Nokia 770 review

Is it a phone? Is it a pocket tablet PC? Is it a plane? Well, all are right, really. Apart from the plane, obviously. This is Nokia’s attempt to break into the mobile email-come-internet browser market. But whatever you do don’t call it a mobile phone: it’s not. You can make calls but it doesn’t use ‘conventional’ technology, instead opting for VoIP technology.

Don’t call it a phone

But this technology isn’t the only thought provoking part of the Nokia. Instead of using Windows applications, the 770 uses the Linux Tablet OS. The advantage is that Linux is more stable than its other competitors, but a lot of third-party applications will not run. To counteract this Nokia has chosen to concentrate its efforts on web functionality.

The hardware does pose some problems, though. Without a keyboard or decent handwriting recognition, it’s unlikely you’ll want to do much writing but web browsing is thoroughly impressive. This is mainly thanks to the 800×480 pixel screen –  imagine a screen with double the resolution of a PSP, with touch-sensitivity to boot.

Night at the opera

Opera, the Flash-enabled web browser, usually lets you see the entire website, there are also handy zoom, and full-screen buttons to help if you have trouble viewing the full page. Because there aren’t too many features on the 770, the battery life is impressive, giving three hours of constant Wi-Fi browsing.

At the moment, the only way to connect to a Wi-Fi hotspot is hook the Nokia up to your mobile via Bluetooth, but the company is working on an update, as we speak, to enable easy VoIP calls as well as instant messaging.