November 12th, 2008
Nokia E63 announced; mass market QWERTY device
The Nokia E71 is one of the best QWERTY mobile phones I have ever used (see my review) and there were rumors of another model coming out that was quite similar, yet targeted at a bit lower cost. Today Nokia officially announced the Nokia E63 and Rob Evans has one that he is showing off with an E71. Also check out the rest of the posts Rob has made as he covers the software and device in more details with the only E63 hands-on experience I have seen so far on the internet.
The Nokia E63 has keys that are slightly larger than the E71, the casing is now plastic instead of stainless steel, the dedicated on/off button is gone (the end key serves this purpose as it does on many standard cellphones), there is now a standard 3.5mm headset jack (why couldn’t this have been on the E71?), there is no GPS receiver or infrared port, and the camera is now 2 megapixel with no auto focus. It appears the device does not have the higher speed HSDPA support, but rather limits out at UMTS speeds. A subscription to Files on Ovi with a 1GB account is provided with the device for remote file access.
While the device may appear to be a step down from the E71, it is also going to be priced 40% less than the E71 was when it was released so it may be a very reasonable trade-off for those looking for a rather inexpensive enterprise phone. You can find the Nokia E71 for just around US$400, which to me is an inexpensive device for all the power it contains.
Matthew Miller is an avid mobile device enthusiast who works during the day as a professional naval architect in Seattle. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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