Nokia 7705 Twist – Lives Upto Its TWISTED Name

Sum n substance:

Thumbs up: Good call quality, unique design, wide set of features and a comfortable keypad.

Thumbs down: Small display, the photo quality is average.

Inside the trunk:

• Product Type With digital camera/digital player
• Service Provider Verizon Wireless
• Width 2.1 in
• Depth 0.6 in
• Height 2.7 in
• Weight 0.2 lbs
• Phone Design PDA
• Caller ID Yes
• Wireless Interface Bluetooth
• Additional Features TTY compatible , Speakerphone , GPS
• Short Messaging Service (SMS) Yes
• Internet Browser Yes
• Included Services VCAST
• Messaging / Data Features Text messages , Multimedia messages (MMS) , Picture messages , Instant messages , Voice mail , E-Mail , WAP Push 2.0 , xHTML Browser
• Talk Time Up to 270 min

THE WHIZ-KID SPEAKS: I don’t think I ve seen anything like this ever before. Yeah, there were many square and swivel phones which came in one by one but both of them together. Now that’s something definitely new. Let’s go ahead with this one and see how this unique handset functions…

Razzle- dazzle: This one has got a perfectly square design at 2.71 inches by 2.71 inches by 0.59 inch however the curved corners make it look somewhat less angular. Some might simply love the hip design but some might just loathe it saying that it’s weird. This one has a basic black cover though the battery cover can be changed to black or purple. It easily slips inside the pocket and is not all that clunky at 3.44 ounces.

Usually it takes a lot of effort to open a swivel phone and frankly it’s been quite some time since I ve seen one. But with this Nokia has left no stone unturned. You can easily open or close the phone with just one hand. Also this one has the pivot point at one corner rather than at the center. Though the swivel mechanism works just fine now, I hope this one doesn’t fly apart like the Sony Ericsson W600i within a few months of use.

It’s got a 2.4 inch screen which supports 262,144 colours with a resolution of 320×240 pixels. The colours and the graphics are vibrant and bright enough and it also has a landscape orientation. The display offers a huge bundle of customization options but again the menus are a bit confusing.

Below the screen there is a navigation toggle with the OK button in between. It’s got two touch sensitive soft keys on both the sides of the navigation toggle. Surrounding the exterior rim of the Twist we have a 2.5-millimeter headset jack, a Micro-USB/charger port, a volume rocker, and the microSD card slot. The camera lens is at the back of the phone and there is a huge self portrait mirror at the back of the phone.

Flipping the phone open reveals the stylish keyboard. The keys are spaced comfortably and its pretty much easy to type on it without making errors. Also the keyboard is large enough to be able to accommodate both the hands while typing. Also the keyboard is thankfully not cluttered with a lot of shortcuts. However the shared alphanumeric keys have been placed at the center of the keyboard so it takes some time too get used to it.

Inside Dope: Its got a 1000 entry phonebook and each entry can store around five numbers and two email addresses. This one has a unique feature called ‘habitat’ mode and after picking up one of the display themes ‘urban’ or ‘jungle’, your callers will be given a avatar. Click on each avatar to see a list of messages and calls between you and that contact.

The basic features that this one includes are the vibrate mode, calculator, alarm clock, a notepad, a unit and currency developer, speaker-independent voice dialing, Bluetooth, PC syncing, USB mass storage, text-to-speech, and support for VZ Navigator.

Its got a 3 megaixel camera which supports clicking photos in almost five resolutions.  It supports flash as well. However the photo quality is not all that great for a 3 megapixel camera. The photos are quite blurred and dull. The photos can be stored in the inbuilt 119MB or by extending the memory using the Micro SD slot.

It also supports a XHTML browser, which is a nice feature to have in a phone like this. But again the small screen plays spoilsport and also it’s kind of annoying to be moving the pointer using the navigation toggle. The EV-DO Rev. 0 connection was speedy enough but with a browser like that we really didn’t enjoy the speeds much.

Coming to the call quality of this one…at my end the sound was pretty loud and audible. There was hardly any display of static or interference. The signal was loud enough and with no background noise as such. On the callers end, however there were a few experiences of background noise. But on the whole it was pretty much satisfactory. Like most of the others that have been reviewed here, the speakerphones of this one too weren’t all that great. I would suggest using headphones or a Bluetooth set.

This one has a battery life of  4.5 hours talk time and 13 days standby time, which is decent enough nonetheless.

Nitty- gritty: This one is It’s available from Verizon Wireless for $99.99 with a $50 rebate and a service contract. Though it can’t be totally summed up as a multimedia phone this one is surely a headturner. It’s surely worth a shot if you want a unique phone with loads of basic features.

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