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| Nokia 9290 Communicator | |
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A popular trend in technology today is an all-in-one personal digital assistant (PDA), pager and cell phone. Several of these devices are becoming available and one of the more unique ones is the Nokia 9290 Communicator. The 9290 looks like a big brick of a cell phone — nothing like the glamorous and tiny flip-phones of today. First, you will notice the front of the phone doesn’t have a speaker or microphone. Both of these are on the back of the unit, which means you dial the phone on one side, then talk and listen on the other side. This took a little getting used to and was slightly cumbersome. I prefer using the flip-style Handspring Treo or the front-facing T-Mobile Pocket PC Phone Edition. The second surprise is a pleasant one — holding the device length-wise, you open the phone to reveal a color screen and a full-size keyboard. For a little screen, the 9290 packs a spectacular punch. It measures 4.3-inches long by 1.4-inches tall with a 640-by-200 resolution. It also supports 4,096 colors, which means you will be happy with just about everything you view — documents, pictures or videos. Below the screen, there is a full QWERTY keyboard with a 12mm center-to-center key spacing. Conventional desktops have 19mm key spacing, while thumb keyboards usually offer 7mm. The Nokia 9290’s keyboard is versatile — I could hold the phone in both hands and type with my thumbs (which sometimes involved a stretch), or I could place the phone on a flat surface and peck. The normal touch-typing method is not possible, but I felt the keyboard was well-designed for the product. The 9290 Communicator also features a four-way “rocker-pad” in the lower right-hand corner of the keyboard. This rocker pad is your primary navigational instrument. I found it worked well, but a touch screen would be much faster. A great screen and functional keyboard are worth nothing without good software. Fortunately, the 9290 doesn’t disappoint. Rather than choosing between Microsoft’s Pocket PC software or Palm’s OS, Nokia decided to load the 9290 Communicator with the Symbian OS. While this might sound foreign, the Symbian OS has been around for a while and lends itself to a friendly and familiar computing environment. On the other hand, Palm and Pocket PC dominate the PDA market so finding software and information for the Symbian OS will be challenging at times. The 9290 Communicator provides all the software you would expect to find on a respectable PDA. You can access your contacts, calculator, calendar/appointments, notes and even some games. I found all of these programs easy to use and in some cases, superior to their counterparts on Palm Handheld Computers and Pocket PCs. The 9290 also offers simple and generic office applications that are compatible with Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint files. Where the 9290 really starts to shine is when you get into the messaging and Internet-related applications. As opposed to most cell phones, the 9290 offers access to the Internet through both wireless application protocol and the Web. This is exciting because you can actually access full Web pages through the phone. The excitement of doing this, however, is almost immediately compromised by the 9290’s slow connection speed. Unfortunately, Nokia programmed the 9290 to work on the slower global system for mobile communications (GSM) and didn’t grant the ability to upgrade the unit to the faster general packet radio service (GPRS) standard. You might get a little better coverage with the GSM standard, but you will probably end up getting frustrated as you wait several minutes for a Web page to download. On the messaging side, the 9290 fares a lot better. First, you have fully functional e-mail. I was able to quickly set up a Post Office Protocol 3 e-mail account on the phone and received messages at an adequate speed. I also found the e-mail program user-friendly in its simplicity. In addition to e-mail, the 9290 supports Short Message Service (SMS), which means you can send text messages to other mobile phones. Last but not least, the 9290 includes a fax modem in the network, which means you can send and receive faxes on the phone. I found this feature impressive. The 9290 Communicator has a few surprises. While you are on a call, you can open up the phone, which immediately turns on the speakerphone. You can continue your conversation through the speakerphone while you take notes on the keyboard. I really liked this feature since I am always scrounging around for a pen and paper to take notes. In order to exchange information between the 9290 and your PC, you will need to install the “PC Suite” software. I found this software mediocre but useful nonetheless. The 9290 also will handle Flash and Real Audio files. While the Nokia 9290 Communicator is not perfect, it’s certainly a brilliant step in the direction of the future of PDA and cell phone convergence. |
Nokia (888) 256-2098 www.nokiausa.com/ communicator Price: $599 Reviewed by Brett Burney, a legal
practice support coordinator at Thompson Hine in Cleveland. You can e-mail
him at Brett.Burney@ PROS CONS VERDICT |
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