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Nokia E7 versus Nokia N900 review: How the keyboards compare (Photo Heavy)
By Mike Browne on April 4,
 2011 at 00:00,

The Nokia E7 is very much the QWERTY smartphone of the moment but it wasn’t so long ago that high-end users had the same feelings for the Nokia N900. Sure they use different platforms but we were wondering if the Nokia E7 may the perfect upgrade for Nokia N900 users? Find out as we put the two devices side-by-side to check out their keyboard chops.

The Nokia E7 and Nokia N900 both have distinctive user types in mind, the Nokia E7 is very much about the business, while the Nokia N900 user is more likely to be a developer or obsessive modder. However, what they have in common is that QWERTY keyboard feeling that simply makes the job in hand easier to cover off.

Nokia E7 QWERTY Genius

The Nokia E7 is built around the Symbian^3 operating system and comes with some pretty amazing tech features. The 4-inch screen is the largest such touchscreen Nokia has released to-date. The AMOLED screen also comes with a ClearBlack Display (CBD) coating so images look sharp and bright no matter whether you’re indoors or out.

The unibody design is stylish and sleek and Nokia has gone to great lengths to make it as slim as possible. Just check out the photos below if proof were needed of the advances in body design. The QWERTY keyboard opens on a neat little hinge and the screen sits at 45 degrees, the natural angle for viewing and typing. Check out our Nokia E7 review

Nokia N900 Maemo Master

By contrast the Nokia N900 is powered by the open-source Linux Maemo platform that allows developers and app builders to easily tap into Qt and build all many of amazing apps for the device. The 3.5-inch screen has a 800 x 480-pixel display, which makes it great for viewing webpages.

The Nokia N900 may be smaller than the Nokia E7 but it’s heavier and squatter, weighing as it does some 181g. It’s also chubby measuring 19.5mm at its thickest compared to the 13.6mm of the Nokia E7. The big difference in design is that the QWERTY keyboard slides out from behind the screen so you’re facing straight-on to the keyboard and the screen at the same. We personally prefer the more ergonomic version found on the Nokia E7. Check out our Nokia N900 review

Have a look at the Nokia E7 and Nokia N900 side-by-side in our photo gallery below and let us know which one you prefer. We have a sneaky feeling that the Nokia E7 will be the device you want to upgrade to after your Nokia N900.

Check out our Nokia E7 versus Nokia N900 photo gallery:

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Tags: E7 Maemo N900 Nokia Nokia E7 Nokia N900 QWERTY Symbian^3
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  • Andrew

    Come on, Mikey. Do your job! How about four wider spaced rows versus three? What is the E7 keyboard like to type with compared to the N900? How does the different keyboard layout compare? E.g. is the apostrophe easier to use when typing? (you have to use a shift key on the N900) How easy is it to use keyboard shortcuts like Ctrl C & Ctrl V for copy and paste on the E7 compared to the N900?

    By the way, from the state of that home screen on your N900, it looks like it has never been used. Not even a widget on the desktop! Considering how massively the N900 can be modded, I’d have thought you guys would have at least dipped your toes. With all the customisation that’s out there, my chunky little N900 is better now than ever. There’s simply nothing on the market which can replace it right now.

    I bought my wife an N8 to replace her old 5800 last autumn. Whilst there are plenty of fripperous mini-programs and games appearing for her phone, there haven’t been any hardcore hacking type mods and widgets. For example, one of the most useful things I’ve been able to do with my N900 is hack the FM transmitter to bang out lower frequencies so I can tune in between 87.5 and 87.9 FM in the car and drive for hundreds of miles without needing to retune. And then some clever dude builds a little widget to control the FM transmitter which looks just like the media player widget so they look really nice sat beside each other on my ‘Driving’ homescreen… Not to mention AwOken’s mega-cool icon pack…

    Why isn’t a community growing around Symbian 3 to start doing the kind of things with the N8 and E7 that we can do with our much loved chunky old N900′s?

  • Mikey Bee

    @Andrew. You got me, that isn’t my N900 – I had it shipped in so you guys could see what they looked like side-by-side. We’ll be covering off your comments when we get around to our Nokia E7 keyboard review, this was just a chance for people to see how it stacks up against the devices you’re already using and clearly enjoying!

    BTW: The E7 has a dedicated apostrophe key (second row next to the Return key), if that helps :)

  • Andrew

    Thanks Mikey. I really wanted to get my wife the E7 for the keyboard, but that was six months ago now – I don’t think she would have waited all this time or put up with delay excuses month after month. She’s getting used to the virtual keyboard at last. She didn’t do much with the 5800 because she didn’t have a data contract back then. No Skype video on the N8 is a bit of a sore point though, grrr.

    Personally, I wouldn’t give up my hardware keyboard – ever. Nice to see the E7 has an apostrophe. Now all Nokia need to do is teach the other 95% of the UK when to use it ;)

    p.s. Not sure if it was such a good idea to use your pink leopard print coat as a background for some of those photos.

  • Isaac

    I have my doubts that E7 will beat N900, specially because of the O.S an all the amazing applications on n900. I’ve just renewed it’s invisible shield for a one mor year (or maybe more) in my pocket, and it was a wise decision since it doesn’t seems to be beaten by any other phone yet.

  • Anonymous

    Thanks for this info – currently have N900 and looking at what next. Cheers

  • Plougman

    I got both phones, i simply couldt get rid of my lovely n900 for the e7, so yeah, i stick to both. :)
    Best phones out there i am sure. :)