Nokia 5800 Cell Phone Review - Hardware

The 5800's touchscreen is responsive and has great resolution, though it isn't all that bright comparatively. Text entry goes quickly on its touchscreen with 2 hands, and markedly less so with 1 hand. The weak link are its buttons that just aren't great for a variety of reasons, and it's got one too many ports than necessary.

Text Words Per Minute (10.17)
For this test, we used the fastest text entry method available to enter a pre-defined set of text and time how long it takes. From this time, we calculate words per minute. The fastest text entry method on the 5800 was the full virtual QWERTY in landscape mode where the average time to enter the defined text set equated to 50.84 words per minute. This puts the 5800 just behind the Blackberry Storm and ahead of the T-Mobile G1 with its physical QWERTY and the HTC Touch Diamond. For more information on how we conduct this test see this article.

The full QWERTY used in this test  

While we found the virtual keyboard to be responsive to quick text input, it lacks any predictive entry or word completion for the full-screen QWERTY, making it harder to be accurate unless you are slow and careful at all times. Additionally, we found the keyboard to be structured a little oddly, which takes some getting used to. The punctuation characters to the right of the letter M move that row further to the left than is typical, so this is an area that can cause errors easily.

T9 and Auto Complete (5.0)
As previously mentioned, no predictive or auto-complete features are available when using the full-screen QWERTY, nor are any available when using the mini QWERTY that requires the use of the stylus or handwriting recognition. However, predictive text, also known as T9 entry, is available when using the virtual alphanumeric keypad.

One-Handed Typing (7.99)
For this test, we use only one hand to enter the same set of text as used in the Text Words Per Minute section above and calculate words per minute from the resulting average time. With just one hand to use, the easiest text entry method was the virtual alphanumeric keypad, and we managed 39.96 words per minute.

The mini-QWERTY and the virtual dial pad

Unsurprisingly, using one hand makes for slower text entry compared to using 2 hands, and the 5800 is very close to our comparison phones in this area. For more information on how we conduct this test see this article.

Keypad Backlighting (4.0)
The 5800 does not have a traditional keypad, but the Send, Menu, and End buttons are backlit and we consider this in this area. There are no separate controls for the backlight for these buttons as they operate in tandem with the display's backlight. The buttons are backlit evenly with a bluish-white light.

D-Pad/Joystick (0.0)
The 5800 does not have a D-pad or joystick.

Touch Screen (6.0)
The 5800 has a resistive touchscreen that is among one of the more responsive ones we've seen lately, though it does not match the responsiveness of the iPhone 3G's capacitive touchscreen, but is on par with the T-Mobile G1's capacitive touchscreen. As is common with resistive touchscreens, it has a plastic surface that has a little give. While this helps with its resilience, it's not as confidence-enhancing as a smooth glass touchscreen.

Jog Dial (0.0)
The 5800 does not have a jog dial.

Soft Buttons (0.0)
The 5800's soft buttons are all virtual, and we only score physical soft buttons in this section.

Volume Control (3.5)
The 5800's volume rocker is flush with side of the phone – our least favorite kind. While they offer good tactile feedback, the fact that they're mounted flush with the side of the phone makes it hard to press them. We'd much prefer buttons that are at least raised a little so they're easier to find by feel alone and to press.

Power and Standby (3.0)
The power button is on the top of the 5800 to the right of the charging connector. Like the volume rocker, it is also set flush with the phone and requires focus and effort to aim a fingernail to press firmly enough to activate. While we like power buttons that avoid accidental activation, the relative difficulty to activate the 5800's power button is taking it a bit too far. Dear Nokia, there's no need to make it really hard for us to turn the 5800 on or off accidentally. Please just make the button easier to press. We're adults and we can handle it.

If you press the power button briefly, it will bring up the Profile selection menu, making it easy to put the phone on silent mode if you're going into a meeting without requiring you to dig through the menus to find this setting.

Other Buttons (2.0)
The 5800 has a spring-action sliding lock/unlock switch on the right side. The switch itself rattles around a little but the spring that pops it back into place is firm enough to give you good tactile feedback. We're not a fan of sliding switches so much as they are usually oriented to be used when you're holding the phone in a certain way, making them harder to activate when the phone is facing the wrong way in your pocket or bag.

The camera button below the lock switch is slightly raised and has a lot of travel before it activates. It also requires firm pressure and we often found it easier to use the on-screen shutter button when capturing images to avoid moving the phone so much when pressing the physical button. This button could definitely use some work to make it easier to press.

Primary Screen Gross Resolution (9.5)
The 5800's screen has a resolution of 640 x 360 pixels, putting it second only to the HTC Touch Diamond in this area.

Primary Screen Pixels per Inch (11.94)
To calculate the number of pixels per inch, we divide the number of pixels along one side by the actual viewable area of the screen as measured with calipers, and the 5800 has a whopping 238.73 pixels per inch, the highest pixel density among all our comparison devices.

Screen Physical Size (7.8)
The 5800's specs claim it has a 3.2-inch screen measured diagonally, but our calipers tell us different – 3.12 inches, to be exact. While this screen size is nothing to sneeze at, the iPhone 3G and the Blackberry Storm both weigh in with larger screens here.

Screen Brightness (7.3)
We use a lux meter in a darkroom to determine the screen's output at its brightest setting, and the 5800 put out a relatively low 81 lumens here, the lowest of all of our comparison phones.

The displays light sensor settings

The display's backlight settings allow you to adjust the response to the ambient light sensor along a continuum with 5 levels and select a light time-out delay from 5 to 50 seconds, but there's no way to turn the sensor off and set the screen to fixed at a specific brightness level.

Screen Bright Light Performance (9.0)
With its high pixel density and color depth, combined with the default theme's high-contrast white-on-black color scheme, the 5800's interface was very easy to navigate in lighting conditions mimicking bright sunlight. The glare of the glossy screen takes a little work to get around, but after that, it's smooth sailing.

Color Depth (10.0)
The 5800's screen is capable of showing up to 16 million colors. While this sounds impressive, the human eye is only capable of distinguishing up to 10 million different colors, so much of this will be lost for most people. Regardless, this color depth earns the 5800 the highest score among our comparison phones in this area.

Secondary Screen (0.0)
The 5800 does not have a secondary screen.

Power & Data Ports (4.0)
The 5800 has separate ports for power and USB connectivity. It can be charged via USB as well and we're always disappointed to see a phone that needlessly has 2 separate ports like this when just one will suffice for both functions. Plus, proprietary connectors make us angry. Very angry. We really don't like the 5800's proprietary charging connector. Fortunately, micro USB is the standard used for the data connector, though the 5800 comes with one of the shortest USB cables we've seen come with a phone at just under 8 inches long.

Headphone Compatibility (8.0)
The 5800 has a standard 3.5mm headphone jack, making it easy for you to use any headphones you already have and offering you the widest selection when purchasing new ones to use with it. In stark contrast, the HTC Touch Diamond and the T-Mobile G1 don't even have a dedicated headphone port, requiring you to use an adapter to listen to music through the combined power/data port, and we much prefer the 5800's set-up in comparison.

Additionally, the 5800 possesses the A2DP Bluetooth profile to enable the use of stereo Bluetooth headphones so you can go completely cordless and still enjoy your tunes.

Internal Storage (1.0)
The 5800 has 81MB of internal storage, which is not much at all for media, particularly for a music-oriented device. Fortunately, there's an expansion slot, which we'll talk about next, and the 5800 comes with a sizable storage card in the box.

Expansion Slot & Format (7.5)
The 5800 has a microSD expansion slot that can take high-capacity cards up to 16GB. The 5800 comes with an 8GB card in the box, which is great considering the limited internal storage it has. The card slot is on the left side hidden behind a tethered plastic cover and it's easy enough to get to here, and this location is preferred over one behind the battery that takes some work to get to.

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