The Nokia E5 Review: A Cheaper E72
by Mithun Chandrasekhar on November 30, 2010 2:01 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Nokia
- E5
- Mobile
Performance, Battery Life and Call Quality
As I mentioned earlier in the review, the E5 is quite a usable phone, as long as you remain within the confines of the Symbian OS. I have included Opera Mobile 10 numbers on the E5 for reference.
During the page load testing, I noticed an interesting behavior; the E5 would just stop loading a page that’s more than 1-1.5MB after a couple of seconds when over WiFi. Because of this, Engadget.com was stuck at about 1.3MB for more than 3 minutes before I decided to call it quits. I noticed the same behavior while running the Anandtech battery test suite over WiFi where the phone would just refuse to load pages after iterating two times through our battery life test suite. The only way around it was to either stop and reload the page or close and reopen the browser, but neither of these worked long enough to actually complete our tests.
Battery Life
The BL-4D 1200 mAh battery powering the E5 is a step down from the 1500 mAh one found in the E72 (although it is the same found on Nokia’s current flagship, the N8). This means the talk time is going to take a hit compared to the E72, but the E5 manages to post some pretty respectable numbers. Also, the official numbers indicate that the standby time for the E5 is an incredible 25+ days while non-3G talk time is north of 15 hours. Under normal usage which included some voice calls, push-email turned on, some surfing and texting, I could get away with not charging the phone for almost 3 days.
For these tests, we ran our standard page loading suite which loads through a few dozen pages endlessly until the battery dies. Screen brightness is set to 50% and all extraneous processes are killed. The WiFi test is again missing because the E5 mysteriously refused to load our test suite after a few iterations in either the default browser or Opera.
The 1200 mAh battery in the E5
Call quality on the E5 was good overall. The sound was crisp and clear and the quality remains good even at lower signal strengths. The E5 seems to hold on to signals noticeably better than my Palm Pre Plus on AT&T in the Bay Area. Of note is the fact that the E5 kept alternating between 3G and 3.5G (HSDPA) once in a while even when kept at the same location. Average 3G speed measured a surprisingly low 725 kbps.
The speakerphone on the E5 is actually very clear and usable. It’s adequately loud to have a conversation in a normal environment with some background noise. It also holds on well at high volume without any distortions and the voice sounds quite natural albeit flat. The same goes for the ringtones which actually sound really good. Coupled with some effects Nokia dubs as “3D Ringtones”, the speaker is well upto its task. Also, being a Quad-Band GSM/UTMS device, you can expect to use the E5 in most parts of the world.
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deputc26 - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
While he may be wrong, "Powerful stupid" does not fit...I agree that those three are currently the best for the most people and will end up 1, 2 and 3 as things currently stand but of course RIM/Nokia and especially WebOS could make top 3 if they get their acts together.
Belard - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
I based my opinion on... educated guess and how the market works. Until I saw the WM7 in action (somewhat - on Andandtech) - I figured it'll be junk. But it's still a rather updated 6.5 with more power.MS looked at iPhone and Android and said "hmmmm... what can we do to make OUR product different and actually better." The big squares look like they'll function better - direct to the point of the function you want with a quick swipe access to more apps.
WM7 will do very well because of MS's marketing but also, unlike before - MS has several hardware partners (HTC, Samsung) selling about 12 models out the gate. While there are only 7 different black berries, half of them on the market for a year. Apple only makes 1-2 models of iPhone... but they are easily skinable.
So with the OS improvements, close work with partners - yes, WM7 will be giving Android some good competition. I don't think WM7 - these three different phones have their strengths and weakness. I have an Android Galaxy-S, and so does one of my business partners... I think he'd do better with the WM7, but it wasn't out when his blackberry died, which he doesn't miss.
I NEVER meet a blackberry phone that I liked.
I prefer the more open design of Android... and I hope 3.0 will take some clues from MS and streamline some of the operations of the phone. I'd like to see a smaller grid... perhaps 3 icons across. Improved unlocked-swipe... yeah, the jig-saw looks cool, but its a PAIN in the butt in ways it shouldn't be.
The battery usage of Android needs to be enhanced.
With limited models, iPhone will end up #3 in about 2-3 years... IMHO.
My prediction by 2013
1 - Android
2 - Windows Mobile
3 - iPhone
4 - RIM
5 - Dumb-phones & Palm & Symbian - which is semi-smart.
Market share for #5 will be reduced... new generation of users will not want dumber phones. I've only recently gone from dumb cell to smart... most of it has been good experience with room for improvement.
mino - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
You know, there are actually customers (90% of world market actually) that expect the phone to JUST WORK out of the box. No firmware update needed.Also there are customers not willing to shell out $300 for a mobile.
$1 with $20 plan being the target market of this device.
mythun.chandra - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
Belard, I see your point. And having used a Palm Pre Plus as my primary phone for the last couple of months, it was almost jarring when I first used the E5.But the Blackberries seem to be selling quite well only because they are tailored for their target market. With the E5, Nokia is trying to do just that.
Also, most of the uber-phones listed sell for $150-199 on contract. If I remember correct, i saw it for $170 without a contract a couple of days ago. Plus, if you're going to use this primarily as a business phone (mail/messaging only), you can get away with the $15 unlimited data plan that AT&T offers for its "dumb" phones. That's a lot of savings over 2 years.... :)
Belard - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
A friend went from a blackberry to Android... it was a huge improvement. He's had his blackberry for about a year (one of the recent models) - the screen, internet, texting, etc... improved experience going to a Galaxy-S. Even thou the Galaxy isn't perfect.... ;(At&t at walmart has the Galaxy-S for $100 on 2yr contract. The data-plan is $25, with unlimited texting. There are times WHEN I do need an internet connection with a usable browser.
Using my old SONY at the moment... its still NICE to sometimes have just a dumb-phone.
calyth - Friday, December 3, 2010 - link
I'm a little amuse that you think a Samsung Galaxy could be a business phone.Mine was sitting on my nightstand when I left for work at like 9am, unplugged from the power source, and whne I was back at around 1030pm, it's already complaining loud and clear that I need to charge the battery. It's got nothing on, but 3 very low traffic email accounts. No IM. Maybe a google reader feed being updated.
I've used both a Bold2 and a Torch, and all of them will last at least a day with corporate levels of email.
I don't have high hopes for this BlackBerry knockoff to last that long when a user actually has any kind of email load.
Exodite - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
Very nice and detailed review, as usual.Can we expect any S^3 devices, primarily the N8 and E7, to be reviewed in the future?
mythun.chandra - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
You should :)Exodite - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
Sweet. :)digitalw - Tuesday, November 30, 2010 - link
I'm not Nokia fan, but, if you have a lot of time to spend "touching" your phone, then go android, go iPhone,go WM7 or WM6.5.... i was using all those platforms and i can assure you, there is no better OS if you want to QUICKLY write SMS, check / write e-mail, quickly send photo as MMS... in the "rush" business hours, my Nokia E52, does the greatest job. After work, my "toy" Samsung Omnia helps me to watch divx or make a nice photos. But E52 (or any other Nokia business model) is the right tool. BlackBerry is in the same class i guess, as i never use it. But my frinds say it's best, for business, not for fun! :)