The forgotten smartphone: Nokia E51 from 2007

May 30, 2021 Luisa Rey

A trusted Nokia, which appeared in two different (and quite special) variants. In this edition of ‘The forgotten smartphone’ we go to the year 2007; the year of the Nokia E51.

Nokia E51

Nokia is now part of the company HMD Global. Every now and then a previously released device appears in a new jacket, but it is really a different company now. We still have good memories of Nokia, so you see them regularly in our ‘The forgotten smartphone’ and ‘The forgotten phone’ section. Today I take you to the year 2007, in which the Nokia E51 was released.

The Nokia E51 was a predecessor of the smartphone. When we think of a smartphone, we quickly think of a telephone with a touchscreen; this E51 didn’t have that. If we look at the possibilities of the Nokia E51, we can say that this is not just a simple phone. That becomes clear when you see the device. The buttons below the screen reveal that you can go in all directions with this.

Screen and design

Under the 2.0 inch screen, which had a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels, you first found the navigation key. There were still shortcuts to the phone book, calendar and messages around it. The phone was also equipped with a delete key and two shortcut keys.

The Nokia E51 had a metal back panel that was prone to fingerprints. In addition, many users complained about slack and crackling in the battery cover. Under this cover was the 1050 mAh battery. Furthermore, the Nokia E51 was equipped with a 2 megapixel camera for taking pictures. Filming was done in 320p at only 15 frames per second. It was striking that this Nokia E51 also appeared as a version without a camera.

Symbian and network

Several features proved that the Nokia was not just a phone. For example, the E51 was equipped with support for HSDPA and WiFi. The device ran on Symbian S60. With the included version of Quickoffice you could view files, only you had to pay for editing. You could also get started with the ZIP administrator and it could handle Exchange for mail.

The Nokia E51 also offered an infrared port, Bluetooth, 2.5 millimeter audio jack and an ARM 11 chipset with a speed of 369MHz. The storage space came out at 130MB and was expandable. The working memory of the E51 was 96MB. The smartphone appeared in the Netherlands for an amount of around 350 euros.