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Nokia 9210 Communicator Resource Site-Product Review- |
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Product Review
The following is a personal review of the Nokia 9210 Communicator based on personal experience and usage.
Physical FactorsThe most impressional thing about the 9210 is it's size. Compared to most other mobile phones the 9210 is very large, bearing resemblance to the first mobiles phones available. However when you consider that the 9210 is two products combined it doesn't seem so big and will fit comfortably in your trouser pocket. It's fairly weighty too, but again this is understandable considering it's capabilities. The design is very understated but Nokia have made some attempts to make it aesthetically pleasing with subtle curves and the use of metallic silver. Overall the phone gives the appearence of a large typical Nokia phone. The arial is tucked inside the top of the phone and will fold out to be upright when either the communicator is open or closed. Although the arial can be hidden it seems pointless having the arial external to the case as folding it out has no noticable affect on signal stength. Accessing the communicator interface is simply a case of grasping the top and bottom half of the case and pulling apart. The hinge is stiff enough to hold the display in position but the angle to which the display can be opened is too restricted. LayoutThe phone interface is layed out in a simple logical manor, similiar to the layout of most nokia phones. The small LCD display on the front is utalised in the same way as normal phones; allowing the user to read messages, navigate the phone book, make calls and see who's calling etc. The changing of profiles throught the phone interface is done simply and effectively by pressing the profiles hot key. The communicator interface, although inevitably more complex is still logical and simple. The keyboard uses a slitghly modified qwerty design with other function buttons such as hot keys to applications and menus. To the right of the display are four option buttons which act as shortcuts to functions. The connectors, like most other phones are found at the bottom. The IrDa window is situated to the left of the connectors. There are two speakers, one positioned to the right of the keyboard and the other on the back of the phone (used when talking on the phone). Below the speaker at the back is the battery and under that are the SIM and MultiMedia card slots. The cover over these slots feels very flimsy, and although not ment to, has detached from the phone once or twice (it is easily re-attached). DisplayA signification selling point of the 9210 is its full colour TFT display. TFT (Thin Film Transistor) is the same display tehcnology used in laptops and is much clearer than cheaper LCD displayes which are often used in other portable devices. Because the 9210 has the capability to access a wide variety of multi media a good colour screen is essential. The 9210s display is bright (with adjustable back light) and very clear, making pictures look vibrant and colourful. The display works well out doors and can be viewed clearly from any angle. UsabilityConsidering the 9210 is intended to be used as a PDA the absence of a touch screen is unusual. Although Nokia have done a good job of designing the interface and keyboard so that navigation is still easy the lack of a touch screen definetly hinders speed of navigating through the GUI (Graphical User Interface). The four option buttons to the right of the display are very useful as they allow common tasks relating to the application currently in use to be executed very quickly. The most obvious situation where a touch screen would be useful is when using the Internet appliation. Navigating the web pages is done using a cursor which is controlled by the arrow keys on the keyboard and is slow and frustrating. SoftwareThe variety of software built into the communicator is impressive and covers every aspect of Personal Information Management. The interfaces for all the software follows the same design is virtually usuable out-of-the-box by windows users as the layout and language is very similiar. The three most notable programs are Calendar, Internet and office. The calendar is a very powerful and feature packed PIM which includes all the features of professional packages. The diary interface is layed out like a paper filofax which makes entering and viewing appointments very easy. The diary also includes week, month and year view a time schedule and to-do. The Internet application is, considering the communicators aim, a very important application and while it does offer many features and is very powerful it isn't easy to use. Although Internet does not support more complicated internet scripts such as Flash it does have full Java support and can be used to view most web pages. The software does not srink pages and so you have to do lots of scrolling to view a page. The office application offers a word processor, spread sheet, presentation viewer and file manager. The word processor offers simple text formatting such as font size, style and colour. Tables are not supported but most other formatting options included in Microsoft Word are. The main idea of the office applications are to provide a viewer and editor for Microsoft Office files. Copying and converting files to and from computer to comunicator is very easy and effective. The spread sheet applications offers simple editing and viewing of spread sheets and can generate charts. The presentation viewer is designed to display powerpoint files but from my experience it doesn't work very well as it doesn't display text of picture properly. The file viewer is more of a utility and is used to access the communicators file storage area. CommunicationsAs a PDA the communicator has the ability to connect to the PC. This is done using a serial cable which by todays standards is very slow the lack of a proper docking cradle is disapointing for a device costing £500. The software which manages the connection between communicator and PC is simple but adequate. The software has two sections; the syncronisation manager and the file manager. The syncronisation manager uses a utility which runs in the task bar and detects when the device is connected. When a connection is deteced the manager is launched and will automatically carry out a set of pre-defined tasks, defined by you. Tasks include; back up all drives, sync calendar/to-do lists, sync contacts, sync e-mail. The last three options are all syncronised with a desktop PIM such as Microsoft Outlook or Lotus Notes. The file manager acts in much the same way as Windows Explorer and allows you to browse the drives of the communicator and copy files to and from the PC. |