Gary Steel
Nokia put on a slap up breakfast for a small coterie of freeloading tech journalists at famed Ponsonby cafe, Dizengoff, this morning.
The reason? To announce today’s release in NZ of the company’s new business-oriented smartphone, the E7.
Released today, the device is available through Vodafone, and retails at $1299.
The E7 is typically Nokia style in many ways – stylish in a discreet fashion, and packed to the gills with features.
The slim form factor doesn’t look like it could accommodate the full QWERTY keyboard that slides out. Likewise, though the 4-inch touchscreen is smaller than many entertainment-oriented smartphones, it’s an AMOLED screen with simply stunning clarity.
The E7 runs on the Symbian OS, and it’s Microsoft-compatible; that is, it uses Microsoft Exchange servers, and Office Communicator Mobile.
What this means in effect, says Nokia, is “private and business email with fast, secure intranet access”, along with “the ability to create, edit and share office documents and view PDF files with Adobe Reader.”
The well-regarded Ovi Maps are included, which means full GPS and maps throughout New Zealand and Australia, with the ability to download maps for other countries.
The E7 comes with an HDMI connect, so that it can easily be connected to a television, so it can show photos, or even video in HD quality.
There are too many features on the E7 to recount all of them here. Suffice to say that it’s a distinctly different philosophy to that of, say, the iPhone, which gives you what they think you will a) need and b) find to be entertaining. The E7 seems to be predicated on “if you can think up something new to do with this phone, it’s probably already capable of doing it.”
Having said that, there has been some criticism internationally for the things the E7 hasn’t included (which some earlier models did) including no autofocus on its 8 megapixel camera, and no mini-SD card.
Our advice? Have a play and see what you think. And while you’re thinking, watch this interview with the E7’s designer:
