Nokia 5230 is an affordable touchscreen phone targeted at emerging markets. Boasting of features like 3G, GPS navigation, maps, and handwriting recognition at a pocket friendly price, the Nokia 5230 is arguably the best value for money touchscreen smartphone in the market today. With Nokia 5230, Nokia has brought touchscreen phones within the reach of millions of new consumers.
A value for money Touchscreen Smartphone
The top selling point of the Nokia 5230 is its touchscreen feature combined with a rich blend of some of the best mobile communications features at a bargain price. Nokia 5230 features a quality 3.2-inch TFT touchscreen display offering a resolution of 360 x 640 pixels and a colour depth of 16 million, similar to the touchscreen on Nokia X6. Nokia 5230 comes with handwriting recognition, allowing you to write notes on its resistive touchscreen using an included plectrum stylus.
OS, Software and Hardware
Nokia 5230 offers fast performance featuring a 434MHz ARM 11 processor. Nokia 5230 is a value for money smartphone featuring the Symbian S60 OS 5th edition. It features multitasking, however running many apps simultaneously will slow performance. Three to four apps runs okay simultenously on the Nokia 5230. Pressing and holding the menu key (centre key) will reveal open apps.
Nokia 5230 has a good user interface. You can place multiple widgets on your home screen. You can easily customise your home screen by downloading Apps, games, and videos at Ovi store for your Nokia 5230 and placing them on your home screen for easy access. Nokia 5230 comes with a Facebook app, making it easy to connect to friends in the world most popular social networking site. Nokia 5230 also features apps like YouTube, MySpace, Hi5, and Amazon.
Network, Data, and Internet browsing
Nokia 5230 is a 3G smartphone supporting high-speed data on HSDPA/UMTS. Outside 3G coverage Nokia 5230 can access telecoms services on GSM with data services on GPRS and EDGE. The built-in browser is compatible with WAP 2.0/XHTML/HTML enabling you to browse WAP pages and websites tailored for mobile browsing as well as full websites. The downside of the Nokia 5230, is its lack of Wi-Fi support, but this is understandable considering the price.
Nokia 5230 supports short-range wireless connectivity via Bluetooth 2.1 with A2DP. You can transfer files from/to your computer wirelesly via Bluetooth as well as share content wirelessly with other Bluetooth enabled devices. With Bluetooth, you can connect your computer to the internet using Nokia 5230 as a wireless modem. USB 2.0 interface is provided for Nokia 5230 and with it you can achieve the same as with Bluetooth but in a wired domain. USB offers short-range connectivity via a USB cable.
A 2.0 megapixels camera
Another downside of the Nokia 5230 is its camera, a mere 2.0 Megapixels camera. The camera also lacks autofocus and Flash. One would expect a touchscreen phone with the sort of features that the Nokia 5230 boasts of, to come with a better camera. However, considering the price the Nokia 5230 is going for, this might be a trade-off. The camera offers video recording.
Lifetime free navigation
Nokia 5230 has a built-in GPS receiver with A-GPS and Nokia maps 2.0 Touch, enabling mobile navigation. The Touchscreen interface makes navigating maps easier. If Nokia navigation service is available in your country, you can get voice guided turn-by-turn directions to any address and traffic information on your Nokia 5230, all free. Maps for over 200 countries are available on Nokia Ovi maps, but not all are navigable. Nigeria is navigable on Nokia maps.
Media and Storage
Nokia 5230 delivers high quality stereo audio but to enjoy stereo audio, you will have to listen in via the 3.5mm audio jack, the external speaker offers only mono audio and hence the quality of audio when listening through the external speakers is poor. Nokia music player supports MP3, WAV, eAAC+, and WMA while the video player supports MP4, H.263, H.264, and WMV. Nokia 5230 features stereo FM with RDS. With a touchscreen, the Nokia 5230 supports exciting touch based games.
Download contents like games, and apps at the Nokia Ovi Store to keep you entertained. Nokia 5230 is also enabled to download music, ringtones, wallpapers, and pictures. In Nigeria, Nokia 5230 comes with 2GB memory card, but the Nokia 5230 supports up to 16GB memory card.
Buy Memory card for your Nokia 5230.
At around N24,000, Nokia 5230 is one of the best value for money touchscreen phone in the market. If you have been priced out of the 3G GPS navigation smartphones segment, the Nokia 5230 might just be for you.
Other features and specifications of Nokia 5230 that might interest you are:
- Handwriting recognition
- ARM 11 434MHz CPU
- 128 MB of RAM
- 3.5mm audio jack
- 70 MB internal memory
- GSM Quad-band (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)
- 3G/3.5G (UMTS/HSDPA)
- Voice memo/dial
- Predictive texting T9
- SMS/MMS
- email/push email/IM
- Music player (mp3, AAC, eAAC, eAAC+, WMA)
- Video player (Mpeg4, WMA, 3GP)
- Stereo FM Radio with RDS
- Photo editor
- Flash Lite 3.0 preloaded
- Java MIDP 2.1
- WAP 2.0/XHTML/HTML
- Symbian OS V9.4 S60 5th edition
- Battery capacity: 1320 mAh
- Standby: 432 hours
- Talktime: 4.5 hours (3G)
- Music play: 33 hours
Nokia 5230 S60 Smartphones are available at all Nokia authorised dealer shops throughout Nigeria. The major advantage of buying your Nokia mobile phones and other Nokia accessories and enhancements from an authorized Nokia dealer is that you are guaranteed to buy a genuine Nokia product. You also get a one-year warranty on any product you buy, plus good after sales services.
For more information on Nokia dealers, stores, sales outlets and shops in Nigeria, visit our Nokia dealer page.
