When Nokia first launched its XpressMusic range, it was aimed firmly at music lovers, but it seems to be evolving into something bigger. In fact, the Nokia 5730 is a real social networking device, albeit a music-friendly one.

 

QWERTY keyboard and messaging

The Nokia 5730 XpressMusic features a full slide-out QWERTY keyboard, so is somewhat hefty – around the size of a Nokia N97, but without the touch-screen. It's a flat keyboard, which has been known to be tricky, but this one is spacious and comfortable to use.

This is a bonus for those who like a lot of texting and messaging from their mobiles. A Facebook icon on the home screen makes this phone's social networking intentions clear, although you don't get pushed alerts like you do with some phones. Oddly, while picture quality on Facebook is near perfect, the text can sometimes appear to be pixilated. You can also set up Push-email.

But while the keyboard excels, handling the rest of the handset proves a bit of a letdown. The keypad is very shiny but the glaze makes it slippery, and the D-pad is stiff and takes quite some pressure to use.

 

Nokia Ovi

Ovi, Nokia's download store, is a service that's beginning to find its feet. It offers users who sign up unlimited storage space, sync and backup, it displays status updates, knows where you are and what music you're listening to. It's fully integrated on the 5730, unsurprisingly. It's only available to Nokia users, but does the job nicely.

The Nokia 5730 also caters for the gamer with a host of demos to test from the N-Gage platform. However, we once again encountered some problems with the D-pad that often resulted in a wrong move. When you’re seconds away from your third consecutive Tetris piece, this can prove rather infuriating.

 

XpressMusic

The music function of the Nokia 5730 is present and correct, and puts in a fine performance. Dedicated keys make selecting and listening to your tunes a breeze, and a 3.5mm jack port means you can make the most of it by plugging in your own headphones. An 8GB memory card, which can simply be popped into the side of the phone without switching it off, is included in the deal so you can carry around a substantial music library wherever you go.

The camera is just three megapixels, with auto focus and an LED flash. It takes a long time to fire up, which could be frustrating when you want to snap something quickly. However, print quality is good. Other notable features include Wi-Fi connectivity and a mapping service.

 

The verdict

It’s worth noting that the Nokia 5730 XpressMusic wasn't designed to be a top-end phone. It's a reasonably priced, mid-range device, so we can't expect a to see a brilliant camera, for example. However, the 3x4 keypad and D-pad are frankly shoddy, and the size of the handset makes the user experience poor. It’s a shame to see a phone with such potential let down by bad hardware, especially from Nokia.