Sure, it looks good enough - but does it have the features to match? Sindre Lia grooves with Nokia's latest fashion phone, the stylish 7270.
In recent years, Nokia has released quite a few fashion phones featuring the more traditional candybar form factor. The Nokia 7270, however, stands out from the crowd as a stylish clamshell phone with red or black suede snap-on covers, and also sports a more user-friendly keypad than previous fashion phones produced by Nokia.
Sizeable yet stylish
The 7270 measures in at 88 x 46 x 22 mm and weighs a hefty 121 g - in other words it's sizeable yet comes across as stylish due to its nice curves. Featuring an external 12-bit display with a resolution of 95 x 65 pixels, information on incoming calls and messages is readily at hand in closed mode. In addition, the external display can also be used as a viewfinder for the integrated 0.3 MP digital camera.
When opening the 7270, ones attention is drawn to the internal 16-bit colour display with a resolution of 128 x 160 pixels - definitely one of the better displays we've seen in a Nokia phone, being both bright and crisp. The phone's flush keypad is also worth mentioning as one of Nokia's better implementations, although the 5-way navigational button is inexplicably small and feels cramped.
Surprisingly feature-rich
In spite of being a fashion phone, the Nokia 7270 offers an extensive list of features starting with GSM 900/1800/1900 MHz functionality, Push-to-Talk, HSCSD, GPRS Class 10, and even EDGE for high-speed data connectivity. Supporting WAP 2.0, the installed browser is capable of viewing XHTML pages and JPEG/PNG images. An infrared port enables PAN connectivity, while Bluetooth is unfortunately not available.
Messaging features such as SMS, MMS, and e-mail are also present, as is support for both polyphonics and MP3 ringtones. As with so many Nokia phones, the 7270 is equipped with a great FM radio, and surprisingly also features two great games: Chich Pinball and Disco.
Still pictures taken with the 0.3 MP digital camera in daylight are of average quality, and can be stored in the phone's 15 MB internal memory. The camera can also be used as a video recorder at a resolution of 128 x 96 pixels, and in both modes offers 4x digital zoom and fast camera mode switching courtesy of the navigational pad.
The Nokia 7270 is powered by the now well-known Series 40 platform, offering an intuitive menu system as well as great interaction with the keypad. The reception and voice quality of the Nokia 7270 are excellent, however the battery life is best described as mediocre with its 3 hours talk time and 5 days standby-time as opposed to Nokia's claim of 4 hours and 11 days, respectively.
Availability
The Nokia 7270 is at the time of writing available in several European markets, selling for approximately $500 USD without subscription.
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