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Mostly Everything

Last Flash Fiction Contest for a Nokia X3

Hi guys! I’ll announce the winner of the previous mini-contest later as I’m still going through the entries. But I already wanted to start the thread for the final contest which culminates tomorrow night. Again, we’re giving away the final Nokia X3! Our first winner (Marlon = “Messie”) was kind enough to send in a photo with the X3, quickly expedited!

BTW, if by chance you win in the second contest, then your entries for this contest is voided (since I’m starting a new round before we announce).

Yay! OK on to the rules (which by now you’re very familiar with!)

RULES

1. The deadline for MYSTERY flash fiction is at 11:59PM of SUNDAY.

2. The contest is FLASH FICTION. If you don’t know what it is, this is the type of creative fiction which you can do with as little words as possible. The limit is 144 characters (including the space and periods, commas, etc) so if your limit is essentially one Tweet. Leave the entries in my comments section.

Example: Perhaps the most famous is the work by Hemmingway which goes something like: For Sale: Baby Shoes, Never Worn.. English / Filipino / Taglish entries are OK. Avoid abbreviations.

3. The theme:

MYSTERY Saturday 12:00AM – Sunday 11:59PM

Clock is based on the timestamp of the comments.

4. I’m choosing the winner. If there are any discrepancies with the rules whatsoever, I’ll have final say with the rules after considering the comments from readers. Winners wil be announced a couple of hours after each mini contest ends, also announcing the beginning of the new series.

5. This contest is open to everyone from the Philippines. if you live outside MLA, we will have to ship the prize to you courtesy of Nokia. They will take care of it. If you won once, you can’t win again. But you can submit as many entries as you wish (you can even combine them if you want). Entries that are heavily offensive / done in bad taste / pornographic won’t be counted. PG-13 allowed.

6. If you submitted your entry in the previous post, don’t worry I am keeping track of them, but please for new entries, submit in the comments section below this post.

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Mostly Everything

UPDATED Hands On: Nokia XpressMusic 5530 retails for 200 Euros (PHP 13,000)

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Hands On

I’d feel bad for you if you recently bought a Nokia 5800 XpressMusic phone. Today, Nokia launched the 5530 XpressMusic phone, the cheapest touch screen music phone in their entire roster, which retails for about 200 EU. Holy cow, that’s just about, or less than, P13,000 if I’m not mistaken.

The complete hands on after the break.

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Mostly Everything

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic as a touch screen device

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Hi folks. You probably read my first hands on with the Nokia 5800 last year. My first impressions still are basically the same, now that I finally have the unit with me and I’d like to supplemement that review with this post. I’ve been pondering how to go about reviewing this phone and opted out from a specs perspective, and will talk about the experience of using a touch screen Nokia device. Thus this review is oriented for Nokia users who are wondering how well the touch screen technology has been implemented on the 5800.

Before I continue, note that this is not Nokia’s first take on the touch screen. They had two devices in the past that did this, and their “N” web browser tablets also do the same. But this is the first time Nokia has put out so much marketing for an XpressMusic phone that seems to be more like an Nseries device because of the way it’s implemented.

The photo above shows you how to get around to the different “hot areas” of the phone’s main menu. Because of the touch screen, you can find other ways to access the clock, alarm, connectivity, and profiles without creating shortcuts. With the XpressMusic menu button on top, you also don’t need to use the custom shortcut buttons for the multimedia functions. Thus, I use the 4 shortcut keys for putting in other things such as messaging, calculator and the camera.

Size Comparisons

Below are comparisons with the Nokia E71, the Apple iPod Touch (Generation II), and the HTC TyTn II. The 5800 is handy and light to the hand, similar to the Nokia N82.

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Home Screen

You can customize the phone’s home screen to use the traditional S60 menu of calendars and updates or you can use the “RSS friend” tracker that updates you with the information of 4 of your chosen friends. I personally don’t find the latter function to be as useful (it does sound cool but I prefer to have my dates and to do’s on the menu).

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Nokia 5800 Virtual Keypad

How well can you text with it?

It’s been four days and I don’t use the QWERTY or mini QWERTY mode of input. I stick to the good ‘ol fashioned numerical keypad that works almost as well as real keys. There have been mixed feedback on how sensitive the keys are compared to real hardware buttons but I sincerely think that you can get used to it.

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A small reservation I have is the method for finding names, as it can get rather confusing when you have the entire A-Z displayed, and as you type in a name, some letters go odd man out on you to see what’s left. It can be confusing at first but come to think of it, it’s the most efficient way save for offering multitouch on the keypad.

Browsing through names using the scroll bar can be a chore. I’m glad that the keypad senses your entire thumb even if you’re not directly touching the scroll node. To scroll up and down, it’s most comfy to put your thumb above or below the node and let the phone scroll itself up and down the contacts list.

iSync Compatibility with OS X

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If you are a Mac user, as of late there is still no sync tool for iSync. But guess what? I was able to find a workaround to getting a flawless sync to work with Apple’s iSync. You can download the plugin from that link. Keep checking the official iSync plugin page for an official driver.

Things that need to be improved:

There seems to be something up with the signal. The screen flickers on and off at times when I’m on a call and I tend to lose the person I’m talking to on the other line. It doesn’t happen often but it needs to be addressed.

Battery life is another issue. It’s not as bad as when the first N95 came out. You will get a day of full charge on this thing if you use the multimedia and WiFi sparingly but you may need to carry around a spare charger for a really long day.

So, I know a lot of guys lined up the for the huge pre-sell discount. How goes your Nokia 5800 experience so far? Leave a comment and let’s figure things out!

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Mostly Everything

5130 XpressMusic: Nokia’s most affordable music phone

A few days ago I reviewed the most advanced XpressMusic phone from Nokia, the 5800 XpressMusic phone. Today, we reveal the Finn’s cheapest XpressMusic phone, the 5130 which is due on shelves early next year.

With dedicated music keys, a digital music player, FM radio and a standard 3.5 mm connector for headphones, the Nokia 5130 XpressMusic is Nokia’s most affordable music phone to date. Equipped with an integrated 2 megapixel camera, the Nokia 5130 XpressMusic also supports image sharing through Share on Ovi, as well as the Mail on Ovi email service. The Nokia 5130 XpressMusic is expected to begin shipping in the first quarter of 2009 with an estimated retail price of 90 EUR. [source]

Due out in early 2009, the Nokia 5130 XpressMusic phone comes with a new feature called Mail on Ovi. As S40 phones aren’t as powerful in terms of their software to access Share on Ovi tools, Nokia chopped some of the features and “widgetized” them to fit S40 phones (the more powerful Nseries phones use S60), thus explaining how S40 differentiates from S60 – simpler but less powerful.

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Mostly Everything

Nokia 5800 XpressMusic Review in the Philippines

UPDATE 3: I have a review up of the new Nokia N97 — following the successful touch screen experience of the 5800.

UPDATE 2: More hands on with me playing with the phone. I talk about the touch screen in particular.

UPDATE: From Nikka Abes of Nokia Philippines:

The Nokia 5800 XpressMusic phone is selling at a preorder price of P20,000.00. To place a preorder please sign up at the Nokia Philippines website. This goes to the first 58 sign ups.

The price of the 5800 XpressMusic is pegged at about P18,000 without tax so we can estimate this to be at the early P20,000 mark when it comes out officially (nota bene: this is only speculation, btu it gives you a rough estimate how much of your Christmas money to save).

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NOKIA 5800 FIRST IMPRESSIONS

A bit of history: the XpressMusic line is Nokia’s flagship brand for anything and everything music. If the Nseries concentrates on multimedia (video mostly), the E series on corporate use, the XpressMusic line is distinct because it has two things – a separate high quality audio hardware (loud and crisp speakers) and a 3.5mm speaker jack. This is consistent throughout all the Nokia phones branded as XpressMusic.

The Nokia 5800 XpressMusic phone is Nokia’s first Nseries touch screen device as well. Nokia has had two other semi popular touch screen phones in the past – the Nokia 6708 and the Nokia 7710, released back in 2006. Here is a walk through of the various features. My first impressions were very positive as the touch screen integrates well into the device. Unlike the iPhone which is an SMS composing nightmare, the 5800 slightly vibrates each time you press a button. There are three text input modes available – full QWERTY keyboard, mini QWERTY keyboard and the traditional numerical keypad.

Photos and full feature after the jump.