The Five-minute fiddle: Nokia X6 (Comes with Music edition)
Right, on to my second five-minute fiddle of the week (note: the five-minute fiddle is entirely different than a five-knuckle shuffle – if you’re looking for one of those, you are on entirely the wrong site!)
For those of you that are not familiar, the aim of the five-minute fiddle is to spend a very short period getting first impressions of a given handset/service, like you would browsing in a shop for example, and then write things up with a summary ‘gut feeling’ about it.
I’ve been lucky enough to receive a ‘Nokia (NYSE: NOK) X6 Comes with Music’ this week, in amongst the slew of mail that I got. Fortunately this was one (padded) envelope that I was looking forward to!
Unpacking
If you’re German, I guess you’d comment “Alles Gut” on the packing front. Yep, it’s all there, and part of the Nokia bread and butter competences these days is getting a device well-packaged, with all the accessories. In my first few minutes however, I wasn’t too concerned with what I found as long as I had the device, battery, and charger – a tick in the box for each of those then
Hardware form-factor
The Nokia X6 has a capacitive screen, which is something I’ve been looking forward to trying out, as I personally can’t stand resistive screens! That’s not to say I won’t give them a fair go, but, given the choice I’d choose capacitive. I’m happy to report that the X6 screen is a reasonable size, and responds well to touch.
The design of the device is a little bit quirky, but that’s something I can well appreciate in a device that could well form the beginning of a new line of mid-range touch-enabled devices. It’s pleasing to find tactile buttons where they are needed however, and the usual array of buttons on the side (volume, keylock, etc).
I have to say I do think the battery cover is a little on the flimsy side – it stretches from to bottom of the back of the device, in a central strip – but should have been engineered out of something a bit more sturdy in my view. I felt very uncomfortable popping it off and snapping it back on again.
My device is the blue/white version (the other is red/black), and overall I think it’s going to be one of those appearances that either visually attracts you, or not, since it’s quite striking.
Software / UI
I have to say I was a little concerned at what exactly Series40 was going to offer up as a touch interface, as to my mind, Nokia are way behind the likes of Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) and HTC/Android in their touch-enabled designs. However, I was pleasantly surprised – everything is reasonably clear, and once you drill out of the main menu grid, buttons etc continue to be finger-friendly – something that wasn’t always the case with some of the earlier touch interfaces on Nokia devices.
All of the usual candidates were there in terms of applications, but what I didn’t get to try was the whole ‘Comes with Music’ experience – more of that hopefully, in a longer review next time.
I did check out the typing on the virtual on-screen keyboard however, because I think it’s something that needs to work really well in a touch-based device – and I’m pleased to report no lag in inputting characters – the space bar did seem slightly shifted to the right though, which catches you off-guard a bit at first!
Conclusion
Overall, I’m feeling quite positive about the X6, and looking forward to spending some more time with the X6. Its got a good (capacitive – yay!) touchscreen, and a UI that at least seems usable and lag-free. Whilst it doesn’t have the bells and whistles of some of the high-end smartphones, that doesn’t matter – it does the basics seemingly quite well, and it’s trump card (in this case) should be the ‘Comes with Music’ offering – more to follow on that one!
