Nokia E51

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The E51 is the latest member to join the Eseries portfolio in mid-September. It is likely a direct replacement of the E50, though it also looks like a slimmed-down version of the chunky E90 after losing the QWERTY keyboard. But this workhorse is no slouch even with a slim figure.

Design

The beauty of candy-bar handsets is you can almost never go wrong with the design. That's exactly how we felt with the Nokia E51. At 12mm thick, the E51 is one of the leaner enterprise devices from the Finnish phone-maker, second to the E61i which is 0.5mm thinner. The E51 feels very solid in hand, something which a picture cannot deliver. Cementing the durability are the stainless steel runs on the entire edge of the front faceplate and battery cover.

To sum it up quickly, the design approach to the E51 is a very reserved and safe one. Nokia didn't conjure any fancy tricks for this enterprise device. Although we adore the slim profile, the handset looks a tad too tall due to the two-tone fascia. That said, the phone is still relatively compact and should fit comfortably in the pocket. The styling of the E51 also bears vague resemblance to a stripped-down version of the E90 Communicator without the clamshell QWERTY keyboard. Click the picture on the right to see what we mean.

The bottom half is peppered with various shortcut keys and a generous-sized keypad. Above that is a modest 2-inch QVGA display with an ambient light sensor and LED light indicator customizable to light up in the event of missed calls, incoming text/multimedia messages or emails. The screen is readable even in bright outdoor conditions, which is great. However, it's probably not suitable for prolonged Web surfing or document reading, unless you want to end up straining your vision.

Like we mentioned in our preview, Nokia has replaced the S60 swirl icon with a "roofed house" that's instantly recognizable as the Home key. It's trivial, but one that's definitely appreciated. Pressing the key from anywhere in the phone's menu brings us to the standby screen. The same can also be done with the End call control.

The * and # keys are slightly smaller than the 7 and 9 buttons due to the tapered edges of the phone, though it doesn't hinder daily use. While we like the excellent tactility of the main keys, we can't say the same for those on the sides, such as the rubberized volume, power and record buttons. They are not disastrous, don't get us wrong, but pressing them requires a little more concerted effort.

At the back is where we find a 2-megapixel camera and the onboard speakers. The glossy surface of the Rose Steel unit attracts fingerprint smudges fairly easily and may irk some users, although a few swipes usually does the trick for the rear face. The Black Steel version isn't plagued with this problem, and we feel it's the more elegant of the two.

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