Monday, December 20, 2010

Nokia's X3 Touch Review

Nokia's X3 Touch
In designing the new X3 (also known as the X3-02), Nokia must be thinking there are still enough people in the world who prefer dialing and texting the old-fashioned way. This combination instantly makes the mobile phone stand out as most candy bar-format devices at this price range—around P8,500—cannot boast of a 2.4-inch, 240x320 pixel display.

Advanced connectivity

Although the X3 Touch and Type is aimed at mid-level mobile phone buyers, Nokia has made sure it comes with advanced connectivity features, including support for 3G/HSDPA networks as well as Wi-Fi and Bluetooth 2.1 data transfer.

For a device running on Nokia midrange Series 40 platform, this particular mobile phone may provide other higher-end smartphones a run for their money.

While the X3 Touch and Type boasts of a 5-megapixel, 4X digital zoom camera, which also allows video recording, this is not the mobile phone’s strongest suit.

Belonging to the “X” series of mobile phones, this device is optimized for music listening so it comes with a standard 3.5mm headphone jack, FM radio, as well as support for microSD cards of up to 16GB capacity, which may be enough for holding up scores of music files.

Resistive touchscreen

While the new X3’s resistive touchscreen may not be the perfect choice for scrolling, dragging or swiping items on screen—as compared with the multitouch capacitive type—remember that most of what you will be doing with this particular device’s screen may only involve tapping icons or commands on screen.

In this case, the new X3’s finger-friendly resistive screen is more than enough to satisfy users.

Apart from the touchscreen feature, the new X3’s design may also be another deal breaker: Its body—barely a centimeter thin (9.6mm deep)—is mostly finished in high grade plastic, which makes it so light at just 78 grams.