maker's latest effort to woo prosumers with a stylish design and where hardware is concerned, the E55 delivers in spades.

From the slender 9.9mm-thick case to the handsome blend of metal and hardened plastic, this phone is certain to turn heads. The E55 also weighs a mere 95g, making it one of the more pocketable handsets in Nokia's arsenal.

Unfortunately, the company's effort to produce a svelte stunner has resulted in decreased usability and an overall humdrum user experience.

Starting with the handset's most distinguishing characteristic, its compact Qwerty keypad, form outweighs function by leaps and bounds.

The compact Qwerty layout has been a polarising keypad configuration ever since it was first popularised by the BlackBerry Pearl line. In the E55's case, letters are placed in pairs and spread across 14 keys. Characters and formatting functions are then spread across the remaining six keypad buttons, including a space/zero button that is equal in size to the rest of the buttons instead of being a bit wider as it is on most keyboards.

The handset relies on predictive text input to speed up the text entry process, though typing can be a hassle when entering URLs in the Web browser or in other areas where predictive input is not available.

While Nokia's T9 text prediction is actually quite good, small buttons and a lack of adequate tactile response makes typing a bit of a chore compared to the solid keypad found on the BlackBerry Pearl or even standard Qwerty offerings from Nokia like the E71.

Strangely, the zero/space key has almost no tactile response at all; you must constantly constantly shift your eyes to ensure that spaces between words have been registered by the phone. Needless to say, this can be annoying at best and for heavy messaging users it may very well be a deal breaker.

The standard Eseries key cluster is found above the compact QWERTY keys, and includes the directional pad, select button, soft key buttons, call controls, backspace button and three shortcut keys for messaging, calendar and home.

While the brushed steel look of the cluster surface is certainly pleasing to the eye, the device's narrow facade translates to reduced button size and an abundance of accidental key presses.

Moving on to the handset's operating system, the E55 provides the quintessential Symbian experience the world has been all too familiar with for years. Nokia's mouth full of an OS, S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 2, is the weapon of choice and while it is quite flexible and usable, it is also very boring and stale compared to more modern options such as Android, webOS, iPhone OS and even Nokia's new Maemo 5 OS.

The phone's 2.4-inch 320x240 pixel QVGA display doesn't help matters at all; pixelated icons and miniscule, jagged letters age the OS considerably.

Sub par screen resolution is a common problem amongst Nokia's mid-range handsets of course, so owners of previous Nokia handsets may not take issue. With that said, the display is shameful compared to larger high-resolution displays that are becoming more and more common on mobile phones.

It's not all doom and gloom, however. The E55 packs all of the functionality smartphone users could hope for. Nokia messaging provides a solid email experience, now complete with HTML rendering, and support for Exchange Activesync and Lotus Notes is sure to please business users.

Beyond PIM, the S60 platform is still the most actively developed mobile OS outside of the iPhone OS. If there is any desired functionality the E55 is missing out of the box, there are almost certainly a variety of applications that will fill the gaps.

When it comes to using all of the great apps available for the S60 OS, the 600MHz ARM 11 processor makes the handset a multitasking monster, allowing users to quickly and easily switch between apps with little or no lag.

In terms of connectivity, Nokia has you covered: The E55 supports Wi-Fi (802.11b/g), Bluetooth 2.0, GPS, FM radio, quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE and dual-band WCDMA with HSDPA support up to 10.2Mbps alongside HSUPA support up to 2Mbps. On the right network, the E55 may very well move files faster than some land-based broadband connections.

The sleek handset falls a bit short on the multimedia front, simply because the small QVGA display is hardly conducive to watching videos. On the music side of things however, Nokia's Music Player app, a giant 1500 mAh battery and a 3.5mm audio jack make the handset a very adequate portable music player.

The 3.2 megapixel camera is full of features, while dedicated zoom and image capture buttons make picture snapping fast and easy. Mobile gaming fans won't be overly pleased with the cramped keypad or the poor display, but the E55 is certainly capable of hosting a quick game of Sodoku or Texas Hold'Em during a commute.

The E55 comes with a 2GB microSD card, stereo headset, microUSB cable, microUSB wall charger and a charger adapter for those who still have older Nokia chargers lying around. It also comes with a free 60-day trial of Files on Ovi (cloud file storage) and a 10-day trial of Nokia maps, Nokia's voice-guided navigation solution.

The E55 is a handset we would highly recommend spending some time with in a shop before making a purchase. The biggest potential barriers are undoubtedly the keypad and display, which detract from an otherwise solid Eseries offering. If the compact Qwerty and 2.4-inch QVGA display aren't a complete turn off however, the E55 has plenty to offer business users and consumers alike.

Nokia has a track-record of producing certain classic handsets that don't create much gadget-lover excitement but do the essentials well - and end up selling in bucketloads, sometimes for ages. The elegant Nokia 6300 was one of these understated smash hits, and the 6303 classic aims to update this favourite with a bit of (but not too much) refreshed functionality and design.

It's aimed squarely at mobile users who want an attractive, well-built handset that's reliable and straightforward to use, at a reasonable price.

While Nokia's recent 6700 classic has slipped into the range as a 6300 upgrade with a lot of extra feature muscle - including HSPA 3G connectivity, A-GPS and a 5-megapixel camera - the Nokia 6303 classic is a more straight down the line follow-on. Its metal-cased classic candybar design sticks faithfully to the 6300 template of refined looks and easy usability. It has no 3G or Wi-Fi data connectivity, relying on GPRS/EDGE instead, and its mid-range multimedia package includes a 3.2-megapixel camera.

The 6303 classic isn't intended to wow with touchscreen trickery or cutting edge smartphone applications, though it's not bare-bones basic either. Using Nokia's Series 40 user interface, it has a typically solid selection of Nokia mid-tier software, including music and video players, Nokia Maps route-finding and search software, plus a smattering of online-based apps and useful tools. It also comes boxed with a 1GB MicroSD memory card (which has UK and Ireland mapping data pre-loaded).

Design and handling
The 6303 classic echoes much of the design of the 6300, although the new model has a more rounded, curvy look to it. it's available in silver with black trim or matte black, with stainless steel bodywork providing a smart, high quality feel. Measuring 108.8(h) x 46.2(w) x 11.7(d)mm, it's tidily compact and reasonably slim, while that metal casing gives its 95g chassis a reassuringly substantial, well-balanced feel in the hand – without being chunky in the pcket

It sports a fairly average screen, a 2.2-inch QVGA (320x240 pixels), 16.7-million colour TFT display that's sufficiently clear, bright and readable. Under this is the control panel, comprising a typical navigation D-pad and two decently-sized rocker buttons, doing duties for softkey controls plus regular call and end keys. The D-pad and rocker buttons are precise and easy to operate, while the numberpad beneath, too, is neatly arranged with adequately sized, well-separatef keys that offer responsive finger action for texting.

Additional body buttonry is limited - an on/off switch plus a volume key but no camera key - but as well as charger and USB data sockets, Nokia has included a standard 3.5mm headphone jack. This allows users to easily upgrade their earphones, should the average set supplied in-box not be adequate for tune-playing requirements.

The 6303 classic's Series 40 user interface will be familiar to many Nokia users.There's no messing about. It has a straightforward set-up that's classic mid-level Nokia, with a simple to understand menu structure, based around a main menu grid, easy to find functions in sub menus, and a generally undemanding navigation system.  And from the standby screen there's plenty of shortcut options for getting quickly to features.

In default standby mode, the D-pad offers a selection of shortcuts, in conventional mobile phone fashion, while a 'Go To' softkey pulls up a list of handy feature shortcut options  – Bluetooth, alarms, profiles, media player, Maps and so on. The standby screen - which out of the box is a standard minimalist display - can alternatively be switched via the Go To softlkey (or in the Settings menu) to a busier 'Home Screen' display view. This shows status info (calendar, music player, messages, and so on) plus a row of five feature shortcut icons towards the top of the screen. Implemented as 'Active Standby' on previous Nokias, this 'Home Screen' display set up can be customised to suit how you use the phone; each of the shortcut icons can be switched for any one of more than 70 functions and apps, or any of your browser bookmarks can be selected.

It's a flexible set up; you can keep it simple of tweak it to something more personalised. Similarly, options such as the Phonebook are easy to use, but offer extensive options for adding extra details on top of name and number, should you want to add more than just the basics. As well as phone numbers, if you're using instant messaging (using a pre-loaded Windows Live Messenger app), a tab appears with an updated IM contacts status list.

Email is supported on this device too, and is easy to set up and use - only your email address and password are required and the phone's  email wizard software does the rest, finding and loading details. It works OK for getting email updates on the move, even if it's not the most sophisticated of email interfaces; there's no document viewer software onboard for viewing attachments, for instance.

Camera
The 6303 classic's camera is an unexciting 3.2-megapixel shooter. It has an autofocus system, but it's not as sophisticated as  Nokia's more upmarket cameraphones. There's no 2-step shutter button; you use the D-pad select key to shoot, holding the button down until it focuses, then releasing for it to snap. There's no way of re-adjusting the subject in focus before you snap, so you simply have to wait to see if you've got the sharply focused snap you're after. It's got a rudimentary feel to it, even if it can get properly in-focus shots; it's not one for the enthusiastic cameraphone snapper.

The camera user interface too is typical Series 40 - manly simple lists of options rather than more visually alluring menus. A conventional set of shooting settings are on hand as overrides to the serviceable auto metering system, plus colour effects and some basic post-shooting image editing options.

Snaps look reasonably good for this grade of cameraphone, with sharp focusing and generally rich colour rendition in good lighting conditions. The auto white balance system doesn't always adjust quickly to changing light conditions, but is pretty good indoors.An LED flash delivers some short-range illumination that's not hugely impressive  but is better than no light.

Video can be shot too, at maximum VGA resolution, which looks acceptable for a phone, though playback of the 15 frames per second footage can look averagely stilted mobile phone fare.
In typical Nokia style, images and video can be uploaded straight from snapping to content sharing sites including Ovi and Flickr, plus there are separate menu options linking to Facebook, MySpace and YouTuvbe mobile sites. Without 3G or Wi-Fi, it may be a bit slow, however, for bigger files.

Music player
Thanks to the supplied 1GB memory card to supplement the 6303 classic's meagre 17MB internal storage, there's plenty of room out of the box for a bit of music listening and video playback. MP3, AAC, eAAC+, MP4, H.263 and H.264 are among the file formats supported. The music player software is uncomplicated and unfussy, and easily loads up and lists new tunes copied over from a PC or slipped in on a MicroSD card (cards up to 8GB work with it).

It's operated by the D-pad, and supports cover art, fi available. The supplied earphones are rather basic, producing unimpressive sound quality. Thanks to the 3.5mm headphone socket, you can easily plug in your own headphones for an ungraded audio experience; it is capable of producing much more detailed and refined sound by adding relatively inexpensive better quality eargear.

An FM radio option is included too; with the earphones/antenna plugged in you can play it back through the loudspeaker too - if you don't mind the rather metallic tone.

Video playback is acceptable for a small screen phone, smooth and bright. Downloaded or sideloaded video plays proficiently enough. Without high-speed data though, streaming can be hit and miss, and YouTube clips were sometimes straggly and broken up.

Browsing
As is virtually standard on its Series 40 handsets, Nokia includes two browser options - regular Nokia software and an Opera Mini browser app. The Nokia web browser supports Flash Lite, so can render full pages, but the phone's lack of high-speed data means it can be very slow at delivering the full page when browsing data heavy non mobile-optimised sites.

The no-frills browser uses list-based options rather than a more user friendly control interface, which makes it feel quite clunky compared to otehrs we're now seeing. As usual, Opera Mini offers a much more user friendly interface with a more desktop-like browser interface, and it also renders pages quicker and delivers an easier to navigate page view. Still, without 3G or Wi-Fi, speed performance is limited.

Nokia has embedded its Maps software in this device, although there's no A-GPS technology built in, so its day to day location-finding use is limited. It can work with an optional separate GPS receiver, but if you're going to that trouble you may as well buy a mobile that already has A-GPS gadgetry inside (such as the 6700 classic).

With mapping info for the UK and Ireland pre-loaded on to the supplied MicroSD card you can get route-finding and mapping, pus search options for locations, businesses and services and addresses. But without auto location finding, either via GPS or cellsite triangulation, its usefulness is restricted.

Organiser
The 6303 classic ticks the usual boxes for organiser tools and apps. It has calendar, to do lists, various clock functions, calculator and avoice recorder. Bluetooth is supported, and the phone can be synced up to a PC using the in-box USB cable and downloadable Nokia PC Suite software. Other apps onboard include an Ovi Share feature which enables you to upload, view and share images online. A Flickr app is pre-loaded too, as well as links for Facebook, MySpace and YouTube services. Nokia's regular Download! tool is available too, providing downloadable apps and other content. Half a dozen decent games are included too.

Performance
The battery life and call performance are both exactly what you'd want from this sort of handset - excellent and reliable. Nokia claims its battery will provide up to 450 hours on standby or 7 hours of talktime, and we got over four days of normal usage between charges. Impressive.Voice calling was top notch too, high quality sound and a dependable network performance.

Conclusion
Refreshing the successful 6300, the Nokia 6303 classic doesn't stray too far from that winning template. It updates a few of the features and spruces up some of the functionality, but generally it still offers a useful, solid set of functionality for its target audience, plus an excellent battery performance.

The lack of 3G will be a drawback for those who want to make use of its online-based features, and if you're looking a more feature-enhanced similar model, the 6700 classic delivers extra punch, including A-GPS, HSPA and a 5-megapixel camera. However, if you're happy with the low-key but tidy approach, the 6303 classic's smart styling and quality build will add to the understated appeal of this unfussy handset that delivers what's expected of it.

It makes economic sense to share hardware between different phone models, and a quick look at the Nokia 5730 XpressMusic may remind you of the Nokia E75. There’s a good reason; the phones are almost identical.

Nokia has taken the existing Eseries device, marketed as a serious business tool, and given it the XpressMusic treatment. It now in comes with a range of bright coloured finishes (four to choose from; grey, blue, red and purple) and a redesigned keypad and keyboard to give it a more youthful appearance.

I am not particularly keen on the dot-matrix font, which makes some of the keys rather difficult to see, especially on the Qwerty keyboard, but the bigger problem is the positioning of the important keys above the numeric keypad. Nokia has squeezed in six keys around the D-pad, and it’s quite easy to press the wrong button. No, let me rephrase that, it’s especially hard to press the right button.

Once you get used to the button arrangement, you will be glad the E75 formed the basis for this phone. It means the phone is packed with an impressive array of features and applications, including Nokia’s improved email client, N-Gage and the ability to share media from a suitably equipped PC or network drive wirelessly.

The phone has GPS, the latest version of Maps and a digital compass - so when you’re walking on foot, you’ll can keep the map facing your direction of travel, or the direction you’re facing. It took a little while to calibrate the digital compass, but once that’s done then it’s a very useful navigation tool for pedestrian usage. A further update to Maps in the future will add further functionality, including the ability to see directions to near points of interest and other ‘augmented reality’ services that are on the horizon.

However, Maps does highlight a lack of speed, with the clock rate of the ARM processor being almost half that of more modern Nokia devices, such as the E52 or the forthcoming N97 mini. It’s not ridiculously slow, but it is sluggish and a sign of S60 being placed under ever increasing demand from features like GPS navigation, large resolution imaging and video.

The 5730 doesn’t demand too much on the camera side, with just 3.2-megapixels to play with - but it has got auto focus and an LED flash and, unsurprisingly, the photos are identical to that of the E75. Good, but not amazing in a world of 5, 8 and now 12-megapixels. Video recording tops out at VGA (640x480) at 30 frames per second, which isn’t as big a gap between handsets now offering widescreen and HD modes.

The one thing I’ve yet to mention are the three subtle music keys down the left hand side of the screen. These allow instant access to the music player, along with fast forwarding and rewinding with a long press - or skipping tracks with a short press. This is a new addition over the E75, and essential to allow easy music control. As a XpressMusic phone, you can get the handset with a subscription to the Comes With Music service and enjoy free downloads of as much music as you can fit on to the supplied 8GB card. If needed, you can easily buy a 16GB card to double your storage capacity.

The home screen allows you to add contacts and show new messages and email, while there are links to Facebook available. Unlike the touchscreen models, which have a dedicated Facebook application, the link here simply takes you to the mobile web page. The screen resolution is also lower, so when you use the phone in landscape mode for the keyboard, you do begin to wish that there was a larger screen available.

As a higher-end offering than other XpressMusic models (until the touchscreen X6 arrives before Christmas), the 5730 is aimed towards users that use messaging or email regularly. It’s no iPhone killer, but Apple doesn’t even have a keypad let alone a slide-out keyboard. Until Nokia announces another music model with a keyboard, this is the best offering if you’re attracted by free and legal music downloading.

The Nokia 5800 ‘Tube’ marked a turning point for Nokia’s music strategy, which ultimately evolved into the new Xseries range - and the all singing, all dancing X6 coming soon.

But, there’s still life in the XpressMusic range yet - and while the X6 takes things a step up, the 5530 brings the touchscreen music device down to the masses, sitting underneath the 5800 in the product ladder.

Sadly, someone took the words ‘cut cost’ a little too literally at the design stage, coming up with something that looks rather cheap.

If this is aimed at a younger market that are cost conscious, but still need to be seen with something trendy, then Nokia may have scored a bit of an own-goal, with cheap plastic standing out from the poor attempt to give it a premium look with a silver surround.

The sliding keylock button looks like it fall off just by sneezing on it - although fortunately looks can be deceiving and despite low cost materials, it does actually feel quite solid.

The phone is also equipped with a stylus, like the original 5800. It’s probably more necessary here too, as the screen is smaller, which is a shame because it’s something to break, lose or stop you using the phone easily with one hand.

The resistive screen works surprisingly well though, meaning you can use your fingers for most of the applications - it’s the option screens that can cause a bit more trouble as you try and navigate them.

For the everyday task of dialling numbers on the full-screen keypad, or entering numbers and text via the (landscape) Qwerty keyboard, we had no problems at all.

You could almost be excused for thinking it has a capacitive touchsceen, but it certainly is not - and if you don’t ensure the screen is locked when you put the phone in your pocket, you may find yourself doing all sorts of things you don’t want.

Whereas the 5800 came with integrated GPS, 3G and an 8GB memory card, Nokia has removed both GPS and 3G and shipped the 5530 with a 4GB memory card. Of course, you can invest in an larger card at any time, and the 5530 supports cards up to 32GB.

Nokia has also kept the almost hidden XpressMusic key that sits just above the top righthand side of the screen - giving you easy access to key tasks, including the music player and your messages.

If you decide to get this with the Comes With Music service, giving a year of completely unlimited and unrestricted music downloads, this is a much cheaper offering than the 5800 - and ideal if you’re not really that bothered about getting on the Internet at full speed or using any type of navigation software.

You can of course install Google Maps and use cell-based location for an approximation of your location, which is still fine for finding out where you are.

Without 3G, the only way of getting a fast data connection is with Wi-Fi - a possibly unexpected feature of a relatively low-end model. This means you can set up sharing on a PC and access music, pictures and video from the phone. You can also send content from the phone the other way.

A simple wizard guides you through the setup process, although we found it a little on the slow side. This feature has been on many Series 60 devices for some time and has never really proved to be much more than a gimmick. Our advice is to buy a larger memory card and store the content on the phone in the first place.

On the imaging side, the phone comes with the 5800’s 3.2-megapixel camera and flash - and it can also record video at VGA (640x480 pixels). Okay, so it doesn’t have a keyboard or the 5-megapixel camera from the N97, but there’s not much else that is different in terms of the capabilities of the operating system.

There’s the latest Nokia email client and support for the official Facebook application, although compared to the BlackBerry or iPhone versions, Nokia’s one is only a small step up from using the mobile website.

Twitter fans are hereby ordered to install Gravity, which is in the process of being enhanced to work with Facebook too. It’s not a free application, but you can try it for 10 days, which should be ample time to discover how good it is.

The relatively small screen does make the web browser tricky to use and navigate, and there’s no iPhone-like kinetic scrolling. There’s a chance Nokia may add the updated web browse in the future, some time after it rolls out to N97 users, but at the time of writing this review it was still to be confirmed. As a low-end model, Nokia may reserve some of the newest tweaks for the flagship models.

The 5530 is primarily about playing music, video, podcasts or listening to the radio, and the music player comes with a range of styles that are adjusted by changing the theme. You can play music from the internal speakers (you’ll struggle to see where they are at the top and bottom of the phone) or connect headphones via the 3.5mm jack. You can also stream music with Bluetooth to wireless headphones or speakers.

Video playback is decent too, and the phone comes with PC software to re-encode existing content. You can either drag and drop music directly to the music folder, or use the Nokia Music Store to manage your music.

If you buy this with Comes With Music, all of your downloads are free - and ‘side-loaded’ from your PC. At the end of your subscription, assuming you don’t renew, all of your music can be kept forever.

Despite the cheap looks, Nokia has produced a phone that is perfectly adequate for listening to music, making calls, sending texts and taking pictures. The operating system will let you do much more, but then the small screen and lack of 3G begins is likely to lead to disappointment.

Nokia has released a number of SatNav-centric devices under the 'Navigator' banner, but all have so far lacked the essential large screen and capabilities of other devices on the market, such as the iPhone or Android devices with built-in Google Maps.

Unfortunately, the 6710 Navigator is another disappointment if you're expecting a fully functional SatNav for your car that eradicates the need to carry your TomTom around with you.

The biggest downer of the device is that the screen isn't that suitable for displaying a large map that you can see clearly whilst driving. At 2.6 inches (and a resolution of 240x320 pixels), it's not large enough to promote simultaneous safe driving and navigation. Sure, it's fine for pedestrian navigation, but you'll have to rely on voice navigation if you want to use it in the car.

That leads us to our next point: the speaker is on the rear of the phone and not particularly loud. This means that if you have a window mount, the sound will bounce towards the window and you'll only be able to hear the voice instructions if you have your music turned off.

However, Nokia Maps is speedy to fire up, with a shortcut key to it resting below the four-way navigation button. The unfortunate let down here is that the key is fiddly to press, especially if you want to set a route quickly. It's a tiny star, about the size of a match head, and is situated too close to the raised navigation button to press comfortably.

The overall design of the Nokia 6710 Navigator is inoffensive. It's a slider, with a curved bottom designed to ensure that your mouth is as close to the microphone as possible, just like the HTC Hero. Our review sample was a rather fetching mocha colour (officially called brown), although it is also available in titanium too for the more conservative. The casing itself does feel plasticky, which is a shame as there are plenty more premium-feeling Nokia handsets out there, but nonetheless it's solidly built.

On the left hand side of the Nokia 6710 Navigator, there's the microSD card slot and USB port. One foible with many phones is that the cover for these ports is often fragile, but the one on the 6710 Navigator in constructed from robust plastic and slides neatly into the casing to stop any dirt making its way into the holes, although closing it is quite a task unless you have long fingernails.

The Nokia 6710 Navigator boasts a 5-megapixel camera, which produces sharp, well lit photos. There's no coloured tinge around the edges as you can sometimes get on Nokia cameras, although the photos take far too long to process. From pressing the shutter to taking the photo, you can wait for a fair few seconds, which is disappointing as this should be an almost-instant process.

Handy camera options include the ability to upload to Ovi, and share online, and panorama mode. Unlike other devices that offer this mode, the picture taking is automatic, so all you're required to do is pan across, lining a red box up with a green box. As soon as they are aligned, the camera takes a picture. Once again however, the 6710 is very slow to react and even slower to stitch together the multiple images. In fact, it took over a minute to stitch five photos together.

One refreshing feature of the Nokia 6710 Navigator is a 3.5mm headphone jack that sits atop the phone, next to the power button. It's becoming the norm on Nokia handsets, but it's a shame other big players such as Sony Ericsson and LG struggle to add a 3.5mm jack rather than proprietary. The music player is average Nokia-fare, but this isn't an XpressMusic handset and so doesn't look as exciting as one, or feature any shortcuts to get to the music player.

One excrutiating point about the Nokia 6710 Navigator, like other Symbian devices, is its response times. Despite including a 600MHz processor, the 6710 is slow to carry out any task, whether it be firing up an app, taking a photo or waiting for the GPS chip to find a fix.

Battery life is decent - after using phone moderately for two days, the battery still powers on, although battery life is seldom an issue on Nokia devices, which could probably be accredited to their inability to run many applications at once without slowing to a snail's pace.

The Nokia 6710 Navigator is a capable smartphone, but we wouldn't recommend pinning your hopes on using it as a standalone SatNav. The screen is simply too small, speaker too quiet and OS too slow to replace your in-car navigation.

There are few high-end phones that escape the ever-increasing lure of the touchscreen these days. Mind you, an Android OS phone would be hard-pressed to get by without one. It’s a different ballgame for the Symbian OS though, as used in the N86.

In fact, we weren’t big fans of Nokia’s recent attempt to shoehorn a touchscreen into Symbian with the N97, so perhaps it’s all for the best that the N86 sticks to its traditional N-series guns with a non-touch screen and decidedly physical buttons, both on its face and slide-out keypad.

Whether of not you’ll get on with the N86 largely depends on how averse you are to this brand of styling. Looking for iPhone-like functionality? You should probably look elsewhere, but that doesn’t mean the N86 doesn’t deserve praise as a robust workhorse of a phone.

At 16.5mm deep, the N85’s form factor befits the adjective ‘reassuring’ more than ‘sleek’ or ‘svelte’, but the build quality seems to be up there with the best of the N-series phones. The double slider mechanism is smooth and very definite, enough to give you confidence that it can take on the slings and arrows of everyday usage without so much as the flutter of camera lens cover.

Unsurprisingly, said lens cover is much the same as the one we saw on the N85, but should do the job of protecting the precious camera lens perfectly well. It’s an important job too, because the camera is one of the N86’s key – and strongest – features.

The N86 features an 8-megapixel sensor, and although that may no longer evoke gasps, since 12-megapixel phones are already winging their way towards phone shop shelves, it offers enough to convince casual snappers to leave their compacts at home. We took the N86’s camera out for a test drive and, although we have our reservations, the results were easily good enough to produce perfectly good 6x4-inch prints.

However, compared to some of the other 8-megapixel snappers we’ve tried out this year, the N86 is a bit keen on processing. It produces conspicuously sharpened images that will frequently appear noisy in darker areas and have the potential to offend purists. However, unless you’re zooming-in to a 100 percent pixel view or beyond, the results that the N86 comes up with appear vivid and accurate. The dual xenon flash means it can fare well in low-light conditions too.

While the 2.6-inch screen won’t do justice to your photos in the same way as an iPhone or HTC Hero, especially since it’s a mere 240x320 pixel resolution example, the display uses AMOLED technology that ensures a great contrast ratio – lovely deep blacks, in other words. Considering this, it’s a pity that the N86 doesn’t support more video codecs. You might not want to watch the uncut version of Das Boot on a 2.6-inch screen, but TV episodes on the way to work aren’t out of the question.

We tested a few handfuls of different video formats out with the N86, but we could only get Real Media files working without a hitch. In its official specs, the N86 supports .mp4, .3gp, H.264, H.263, .3gp and .rm. While it may sound like a long list, we couldn’t get a simple Divx file to play, arguably the most important format for a great many users. There’s even a kickstand surround to the camera to make video watching more pleasurable, although it’s predictably a lot less sturdy than the rest of the N86’s frame.

It may have started to sound like the N86 is simply a fairly unremarkable phone with a good camera, but we do think it’s a solid choice for a certain type of buyer – one looking for a phone with a traditional feel but a relatively advanced feature set. After all, it’s got what is probably the N-series’s best camera to date, a wide spread of connectivity options, A-GPS and an FM transmitter to offset its relatively old-school buttons.

Each of the keypad buttons and the dual-function Internet/music buttons, revealed by pushing the dual-sliding screen downwards, are entirely separate and have a satisfying click to them that’ll appeal to anyone that bemoans the proliferation of touch-sensitive buttons.

They’re far more clearly defined than those on the N85 or N96, with the button and button surround entirely separate – rather than making the whole keypad a ‘button panel’.

It may seem like a small point to harp on about, but – camera aside – it sets the N86 apart from its N-series brothers. The N86 is an evolutionary step in the N-series, but for those that aren’t convinced by the touchscreen stylings of the latest Android or iPhone handsets, it’s a solid choice. We just wish the N86 a bit more capable with different types of video files.

The aliens are here. There's no escaping. They're in your town, and soon they could be in your home.

The world of District 9 is a scary place, but how far is it from the truth? Ok, so an alien invasion is hopefully not on the cards any time soon, but who knows? Right?

This District 9 theme includes a full makeover for your phone, using the film's iconic anti-alien posters.

To download and install the District 9 theme for the Nokia N97, download the theme onto your PC by clicking on the link below. Transfer the file to your phone via Bluetooth or USB and follow the instructions displayed on the screen to install it.

Download District 9 theme for the Nokia N97

View more articles for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic:
Nokia 5800 XpressMusic vs Samsung Omnia i900
Porsche 911 theme for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
Setting up and using shortcuts on the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
Nokia 5800 XpressMusic review

The aliens are here. There's no escaping. They're in your town, and soon they could be in your home.

The world of District 9 is a scary place, but how far is it from the truth? Ok, so an alien invasion is hopefully not on the cards any time soon, but who knows? Right?

This District 9 theme includes a full makeover for your phone, using the film's iconic anti-alien posters.

To download and install the District 9 theme for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, download the theme onto your PC by clicking on the link below. Transfer the file to your phone via Bluetooth or USB and follow the instructions displayed on the screen to install it.

Download District 9 theme for the Nokia 5800 Xpressmusic

View more articles for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic:
Nokia 5800 XpressMusic vs Samsung Omnia i900
Porsche 911 theme for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
Setting up and using shortcuts on the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
Nokia 5800 XpressMusic review

Nokia has done very well with its E series handsets. Primarily designed for the business community they quickly gained a foothold outside that arena becoming a neat foil for the multimedia rich N series as a less blingy, less swanky but very usable alternatives.

We reckon the E series has reached a high point with the E52 which is a great example of how to make a seriously capable mobile phone and package its abilities in a well built and understated casing.

It almost defies belief that Nokia has managed to cram quite as much as it has into the frame of the Nokia E52. The phone feels very comfortable in the hand and its relatively sliver-like form means it fits into most pockets with ease. For the record, then, its vitals are as follows: 116mm tall, 49mm wide, a svelte 9.9mm thick and 98g in weight.

The metal grey coloured casing is attractive, and there’s a pattern on the aluminium backplate which adds individuality and helps with grip.

Into the front fascia Nokia has engineered the three all important elements of screen, number pad and shortcut buttons. The screen is a 2.4-inch 240x320 pixel display which is clear and bright. Its automatic rotation works well and is very useful for things like Web browsing, text reading and picture viewing where the extra width the 320 pixels provide is welcome.

Side buttons comprise a fairly predictable set. On the right there’s a camera button, combi volume and camera zoom buttons and mute/push to talk button. On the left there’s a microUSB slot for charging and PC connection.

And, on the top edge, joy of joys, there is a 3.5mm headset slot. The provided headset is one piece which is a bit annoying as you can’t use a favourite set and keep the handsfree mike intact, but at least you can use a top-notch headset with the phone to improve music quality.

There’s a microSD card slot under the backplate on the right side, and this can be used to boost the 60MB of internal memory. A 1GB card is provided but the phone supports cards up to 16GB in size.

The number pad comprises large, well defined keys which have a good return. We found fast texting was no problem. The markings on the number keys – and the other front keys – don’t stand out too well against their grey background, and those with poorer eyesight might find that a negative factor. Try before you buy.

Between screen and keyboard the obligatory navigation pad is large and its well raised rim easy to hit. Call and End keys and softmenu keys are flush to their surrounds, and raised between them are left and right rockers which take you home and to the calendar on the left side, to messaging and back on the right side.

On the features front there is little that is left out. This is a HSDPA handset which can boast download speed to 10.2Mbs. There’s Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and GPS. The software is S60 3rd Edition and its goodies are plentiful. There’s an FM radio as well as access to the Nokia Music store. Ovi Maps (formerly Nokia Maps) and Landmarks give you something to use with the GPS out of the box.

There is also a good range of ‘office’ applications for those mobile professionals, including QuickOffice for creating Word, Excel and PowerPoint presentations, and a PDF reader. Of course, if you are really into creating documents then you might look for a smartphone with a sliding QWERTY keyboard, but for those moments when you just have to write something, the setup here works well enough.

A real plus is the dual home screens system. You can set up two different home screens, with different wallpapers and shortcuts and then switch between them using a tool that is always present on the applications shortcuts screen. This gives you a very easy way to move quickly between work and non-work modes, escaping the professional look for something more funky.

There is a front camera for two way video calls. The main camera shoots at 3.2 megapixels which isn’t exactly up there with the best of them in specs terms. But image quality is good.

For all these goodies one of the best things about the E52 has to be its battery life. Nokia says you should get 8 hours of talktime, 12 days on standby, and 18 hours of music playback. We don’t know what went wrong – or right – with our testing, but we got more than 26 hours of music playback from our continuous test.

Overall, then, the E52 has to be our favourite E series handset to date. Nokia has crammed the goodies in, come up with a strong and ergonomic physical design, and apparently surpassed even its own battery life claim.

Forget large screens, forget touch support, banish all thought of multiple, customisable home screens from your mind. The 6700 Classic will have none of it. Instead this is a straightforward-ish mobile phone with some extras tacked on.

There aren’t quite enough extras to make us brim over with excitement, though especially considering that as we write the phone will cost you £320 SIM free from the Carphone Warehouse and £220 on O2 Pay As You Go. It is free on some contracts unsurprisingly.

Design-wise the 6700 Classic is a mix of the good and the irritating. The phone is very comfy for the hand at 109.8x45x11.2mm.

The 2.2-inch screen is clear and bright, its 320x240 pixels doing a very good job of delivering information. The under-screen buttons are built on a single piece of plastic, and are easy to hit. The D-Pad is large and easy to use. And its up, down, left and right directional presses can be customised.

You might want to assign one of these direction presses to launching the camera. There is a side button but this only activates the camera when you are on the phone’s home screen, making it difficult to take quick-fire shots when you are in another app.

The number pad is flat, and has a chrome finish. This looks sparkly but it attracts fingerprints. As the numberpad is flat it is possible that speed-texters may find it is not responsive enough for their needs.

The chrome finish extends to the backplate which is again ultra-shiny but attracts fingerprints. After half an hour of use we found the need to continually wipe the phone clean of hard to remove smudges started to become a bit of a pain.

The technically minded might like to know that this phone runs S40. That’s not quite as advanced as the S60 we see in many Nokia handsets, but is has a familiar look and feel and Nokia fans ought to find it easy to get to grips with. The one immediately notable innovation we’ve not seen before is that you can put a short alert on the home screen. There is room for about eight words to display on screen, although the note itself can be considerably longer – you just select it to see the whole text. It is potentially useful if you are the kind of person who needs a kick to remember the one important thing you have to do each day.

This is a 3G handset with HSDPA support. The 10Mbps the phone supports is super-fast, and while you won’t find it offered by any operators in the UK you should be able to get the fastest speed available where you are.

There is also A-GPS. Nokia Maps is pre installed, and we installed Google Maps for good measure. Go to the Apps folder and look in the Collection folder and you’ll find links to FaceBook, MySpace, YouTube, Flickr (websites not clients), as well as Opera Mini for Web browsing and some other goodies such as the Ovi photo sharing app. Other apps include an FM radio, voice recorder, alarm clocks, unit converter, stopwatch and countdown timer, a motley selection of the usual suspects, in fact.

Very sadly there is no Wi-Fi. We are starting to think that even in mid-range handsets this it is a must, so we’re a bit miffed with Nokia for leaving it out.

There is no front camera for two-way video calls, but there is a main camera lens on the back. It shoots stills at resolutions to 5-megapixels and it did well under household lighting and outdoors. Get into dim lighting conditions, though, and it is a bit less rewarding. The exceptionally small LED light doesn’t illuminate things unless you are on top of them.

We also found that side button – the one that only launches the camera from the main screen – to be a bit small and fiddly for actually taking photos. Fortunately the centre of the D-pad also shoots. Beware the shutter lag, which makes photographing moving objects a bit iffy. Master all that and actual pictures can be crisp and sharp, with good colour reproduction.

There is a generous 170MB of built in memory and the phone comes with a 1GB microSD card to boost that further. It is a pity that Nokia has decided to supply a one-piece headset which connects via a microUSB slot on the bottom of the casing. That slot doubles up for PC connection and the phone can be charged via that connection. There is also a separate mains power cable that uses Nokia’s tiny teeny round plug.

The in-ear buds are the type we find extremely uncomfortable to wear and which have a tendency to fall out of our ears. That rather marks the 6700 Classic as poor for music listening, which is a real shame as sound reproduction is quite good, volume loud and battery life good. Nokia says you will get up to 5 hours of GSM talk and 416 hours of standby.

Despite the lack of Wi-Fi and fingerprint magnet chassis we can’t help liking this phone. Nokia knows how to do simple understated phones, and anyone using a Nokia 6300 would certainly consider this a worthy upgrade.

40 years after astronaut Neil Armstrong walked on the moon we celebrate that historic event with a free Apollo 11 theme for the Nokia 6300

Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin landed on the moon on July 20 1969 and stepped onto the lunar surface. It is widely regarded as the greatest technical achievement in the history of mankind.

The Apollo 11 theme for the Nokia 6300 includes several stunning images from that amazing mission including the fabled 'Earthrise' image showing planet Earth from a distance of 250,000 miles away.

You can find a quick guide to installing and changing themes in our Nokia 6300 user guides section but here are the quick instructions:

1. Download the file apollo11-6300.nth to your PC or Mac by clicking on the link below
2. Then use the supplied USB cable or set up a Bluetooth connection to transfer the theme file across to your Nokia 6300 handset
3. You will them be prompted that a new theme has been received. Click on Apply to install the theme
4. If you want to change the theme back simply go to the main menu, click on Settings then Themes then choose the theme you want to change to

Download the Apollo 11 theme for the Nokia 6300 (0.6MB)

The N-series has blazed a fairly impressive trail through the mainstream highways of the mobile market since its inception in 2005, but Nokia claims that the N97 is the most anticipated N-series phone to date. It’s a little different to its direct predecessors though, the N96 and N95, featuring a slide-out Qwerty keyboard.

Of course, in line with the current mobile trends, it’s got a whacking great big touchscreen too. However, unlike all the biggest and brightest stars in the touchscreen sky, it’s of the resistive type rather than the capacitive sort made, well, ubiquitous by the iPhone.

This type of touchscreen is generally used more with a stylus than a finger, but Nokia has done its best to make sure that the N97 can be operated fairly easily with a finger too. Unfortunately, it still can’t compete with its capacitive touchscreen rivals. Although responsive, it doesn’t cope well with the lighter touch that’s more comfortable to use when casually navigating around your phone.

There is a mini stylus included for when you need that extra level of precision, but it doesn’t slot into the phone, making it both eminently lose-able and a pain to remember to carry around with you.

To mitigate for the slight lack of touchscreen agility, a halo pops up around menu items as you drag your finger about the standard menu. It’s more problematic if you’re texting or emailing using the keypad-apeing interface on the touchscreen though.

Then again, that’s predominantly what the Qwerty has been added for. Its keys have a somewhat spongy feel, making it less than perfect for typing at speed. The layout is fairly well suited to two-thumbed texting, although the D-pad to the left of the Qwerty means that it’s not centred. This means there’s a light learning curve to using it, but nothing that a few days of acclimatisation won’t cure.

There’s still a sense that the N97 is stuck between two control methods, neither of which are perfect, especially when neither the Qwerty nor the slightly clumsy touchscreen are amazingly good for inputting numbers- very useful for a phone.

To make the phone’s more advanced features accessible, the N97 has a customisable home screen. It’s made up of six different slots that you can assign widgets to. Pre-installed widgets include the calendar, Facebook update, the music player, FM transmitter and a collection of other applications. Adding and removing them is simple. All you do is press down on the widget’s slot until a menu pops up, which lets you add and remove widgets as you like.

However, compared to rivals like the HTC G1 and LG Arena, the N97’s home screen seems clumsy, ugly and lacking in customisation options. Even if you change the widgets around and add your own phone theme, the N97 is always going to be encrusted with a thick layer of the phone’s in-built (lack of) style. And it’s starting to feel distinctly lumpen.

That said its feature set is fairly impressive. There’s 32GB of storage built-in, and the ability to add an additional HC microSD card, with official support running up to 16GB, makes it a viable alternative to a hard disk MP3 player. The 3.5mm headphone jack seals the deal.

Add in the FM transmitter and it’ll even be your very own in-car jukebox. However, the RDS FM radio did have trouble finding stations in our tests, although whether you’ll have similar problems will likely be dependent on the strength of signal in you area. Connectivity options are also comprehensive, with Wi-Fi and HSDPA onboard.

We weren’t quite so impressed with one of the N97’s other key feature areas- the camera. It has five megapixels to its name, accompanied by a dual flash. While it performed fine in optimum conditions, it stumbled when subjected to anything but the most consistent of lighting. Plus, it’s slow to acclimatise to changes in environmental light so, if you were to move your focus around a room with varying light levels, you’ll need to hold the N97 in place for several seconds after its focused before it’s actually ready to take a decent photo.

To an extent, it’s a case of adapting to the camera’s learning curve, as the N97 is capable of producing impressive photos, even if it lets out the occasionally inexplicably blurry shot.

Still, much like the N97’s other features, it’s far from the top of its field. Unfortunately, this trend becomes what categorises the phone. It does a lot of things, sure, but is a master of none of them.

The touchscreen is responsive considering it uses resistive technology, but isn’t on par with capacitive rivals. The interface tries to make the phone’s screen handy for the connected mobile generation, but is left chewing on the dust of Android phones. And, while we don’t like to dwell on megapixels too much, the camera doesn’t cut it against the best of them.

The Qwerty keyboard does add something to the N-series roster, and if you haven’t used any other keyboard-toting phones before, it’ll doubtless make your emailing a lot easier. Even that feature is bettered elsewhere, with handsets like the HTC Touch Pro 2 sporting larger keys. The N97’s certainly not a bad handset, but unless you’re an N-series devotee, it shouldn’t be right at the top of your list.

The Nokia N97 has been bouncing around for sometime. It was officially announced last December, and is finally ready to hit the shelves.

It's a touchscreen device, running on Symbian S60, just like the 5800 XpressMusic. However, it's huge in comparison, at 15.9mm thick.

Nokia has obviously taken criticism of the 5800 XpressMusic onboard, because the resistive screen on the N97 is much more responsive than that on the original Symbian touchscreen device, although it's still not as joyful to use as a capacitive screen.

It's also pretty vibrant, with 16million colours and a resolution of 360x640 pixels. Watching videos is a breeze if you open the slide and they're crisp too, whether you're streaming or have downloaded them.

The homescreen features a widget interface, with shortcuts to the browser, Nokia Maps and music player on the left side of the screen, and Accuweather, Facebook and hi5 widgets preloaded on the right side.

The kick slide that allows you to access the Qwerty keyboard is a little violent - we trapped our fingers in it more than once. However, its one of the best devices we've seen for writing emails or large chunks of text resting on a desk because it doesn't rock forwards and backwards like many other devices with a sliding Qwerty keyboard. Conversely, the keys on the Qwerty keyboard are a little spongy, making emails and long chunks of text a little trickier than we'd like.

In the menu, you'll find a shortcut to Nokia's Ovi store to download music and applications. It's not as easy to use at the Apple App Store, and the interface isn't as pleasant to use as BlackBerry App World, but it's a step in the right direction for a world of mobile applications. What is spectacular is that the Nokia N97 features a whopping 32GB internal memory for loading images, videos and music on, with a microSD card slot that supports memory cards up to 16GB on top. That's bigger than the iPhone!

Once you've got your tunes loaded up on the N97, there's an FM transmitter to stream your music to a stereo. If you're bored of the tunes on your mobile, you can also listen to music through the visual FM radio.

For imaging, there's a 5-megapixel camera, although we haven't yet had the opportunity to try it out fully yet - that'll be coming up very soon in the review. Video is another impressive feature on paper - VGA at 30fps, but we'll see what it's like when we put it to the test.

The Nokia N97 is packed full of features, but it's not quite the device we were hoping for. None of the features are executed spectacularly well, although there is a possibility that some issues will be rectified with a firmware update.

Check back on Know Your Mobile for our full Nokia N97 review early next week.

Compare all Nokia N97 deals online

The Nokia N79 is a highly capable handset, with more functions than you might initially assume. It includes everything from Wi-Fi connectivity and HSDPA high-speed 3G to A-GPS satellite navigation capability and Symbian S60 smartphone capability.

But it doesn't stop when you get the phone out of the box. Nokia regularly introduces software updates that users can download online and install on their handsets, which can add new features, improve existing functions, fix bugs, improve battery life and so on.

The latest updates can be found on the support and software sections of Nokia's website. You can select your handset model and check if there are any updates available to the current version of software installed on your phone (you can type *#0000# in standby mode to get the software version onscreen). Updates can be downloaded quickly and easily using Nokia Software Updater software on a PC and your phone's supplied USB cable.

But on the Nokia N79, you can also update software over the air directly to the phone. It's easy to do, and you could end up with a significant improvement in your phone's performance.

We describe how to do it below. You can check for updates and download using a mobile network data connection, or you could do it via a Wi-Fi by selecting a WLAN connection point on your N85. Be aware that if you're using a mobile network connection, unless you have an inclusive data deal you could end up with additional data charges for download software updates.

Also, it's important that before installing a software upgrade you make sure that all the data on your phone, contents and contacts have been backed up to a PC or on to a memory card. You can use the in-box Nokia Nseries PC Suite software and USB cable to synchronise and back up these with your PC.

Updating software

1. Press the Menu button (Figure 1).
2. Scroll to highlight Tools (Figure 2). Press Open.
3. Scroll to highlight Utilities (Figure 3). Press Open.
4. Scroll to highlight Device Manager (Figure 4). Press Open.
5. You will see details of the phone's current software version and date (Figure 5). You can normally check for the latest software version online at Nokia's support and software section. To check directly from the phone, press Options.
6. Highlight Check for updates (Figure 6). Press Select.
7. A message appears asking if you want to connect to the internet (Figure 7). Press Yes.
8. You can now select which access point you want to use. You can choose a mobile network or a WLAN connection. You can use a WLAN connection to avoid any potential mobile data costs and to get quicker downloads (Figure 8).
9. Highlight the WLAN or mobile network you want to use (Figure 9). Press Select.
10. The phone now connects to the Nokia server and shows whether any updates are available (Figure 10).
11. If an update is available, press Accept to download the update. The software update starts downloading (Figure 11).
12. A message appears asking if you want to install the software update (Figure 12). Press Now if you want to install it.
13. A message appears reminding you to backup your phone's data before installing the software (Figure 13). Press Accept if you want to proceed (if you haven't yet backed up your phone, press cancel and do so before installing the software update later).
14. A message appears telling you that the phone can't be used during the update and that the phone will restart (Figure 14). Press Accept.
15. The phone will start updating. In a few minutes, the phone restarts and a message appears: Phone updates: Update complete. Press OK. Your update has been completed and the phone is ready for use again with the latest version of software installed.
16. Reinstall any files or contacts you have backed up.

Your Nokia N78 is packed with some of the latest mobile phone features and software, from Wi-Fi connectivity and HSDPA high-speed 3G to A-GPS satellite navigation capability and Symbian S60 smartphone capability.

But it doesn't stop when you get the phone out of the box. Nokia regularly introduces software updates that users can download online and install on their handsets, which can add new features, improve existing functions, fix bugs, improve battery life and so on.

The latest updates can be found on the support and software sections of Nokia's website. You can select your handset model and check if there are any updates available to the current version of software installed on your phone (you can type *#0000# in standby mode to get the software version onscreen). Updates can be downloaded quickly and easily using Nokia Software Updater software on a PC and your phone's supplied USB cable.

But on the Nokia N78, you can also update software over the air directly to the phone. It's easy to do, and you could end up with a significant improvement in your phone's performance.

We describe how to do it below. You can check for updates and download using a mobile network data connection, or you could do it via a Wi-Fi by selecting a WLAN connection point on your N85. Be aware that if you're using a mobile network connection, unless you have an inclusive data deal you could end up with additional data charges for download software updates.

Also, it's important that before installing a software upgrade you make sure that all the data on your phone, contents and contacts have been backed up to a PC or on to a memory card. You can use the in-box Nokia Nseries PC Suite software and USB cable to synchronise and back up these with your PC.

Updating software

1. Press the Menu button (Figure 1).
2. Scroll to highlight Tools (Figure 2). Press Open.
3. Scroll to highlight Utilities (Figure 3). Press Open.
4. Scroll to highlight Device Manager (Figure 4). Press Open.
5. You will see details of the phone's current software version and date (Figure 5). You can normally check for the latest software version online at Nokia's support and software section. To check directly from the phone, press Options.
6. Highlight Check for updates (Figure 6). Press Select.
7. A message appears asking if you want to connect to the internet (Figure 7). Press Yes.
8. You can now select which access point you want to use. You can choose a mobile network or a WLAN connection. You can use a WLAN connection to avoid any potential mobile data costs and to get quicker downloads (Figure 8).
9. Highlight the WLAN or mobile network you want to use (Figure 9). Press Select.
10. The phone now connects to the Nokia server and shows whether any updates are available (Figure 10).
11. If an update is available, press Accept to download the update. The software update starts downloading (Figure 11).
12. A message appears asking if you want to install the software update (Figure 12). Press Now if you want to install it.
13. A message appears reminding you to backup your phone's data before installing the software (Figure 13). Press Accept if you want to proceed (if you haven't yet backed up your phone, press cancel and do so before installing the software update later).
14. A message appears telling you that the phone can't be used during the update and that the phone will restart (Figure 14). Press Accept.
15. The phone will start updating. In a few minutes, the phone restarts and a message appears: Phone updates: Update complete. Press OK. Your update has been completed and the phone is ready for use again with the latest version of software installed.
16. Reinstall any files or contacts you have backed up.

The N81 is a sleek and stylish entry to the popular N-series range of Symbian-powered phones. It's full of up-to-date entertainment features too, like N-Gage.

However, on top of the staggering array of multimedia gadgetry packed inside, the Nokia N81 is geared up to meet all your mobile messaging needs - including email. The device enables you to receive and send emails from your normal email account(s) in a similarly easy way as you would with a desktop PC.

It's simple to set up too. With just a few button presses, you can be accessing your emails, viewing and downloading attachments and firing off emails from the phone.

All you need is a few details of your email account - address, user name and password - and you can get connected to web-based email or email provided by your Internet Service Provider. You can receive and read emails, send emails and forward messages, and tweak settings to suit exactly how you want to use and view your messages - just like with your desktop email.

You can add one email account, or use a number of separate email accounts and switch between them in the phone's settings menus.

The Nokia N81 has an email wizard onboard that can be used to automatically retrieve settings for POP3 email for most web and ISP email accounts. It's simple to use, but if you do have any problems, you can find help and settings details from Nokia's UK support site. From here you can set up your phone via a received text message. If you want to use your Nokia N81 with corporate email, you should talk to your company's IT department to get it set up.

Setting up email

1. From the standby screen, press the Messaging softkey (Figure 1). Altenatively, press the Menu button, and highlight Messaging (Figure 2). Press Open.
2. Scroll down to highlight New mailbox (Figure 3). Press Open.
3. A message appears: No mailbox defined. Define now? (Figure 4). Press Yes.
4. Instructions appear for the email wizard (Figure 5). To start the email set-up wizard, press Start.
5. In the email address box, type in your full email address (Figure 6). Press OK.
6. You can now type in the name you want to call your email mailbox, or leave it as the default name of your email service (Figure 7). Press OK.
7. You are asked to define the user name and password for your account (Figure 8). Press Yes to continue.
8. In the User name panel, edit the email address until you have your user name - this is usually the bit of your email address before the '@' sign, (though if you're unsure, check with on your email service provider's website) (Figure 9).
9. When completed, scroll down using the navigation pad to highlight the Password panel. Type in your email account password (Figure 10). Press OK.
10. After a few moments a message appears onscreen informing you that the email mailbox has been defined (Figure 11). Press OK.
11. The first time you set up, you will be taken into your mailbox and asked: Connect to mailbox? (Figure 12). Press Yes.
12. After a few seconds while the phone connects, you will get a list of email message subject headers onscreen (Figure 13). Scroll through the list to highlight ones you want to view.
13. Press Open to download and view the full email. Scroll down to read the message (Figure 14).
14. If the message has an attachment, scroll to highlight it and press Attachments (Figure 15). Highlight the attachment and press Open (Figure 16). You'll be able to see the attachment in full (Figure 17). Press Close and Back to return to the original email.

To get back to your mailbox, press Back. Alternatively, if you want to reply, forward or see other options, press Options. A list appears onscreen (Figure 18).

Replying to emails

1. To reply, highlight Reply. Press Select. Highlight To sender (Figure 19). Press Select.
2. Type in the text of your message. You can also edit or delete the original message if you want to, add new recipients or alter the subject header (Figure 20).
3. When you're ready to send, press Options, highlight Send and press Select (Figure 21).
4. Alternatively, before you send the message you can add an image or other files by selecting Insert from the Options list and pressing Select (Figure 22).
5. A row of icons appears at the bottom of the display, representing different elements you can insert - images, others, video clips, sound clips or text (Figure 23). Highlight and select one of these, and you can search through files to add a suitable attachment. Press Select to add it to your email.
6. When ready to send, as before press Options, highlight Send and press Select (Figure 21).

Checking for new emails

1. To check for new emails go to the Messaging menu as before (Figure 2).
2. Scroll down to the name you gave your email mailbox (Figure 24). Press Open.
3. If you're not currently connected, you will be asked if you want to connect to your mailbox (Figure 25). Press Yes. New messages will now be retrieved.
4. If you are already in your mailbox and want to check for new messages, press Options, scroll down to Retrieve email (Figure 26). Press Select.
5. Highlight New (Figure 27). Press Select. New messages subjects will be delivered to your mailbox.

Sending new emails

You can send messages as emails as quickly and easily as text or MMS messages.

1. In the Messaging menu, highlight New message (Figure 28). Press Select.
2. Scroll down to highlight E-mail (Figure 29). Press OK.
3. Add the email address, subject and message (Figure 30).
4. If you want to, add any attachments in the way outlined above.
5. As before, when your email is ready to send, press Options, highlight Send and press Select (Figure 21).

Michael Bay's back with another Transformers movie with Revenge of the Fallen this summer. Shia Lebouf's back too, as the slightly geeky unlikely hero of the piece.

Whether you think Bay's new take on the series does justice to these classic 80s toys or not, there's no denying the films make great source material for a phone theme. We've used promotiona images from the film and actual Transformers icons to give your Nokia 5800 Xpressmusic a thorough metal makeover.

To download and install the Transformers 2 theme for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, download the theme onto your PC by clicking on the link below. Transfer the file to your phone via Bluetooth or USB and follow the instructions displayed on the screen to install it.

Download Transformers 2 theme for the Nokia 5800 Xpressmusic

View more articles for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic:
Nokia 5800 XpressMusic vs Samsung Omnia i900
Porsche 911 theme for the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
Setting up and using shortcuts on the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
Nokia 5800 XpressMusic review

The Nokia 5310 Xpressmusic may be a sleek handset, but it's nowhere near as slick as the Porsche 911. The Porsche is a true design classic that you can't fail to recognise.

We've made a theme of the car to give your Nokia 5310 Xpressmusic a full Porsche 911 makeover. Even if owning the car may be a dream, you can still take it wherever you go with this theme.

It includes several shots of the car driving around, plus a great MP3 ringtone of the Porsche's engine revving. Keep on saving, readers.

Follow these instructions to get the theme working on your Nokia 5310 Xpressmusic:

1. Download the file porsche_5310.nth to your PC or Mac by clicking on the link below
2. Then use the supplied USB cable or set up a Bluetooth connection to transfer the theme file across to your Nokia 5310 XpressMusic handset
3. You will them be prompted that a new theme has been received. Click on Apply to install the theme
4. If you want to change the theme back simply go to the main menu, click on Settings then Themes then choose the theme you want to change to

Download the Porsche 911 theme for the Nokia 5310 XpressMusic