Nokia E72 (photos)

The Nokia E72 is the successor to the Nokia E71/E71x and brings such improvements as a faster processor, more memory, and a better camera.

Like many of Nokia's high-end smartphones, the Nokia E72 will be sold unlocked. While this frees you from service agreements and carrier commitments, it comes at a price. The E72 costs $419, though you can find it for a little less online.

The smartphone measures 4.48 inches tall by 2.34 inches wide by 0.39 inch thick and weighs 4.51 ounces, making it slightly taller, wider, and heavier than its predecessor. However, it's thinner than the E71, so you'll have no problem slipping the phone into a pants pocket.

The E72 features a 2.36-inch QVGA (320x240) display that supports up to 16.7 million colors. While clear and bright, it's not quite as sharp as the RIM BlackBerry Bold 9700, which has a higher-resolution 480x360 screen.

On top of the phone, you'll find a power button and a standard 3.5mm jack. The latter is a welcome addition since it allows you to plug in your favorite pair of headphones without requiring a audio adapter.

Below the display, you have a navigation array of two soft keys, Talk and End buttons, and shortcuts to your Home screen, Calendar, Contacts, and Inbox. In the middle is a directional keypad with a center select button that also doubles as an optical trackpad or as Nokia calls it, the Optical Navi key. Unfortunately, we found that the outer ring really restricts movement and as a result, makes the trackpad difficult to use.

The E72's keyboard feature dome-shaped buttons with a nice tactile feedback, making it quite easy to use. It also offers more shortcuts for symbols and features, so you don't always have to dig through menus to access them.

The left spine of the phone holds a Micro-USB port and a microSD expansion slot that can support up to 16GB cards. Nokia ships the phone with a 4GB microSD card.

The Nokia E72 features a 5-megapixel camera with an LED flash, a CMOS sensor, autofocus, and up to 5x digital zoom. It can also record VGA-quality video at up to 15 frames per second.

Despite the better camera, we were a little disappointed in the picture quality for indoor shots. The flash was too harsh, but without it, the image was too dark.