This evening was the first time I was able to sit down with the E61 and fool around with it. I’ve pretty much just gone through some of the basics in terms of getting the applications I like installed on there, and trying out one or two new function. For a general overview of the device I recommend checking out the review at MobileBurn. I’m gonna cover more of the geek end of things. What do I mean by the geek end? My first app install on the E61 was an SSH client. Not exactly the tool most people would put first in their required mobile services. Lets start off with the software I’ve put on so far:
- Putty – an SSH client for Symbian devices. I used this on my other S60 phones, but generally it’s been a pretty bad experience. Better than nothing when you’re in a pinch, but only just better. One of the things I really liked about the Treo 650 was that the SSH client for that kicked ass in comparison. However Putty for S60 now rivals that implementation.
- Python – Python for S60 is running on 3rd edition devices, and it’s definitely working on the E61. However it seems like the feature I used the most before, being able to take script files from online and quickly send them over to your phone to run, is no longer supported. The Readme files for the release are written by someone intimately familiar with the internal workings of the new Series60 security model, and explaining why installed scripts need to be signed. At least that’s what I think it’s saying. That really blows, cause I’m not familiar with the security model and I really don’t give a shit about it. I want to do things with my phone. My guess is that most people using Python on S60 don’t really care about the security model as well. That’s what made the port interesting, it allowed folks to hack without having to deal with the painful ordeal that is Symbian development. Step in the wrong direction on this one, hopefully someone finds a way to clear it up. You can install your own scripts, you just have to do a little dance to get them transferred over.
- AgileMessenger – works on the E61, and the app itself rocks when combined with the full keyboard. However be aware that there is a bug with the labeling of the softkeys within the app. The label for the left key shows up over the right key instead, and the label for the right key shows up in the upper left hand corner of the screen. Very confusing, and it can make the app appear to fail if you don’t know that the bug is there. It does work however, besides the obvious usability problem, the bug doesn’t seen to affect anything else.
- Podcasting – the free application provided by Nokia. The Wifi makes downloading audio directly from the device much more realistic. I think this is a new app that I’m going to start getting a lot of use out of. The coolest bit? It seems to have scheduling and preferences config that I can use to tell it to download automatically overnight if it sees my home access point. Very cool! The second coolest bit? The service endpoint for the built in search seems to be configurable.
- Mobile Google Maps – not the (although I do also have that installed), this version has support for GPS. It works with my Delorme BlueLogger bluetooth GPS unit, but the setup is a bit odd. Check out the FAQ at the Mobile Google Maps site. You have to pair your bluetooth GPS with your phone, and then tell the app to use ‘internal’ GPS intead. This did work for me, and led me to play with some of the built in location tools that the E61 apparently ships with.
- Y-Browser – normally I use FExplorer, but that doesn’t have a 3rd edition port yet. Y-Browser gets the job done though. It’s what I used while poking around in the Python stuff.
- EEMame – because games are a universal language, and no one is impressed with any bit of technology normally until they see a game being played on it. Nothing screams geek like emulating classic arcade machinies and playing the original ROMs, so I figured my phone should be able to do it. I should also download Lumines mobile and give that a try.
The device certainly isn’t perfect yet. What’s some of the rough edges?
- The responsiveness is a bit poor. Sometimes I find myself wondering if the device has hung as it spins away doing something. It actually seems to be more UI update issues than base operating system slowness. I’ve done a few downloads in the browser where apparently the request had hung at 50%, but it had really downloaded the rest of the file without updating the UI.
- The Wifi support seems to be great. I like the way the network handling has integrated the new interface type. However support for WPA seems to be a bit off. I run WPA on my home network and I’ve had to request a connection a few times more than once. I’ll get the “select an access point dialog”, I choose my home network and the device kicks back with a WPA authentication error almost immediately. Try to connect again and it goes through.
- Access point groups aren’t consistently used. The device includes support for access point groups, which are a series of access points to be tried in some predetermined order. The purpose is to allow you to define a hunt order for the different access types. “Use this wifi network if you can find it, and then this wifi network if you can find it, and finally call back on cellular if you can’t find either. Fantastic! However it seems like the access point groups only appear in the default access point selection list for some apps. Others simply don’t display them to choose from. For some reason the web browser is one of them, so I have to choose my access point explicitly every time I start up the browser.
- Browser crashes. Generally the browser seems to be quick and slick. The minimap I could either take or leave, doesn’t really do all that much for me. However, the history function includes a small snapshot of the pages to flip through as you choose where to go in your history list. That I think really rocks and helps me a lot. However, on the other hand, I’ve gotten the browser to crash on me a few times. Seemingly more likely to happen when downloading something using the browser than while browsing with it. But still very very annoying.
I would definitely recommend getting a memory card to go along with this. The wifi makes that storage much easier to fill. I live over by a Fry’s, so I just ran out and got a miniSD card this afternoon. But if you aren’t in the middle of tech central and you’re picking up an E61, might as well add the memory card right off the bat if you don’t have one. I was amazed to see that 2 gig minisd cards are under $90. Yet still another memory format I have to get damnit! At least this one is cheap in the higher capacities. I think I paid $90 for my 1 gig dual voltage rsmmc just a few months ago.
I still have a few more apps to test out and play around with. And I haven’t even really experimented too much with the built in functions. There’s a spreadsheet and some kind of presentation software on this this by default! I also picked up the trial of Wayfinder to give that a try. $99 is a lot to spend on maps though, and I might be able to get what I need out of Mobile Google Maps for now. Anyone else with an E61 out there find some particularly interesting stuff?
Sorry, I forgot to give you a list the other day! There’s also the Nokia Search App, the S60 Internet Radio App (an OSS project from Nokia as well), C2Doom, Opera 9 for S60 (not-free), and there’s a few cleaner themes floating out there as well. WidSets is a Java app, but looks really nice on the big screen, and works great over WiFi (not that any of the WidSet widgets are useful, but it’s nice eye-candy to show off…).
The intermittant hanging is weird, I have to say. Sometimes I click the “New Text Message” shortcut I put in the Active Standby list, and I have to wait a full 20 seconds to begin typing. That’s annoying. The other annoying thing is the inability to turn off the quick access key to the voice recorder. So instead of taking pictures of the inside of my pocket as I did with the N70 (when the too-easy-to-slide-open back would open and start the camera in my pocket), I’m not taking recordings of myself at random times…
The calendar is great though and putty rules… I’m on the fence about Wayfinder as well, but I have to say it works *really* well and I’ve already used it once “in the real world” with great results.
Notice the missing “Favorites/GoTo” annoyingly useless app? woohoo! But then Nokia also got rid of the To-Do list… weird!
In summary though, it’s a killer phone.
-Russ
I haven’t tried out widsets, I’ll have to muck around with that. I tried out the internet radio thinig, but I just don’t see much use for it for me. The podcasting app however is a definite winner.
I tried out the mobile google maps app on the road this morning and it worked out pretty well. Depends what your use case is I’m sure. Given that I don’t have a mounting kit for the phone I’ll probably be using the GPS and maps to unlose myself when I get turned around, not use it for active navigation. So that might be good enough for now. I just can’t bring myself to pay $100 for some software when I know that a significant percentage of that will end up going to Teleatlas.
I do miss WirelessIRC in general. The #mobitopians turned me on to jmirc, an IRC midlet that seems to work pretty well. Would be nice to get a little hackery going for these keyboard devices and evolve some of these open source efforts.
Any luck with the E61′s IMAP support? I bought an E61 (on Amazon) only to have it fail to keep an IMAP IDLE connection open to my hosted mail server (which support IMAP IDLE). Over several days of fiddling it only worked relaibly for short periods.
Shortly after, I replaced it with a [shiver] Treo. Chattermail works the way I expected the E61 Mail to work — seemlessly and (mostly) flawlessly.
The E61 is a beautiful device – looking forward to more reports on your findings.
Cheers,
-I-
Unfortunately my experience with the email functionality in general in the built in messenger has been pretty poor. I’m gonna post some of the details, but I’ve found pretty much the same thing. Idle support seems to be horrible, and the overall implementation prone to failure even when sitting still using a consist connection. Downright unusable while moving around. Fortunately I’m not too heavy of an email user, or this would be a deal breaker for me. I can’t see how this could be a good device for “corporate users” given that.
I’ve had my E61 for 2 months now. Awesome device, I can live with it not being “perfect”. I manage a department which operates whithin 4 plants and a remote location, I supervise several people. Text messages keeps the workflow smoother. I am not much of a push email fan, being busy with multiple tasks, which can change from hour to hour, I check email as often as I need to. I have AOL and Gmail setup, one IMAP the other POP. Both work without major glitches. Downloading and opening attachments works fine.
I upload our production and shipping schedules, an Excel workbook and am able to have access to the most relevant info. I need daily. QuickOffice does a great job. I can also synchronize my corporate email account, though I have chosen to postpone fulltime use of it. AquaCalendar keeps my schedule straight and my tasks prioritized. I can better manage by keeping on top of my information flow.
I am very satisfied with the E61. No, it’s not perfect but as close as it gets today.
Hey Manny, thanks for the comments. I agree, not perfect, but I’m certainly getting a lot more utility out of this device than I did out of my 6680 or my Treo. I’m kinda curious how a Sidekick 3 would work out. I think it would be great for messaging, but much poorer on the application side. For me the apps are necessary because I live and work online. But for many people I suspect the SK3 would be a good option.
I’ve just made some attempt to play with Google “Search” functionalities, with my J2memap program. Not really the finishing touch of GoogleMap, but cool anyway:
http://blog.landspurg.net/navigation-on-mobile-for-free-nearly
and
http://j2memap.landspurg.net
(be sure to download the beta version, v09.06 or higher)
To respond to some of the other people who commented :
1- We found the IMAP idle support to be unusable, but after a firmware upgrade it is much more stable.
2- The To Do functionality is now buried within the calendar. It’s not a bad place for it to be. Go into the calendar app and try “New –> ToDo”.
Overall an excellent device. I find that the Access Point Groups don’t work very well. My mail app keeps defaulting back to my GSM access point even though I didn’t change it. Very frustrating and confusing. It works well when you choose one access point or choose it on the fly.
Hey Paul, how did you get a firmware update done? Take the device into a shop to get it flashed? I’m in the US.. so I’m kinda shit outta luck with respect to getting firmware updated. Unless Nokia Research down in Mountain View is willing to do it for me.
As of this week the E61′s included on the Nokia Software Updater (check the UK or European region site), so if you’re in the US you could try that.
With the N73 calender you can go trough the different views (month, week,day) and to-do list by pressing the * key after each view.
Congrats for the new E61!
Nice, great tip Henrikki! I use calendar very frequently. Unfortuantely on the E61 the shortcut keys now require blue function key + ‘u’ in order to get the *. But still, more convenient than going into the menu sometimes. Hope they do something to address the “shortcuts” needing two hands to activate issue in general.
What about some TCP/IP utilities for the S60 3rd edition? At least I need to be able to ping from this phone, take a look at the IP interfaces, ftp client would be nice, and so on…
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pls hw were can i get free softwares for my new nokia e61. pls if you knw kindly reply my post i will really apreciate it. thanks.
gbemi