GLOBAL – Many of us like listening to music on our mobiles, and it’s no surprise with access to services like Nokia Music Store and the much-loved Comes With Music. But to get the most from your mobile music listening you need the right hardware too. Fortunately, Nokia has you covered with some fantastic entertainment-focused handsets for any budget. We’ve raided the Almanac to bring you our three favourite Nokia music phones. Forget throwaway earphones and frustrating interfaces – these are music thoroughbreds.
Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
5800 XpressMusic snapshot: 3.2-inch resistive touchscreen / 109g / Symbian S60 5th Edition / 8GB microSD card included / stereo FM radio / Comes With Music / 35 hours music playback
No Nokia handset has done more to advertise Comes With Music than the 5800. As Nokia’s first ever touchscreen phone it was always going to grab the attention, but tacking on CWM made it a serious multimedia powerhouse.
In the box is an 8GB memory card so you can get cracking on downloading all your favourite tunes straight away, and with features like built-in GPS, Wi-Fi and a 3.2-megapixel camera that shoots video too, this is no one-trick pony.
The 5800 has been widely praised for its audio quality, even when played through the on-board stereo speakers, and it remains one of the best music phones around bar none.
Nokia X6
X6 snapshot: 3.2-inch capacitive touchscreen / 122g / Symbian S60 5th Edition / 32GB onboard storage / stereo FM radio / Comes With Music / 35 hours music playback
The first phone in Nokia’s recently introduced X-Series is a music-lover’s dream from start to finish, and throws in plenty of style for good measure too.
The wow factor comes courtesy of a massive 32GB of on-board storage – so no fiddling about with microscopic memory cards – and a finger-friendly capacitive touchscreen so you don’t have to keep hunting around for that stylus.
Its all-round spec makes the X6 an ideal mobile companion whatever your needs are, but its first love is music. And thanks to great built-in speakers, a top-notch media player with bags of settings and of course the feast of tunes offered up by Comes With Music, it more than delivers.
Nokia 5630 XpressMusic
5630 XpressMusic snapshot: 2.2in TFT / 83g / Symbian S60 3rd Edition / 4GB microSD card included / stereo FM radio / Comes With Music / 25 hours music playback
All the important audio bits are present and correct, from CWM to some seriously good sound quality and a 4GB memory card to store all your favourite tunes.
You don’t get a touchscreen, but the flipside is a lower profile and a feather-light weight of just 83g. Despite that, the 5630 is still good for a full 25 hours of music playback before you’ll need to plug it in for a recharge.
Music is what it does best, but the 5630’s eco credentials also deserve a mention: intelligent power-saving charging, a carbon footprint calculator and an 80 per cent recyclable body all help the 5630 do its bit for the planet.