Yesterday Nokia announced the E52 to relatively little fanfare (with apologies to the people in Warsaw at the event). It’s an ultra-slim candybar unit with a huge battery (1500mAh - the same as the E71 / E63 and even the flagship N97) - effectively it’s the same as the E55 without the Blackberry-esque 20 key keyboard. So what?
Well, for a start, as Vikki commented in her video diary the materials and construction of Nokia’s E-series units has always been excellent and is improving still - plenty of consumers will love it for that alone. But more importantly, it gives enterprise users one less reason to stick with their Blackberry or their Treo. Certainly if your employer is only interested in giving you a phone for calling there are still much cheaper (and nastier options) including plenty of other Nokias. But if you want to sync e-mail, contacts and diary to an Exchange server or if you want to run mapping apps or use mobile web and particularly if you want security functions that encrypt the memory and offer ‘remote kill’ options on lost handsets, then this fills out the range brilliantly. In choosing Nokia businesses can offer their staff a choice of devices - a familiar ‘phone’ or a slim QWERTY device like the E71 or even the E75 which make the transition between the two.
There’s certainly still a few gaps in the range - touch devices and better imaging are surely on their way as must be more budget options such as the E63 - and S60 software is a mixed bag, but this is an increasingly complete and attractive range.
There is a hands-on video from the Nokia Conversations team available on YouTube [mobile-friendly link]