Palm Discovery would like to extend a BIG THANKS to Katie and others at Womworld for providing the product for this review.

This Nokia E66 review has been broken down into 2 parts:

Part 1 will cover an overview of the device including the specs, physical appearance, etc and an overview video of the smartphone.

Part 2 will provide videos of the smartphone and the underlying Symbian OS plus my observations and final thoughts of the device.

Continuing onto the second and last part of this 2 part review, I will take a closer look at the Nokia E66 smartphone, going through some of the programs, menus and features.

Here are some screenshots taken of the various menus and folders in the device. Click on the thumbnail images for a bigger image.

And some pictures taken with the camera. They should be very similar in quality to the Nokia E71. Click here to view the pictures taken by the E71.

Again the colors are not very good and as discussed in my Nokia E71 review, you can use photoshop or other image software programs to adjust the color so that it is better. Also very evident as with many Nokia devices is that images are not well rendered in overcast conditions or low light conditions.

Video of Nokia E66 smartphone

Video of Nokia E66 Part 1

Video of Nokia E66 Part 2

Here are my observations:

Pros:

Automatic Screen Rotation/Orientation

First of all, I really like the automatic screen rotation/orientation feature. When holding it vertically, the screen is in portrait orientation. When the phone is tilted on its side horizontally, the screen will automatically rotate in a horizontal orientation. This is a very useful feature when viewing documents or surfing the internet and viewing web pages.

Slider design

The slider design is beautiful. I really like how effortless it is to slide out the numeric keypad to access the numbers. This enables quick and easy access to the keypad buttons but keeps the smartphone sleek looking when it’s snapped back in.

Similar features to E71

The E66 offers practically the same features I loved in the Nokia E71 (see my review here) so there isn’t anything NOT to like with the E66.

Auto keylock activation by slider

I really like how the keypad lock automatically becomes enabled and disabled when I open and close the slider. This really makes it very useful as it automatically locks the keypad when the slider is closed and unlocks when it’s opened, eliminating the need to press buttons to unlock and lock the device. I really like this. Ingenious!

Enough of the positives. Here are some of the not so positives. Please keep in mind that I am not a typical cell phone texting expert who has no problems with texting so obviously I would experience difficulty texting on a numeric keypad.

Cons:

Numeric keys not suitable for serious text entry

Coming from QWERTY layout styled smartphones, it was unbelievably difficult and frustrating for me to text or enter even a few words on the Nokia E66 smartphone. While with QWERTY smarphones, I can easily press a specific key and get a letter, it takes me almost three times as long to enter that same letter since I have to press the numeric key a few times to get a specific letter. For example, if I wanted to enter the letter “P”, I’d have to press the number “7″ key once. For the letter “A”, press “2″ once. Letter “L”, press “5″ three times. Letter “M”, press “6″ once. So, the 4 letter word “palm” forces me to press 6 times while on a QWERTY smartphone I press it 4 times. And that’s only if I get the letters right. You see, if I miss any of the letters the first time around, I’d have to keep pressing until I get back to it. So, you can imagine my frustration. Obviously, I have experienced many times of missing the letter and having to go through the extra characters. Think of all the letters and characters we may have to enter for each sentence and you’ll begin to understand how much longer it takes to enter the text and how I HATED posting on Twitter or anything. Again, this is mainly due to my inexperience with numeric keypads coming and being spoiled with QWERTY keypad smartphones but it also makes me so relieved to get back to my Treo.

MicroSD card slot hidden underneath battery cover

Although I can understand the reasoning behind the location of the microSD card slot due to limited space on the phone, it doesn’t mean that I like it. As a matter of fact, I HATE it. You see, I am one of those people who like to swap out my microSD cards from time to time. With the microSD card slot on the Nokia E66 smartphone now hidden underneath the metallic battery cover, it’s much hassle to swap out the card. To access the card, I’d need to open up the battery cover first. This and the way how the SIM card tends to be fitted on Nokia devices is one of the things that I really HATE about Nokia phones. Why is it that I have to remove the battery FIRST to get access to the SIM card? Come on, there’s got to be a better way. At least allow me to access the SIM card WITHOUT first removing the battery. This is ridiculous.

Thick size

The E66, although it seemingly “looks” small and thin, is actually quite thick on its side, due to its slider design. If you are a fan of thin smartphones, you will find the E66 to be way too thick to hold. Especially compared to its slimmer counterpart, the E71, the E66 seems huge in terms of thickness. Coming from Treos, I am okay with its thickness as I feel that it “fits” better on the hand.

Non-touchscreen

The E66, very much like the E71 is non-touchscreen. As mentioned in my Nokia E71 smartphone review, there are times when I find myself wishing that the E66 supported touchscreen as it would have made my life much easier. Again, this is usually to do with internet surfing and navigation when tapping the screen with a stylus could easily help rather than pressing multiple times on directional keys to get around. Perhaps, when the Nokia N97 comes out that this could be the ultimate Nokia smartphone combining the stable nature of the OS with the easy access of a touchscreen. Time will tell, and I am waiting for its arrival with anticipation, although quite hesitant about its price.

Character selection doesn’t pop up

On both the Nokia E71 and the E66, it seems (and I wasn’t able to figure what caused this) from time to time, I can’t bring up the character selection pop up window. I would press the button and nothing would come up. That means, that I am not able to type in an underscore _ or other symbols or characters on the screen meaning I can’t log in a site if my username contains an underscore or other characters. The only way around it is to do a reboot or reset, which means, I either have to remove the battery cover and remove the battery for a second, or turn off the device and turn it back on again. This is one of those times when being able to have a RESET button would be very handy.

Review Summary

The Nokia E66 smartphone can be thought of as a numeric keypad version of the very popular Nokia E71 smartphone. This can be very appealing for those who dislike the cumbersome and space taken up by the QWERTY keypad for a much more basic and sleeker look. The screen is beautiful and the automatic screen rotation/orientation feature can easily convince you to get it simply for that feature because it’s very impressive. The slider design is ingenious as it keeps the E66 looking sleek and beautiful when closed yet allows you to easily slide it out when placing calls or inputting text. As well, the automatic keypad lock with the slider is another plus. However, for those who may want to use it for inputting text who are not familiar with texting on numeric keypads, you may discover that a QWERTY keypad smartphone like the Nokia E71, may be a better choice as you can enter text in half the time or less. If that’s not a concern, the E66 will be just as good a choice.

What do you think? Do you think that the E66 is something you’re interested in? Or, do you think that the E71 is better? Personally, I prefer the E71 for the QWERTY keys but then, again, I’m biased towards QWERTY keypad layout smartphones so I don’t count Please leave me your thoughts below.

Check out the Nokia E66 smartphone at these fine stores:

Nokia E66 (Gray) at Amazon.com

Nokia E66 (White) at Amazon.com

Nokia E66 (white) at Newegg.com

Enjoyed this review? Check out the many other Palm Discovery reviews of pda and smartphone devices and nokia related posts here.

This is the end of a two part series review of the Nokia E66 smartphone. Please visit Part one if you have not read it yet for an overview of the specs and details.

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