Design
When we reviewed the 5310 XpressMusic we praised Nokia for the phone's slim profile and the fact that it looks the part of a rock 'n' roll handset with its piano black finish and metallic red racing strip. Well, the 5610 is obviously going to the same party with a similar colour palette at work, but the slider form isn't as trim or slinky as its "little brother"; in fact, at 17mm the 5610 is nearly twice as thick.
On the surface the 5610 is a standard slider design. The top half of the phone features call buttons, selection buttons and a four-way directional key for menu navigation and music controls. Under the slider is a well-spaced numeric keypad which we found easy to use for calls and messaging. Below the screen Nokia have added a spring-loaded switch for fast access to the music player and FM radio. This is a really handy tool and it would have been great to see it used to access more menu features, maybe cycling through all the applications displayed on the standby menu.
Another feature we praised when reviewing the 5310 XpressMusic was the inclusion of a 3.5mm headphone jack on the top of the handset, used for attaching your favourite headphones rather than having to use the bundled set. Bafflingly, Nokia have chosen to ditch the 3.5mm jack and replace it with a 2.5mm port on the 5610. We're guessing it has something to do with available space inside the phone, as the 5610 does have a few extra bells and whistles, and of course, you can buy an adaptor to use your headphones with the smaller inputs, but that's extra money we'd prefer not to have to spend.
Features
The obvious drawcard for Nokia's XpressMusic range is the music player, but in truth, the music player isn't really much to write home about. It works well enough, the music sounds loud and clear -- though noticeably louder and clearer through headphones other than the low-quality stereo headset bundled with the handset -- and the music player supports album art, but, the XpressMusic player lacks the wow factor of the competition. The music player menu is practical enough, but it's also unattractive and unintuitive so that you feel as if you're always drilling in and out of drab looking lists. It just doesn't inspire use in the same way as the menus on the Sony Ericsson Walkman players do.
Likewise, the 3.2-megapixel camera on the back of the 5610 is practical but unexceptional. The specs look good, including auto-focus and LED flash, however, the test pictures we took, while colourful, were often out of focus, particularly when trying to focus on a subject. Landscape pics look great, and the pictures of people or objects are more than adequate for MMS and blogging online, just don't trust it to capture your precious memories.
Unlike the 5310, the 5610 is thankfully a 3G phone. To make best use of the faster data speed Nokia have included a shortcut to their Download! application, linking you to mobile content like ringtones, music and video games, some of which is free through Nokia, or available to buy through third party vendors. This isn't exactly a selling point but we did manage to snag a few cool new games to play on the bus.
The obvious oversight, as with the 5310, is the lack of substantial internal memory for storing music and photos. The 5610 will ship with a 1GB microSD card in the sales kit, and can accept microSD memory cards up to 4GB, but there's no doubt a dedicated music phone needs internal storage. We saw this implemented in Nokia's N81 8GB model and we definitely want to see more of it with future XpressMusic releases.
Performance
The 5610's all-round performance is excellent. The menus are fast and responsive and there is almost no lag when opening applications. We saw how bad performance can seriously impair our opinion of a product when we reviewed Sony Ericsson's W960 -- which is, granted, a more feature-heavy smartphone.
Part of this speed can be credited to an absence of multitasking, as in, applications close when you exit them rather than remaining open in the background in case you want to return to them quickly. This may be seen as a negative by some, particularly people wanting to keep Web pages open in the browser for example, but if the price of multitasking is a serious reduction in performance then we think this would be too great a sacrifice.
As a mobile phone the 5610 is as good as we expect from a Nokia phone. Call reception is good, messaging is easy and there's the common addition of calendar and clock to flesh out the functionality of the phone. Battery life is about average; we saw four days between charges with light use, and we charged every second day when using the music player for a few hours each day.
Overall
The 5610 XpressMusic had us asking ourselves: what is the price of convergence? For the RRP of AU$599 you could buy an MP3 music player and a basic phone and you'd still be ahead AU$200. Is the fact that the two are crammed together worth the extra money?
In a mobile phone market flooded with figures and features, the 5610 just doesn't stand out. It's a decent phone and an average music player. It's also an average camera phone, for that matter. If there had been at least 4GB of internal memory then we'd start to see value for money, but as it stands, we think there are better options available.
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DON
01/09/2008, 07:36 AM
rating
9/10
A beautiful user friendly musical phone by nokia.
The hanging problem solves with the 6.6v software.
Pros: 3g
2.2" 16.7m color bright screen
attractive color combinations
class slider technology
clear and crispy music quality
loud headset
fast user friendly s40 5th ui
auto focus 3.2 mp camera with Dual led flash
640x480 video res
3.5 mm adapter
big Dpad.
COOL themes
enough memory support
fast usb transfer
video call secondary camera
Cons: Hungry for dust and finger prints
though camera is great it is not carl zeiss lens
opening back cover not easy
volume key hard
no deficited music control key in phone or in headphone
mono loudspeaker
no wifi
cant use flash and night mode together
no flash in video
no macro mode
poor web browser
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JB
19/07/2008, 02:13 PM
rating
8/10
Pretty good phone.
Pros: good slide, good camera, good music quality
Cons: Battery life poor, takes a long time to find songs, back hard to take off
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squidgy
19/07/2008, 12:11 PM
rating
1/10
do not get this phone! like seriously, it starts falling apart and the music quality ain't that great... better off getting an s60 phone.
Pros: camera, look and feel, brag about it
Cons: too expensive, music quality, falls apart(music slider key), s40, they released 5610 too early(they should have spent more time on it)
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Izhar
10/07/2008, 04:49 PM
rating
1/10
I have purchase Nokia-5610 .After one month I have face problam in its navigation Key, There is also problem with the slider it got broke and pieces fall down. The phone gets restarted automatically. battery and replacing it.
The quality of music is not very good.
Pros: Bad Choice
Cons: China Mobile quilty is more high then Nokia 5610, very very bad mobile No worranty i have lost my money
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Abhi
26/06/2008, 03:45 PM
rating
9/10
A user friendly phone
Pros: Muzik and Nokia : this is an unbeatable combination
Cons: Battery case is a big drawback , but it can be rectified in the later releases
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Manjunath
25/06/2008, 06:36 PM
rating
2/10
Look wise is good, its nearly 45 days i bought the phone, There is a problem with the slider it got broke and pieces fall down. The phone gets restarted automatically, and gets hung up nothing can be done except removing the battery and replacing it.
The quality of music is not very good.
But still people can buy who have more money to spend on phones so that they can go for next phone.
Cons: Please read as many reivew comments as possible before buying any phone.
I know 4 people who are using this phone all facing the same problem.
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adibha59007
19/06/2008, 02:19 AM
rating
9/10
this phone is a great phone
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nokia 5500 sport
11/06/2008, 04:34 PM
rating
7/10
I like this mobile phone. Its performance is excellent. In all express music series i like most 5610 because it is unique than other in performance and features.
Pros: Very light.
Large screen.
Small stylish design.
Gorgeous color.
Cons: Camera stills only average in quality.
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jeetu bhatia
17/05/2008, 11:24 AM
rating
7/10
i like this mobile
Pros: want this mobile
Cons: what's the rate
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jeth
13/05/2008, 11:52 PM
rating
8/10
This phone is great for music lovers and just enjoy casual snap shots.
Pros: lightweight and good camera. Not as pricy as the heavily featured phone but very reliable. All you need for everyday use is there like mp3/radio player when travelling around, camera phone and making/receiving call,text etc.
Cons: The battery doesn't last as long as I expected specially when using a lot of video play and phone call. The battery could be replaced with longer lasting ones.
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