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Nokia 5310 XpressMusic

MSRP: $49.99

The stylish 5310 is the most pocket-friendly music phone on the market and offers very good call quality.

Review date: May 20, 2008

Imagine if the first-generation iPod nano could make phone calls. Nokia’s 5310 XpressMusic is just a hair bigger than Apple’s diminutive music player, making it one of the slimmest mobile phones out there. We wonder, then, how Nokia stuffed so much functionality into such a small package, including dedicated music controls, a 2-megapixel camera, and a 3.5mm audio jack. The 5310 may not have 3G, but it makes up for that loss in music-friendly features and a low $49.99 price (with a two-year contract). It’s easily one of the best music phones of the year. Svelte Design Measuring a scant 4.1 x 1.8 x 0.4 inches, this thin, music-centric GSM phone, available from T-Mobile, can roam among the U.S., Europe, and other overseas networks. It weighs a mere 3 ounces, making it barely noticeable in a shirt pocket or your jeans. Following the design of the Nokia 5300, the 5310 has two aluminum side panels on either side of the screen, where external controls for Rewind/Fast-Forward, and Play/Pause are located. You can choose among red, orange, and purple to accent the black phone. But where the 5300—which had only soft keys and Send/End buttons on its face—slid open to reveal a keypad, the candy-bar 5310 features Send and End buttons and two soft keys surrounding a D-pad. Below them is a fairly small keypad for dialing numbers, but it wasn’t too scrunched as to make for sore thumbs while dialing or even shooting off some short texts. The 2-inch QVGA screen is nice and bright.

ProsCons
  • Great music performance
  • Very compact design
  • Simple user interface
  • 2-MP camera
  • Good call quality
  • No 3G
  • Tri-band configuration limits worldwide roaming

Read Full Review @ LaptopMag.com by Eric M. Zeman




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