The so-called “Tube” is an innovative music phone

Oct 3, 2008 07:08 GMT  ·  By

Yesterday, October 2, in London and Singapore, Nokia launched its highly anticipated Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, which aims to be a mobile device both innovative and able to deliver new features to users. Designed to provide the best music experience possible, 5800 XpressMusic will support Comes With Music, a Nokia service that offers one year of unlimited access to the entire Nokia Music Store catalog.

"With the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, we set out to connect people through the one thing we all feel a universal connection to - music," said Nokia Vice President Jo Harlow. "The way in which people enjoy music is different around the world. With that in mind, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic gives people the freedom to experience music they love in the way they prefer."

This phone delivers two features that Nokia presents as groundbreaking: Media Bar and Contacts Bar.

The Media Bar is a drop-down menu that provides users with direct access to the music and entertainment they have stored on their phone, but also allows them to connect to and browse the Net. Supporting Flash, the Nokia 5800 grants users access to the entire web.

The phone also offers graphic equalizer, 8GB memory, support for all main digital music formats, a 3.5mm jack and built-in surround sound stereo speakers. Together with all this, Nokia also packed in this device a 3.2 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss lens, to make the best of the 3.2-inch touchscreen that brings a 16 by 9 aspect ratio, with 30fps playback and recording as well.

The Contacts Bar enables users to highlight four favorite contacts on their homescreen, and also to keep track of recent text messages, emails, phone logs, photos and blog updates.

"As Nokia's first mass-market device with a touch screen, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic turns a 'user interface' into a 'human interface' by truly putting people first. For example, we've introduced the Nokia Contacts Bar, which is like a digital RSS feed on your life," said Harlow. "By adding the benefits of touch screen technology to S60, the world's leading smartphone interface, Nokia is taking the familiar and giving it a human touch. We have used touch technology where it really adds value such as the Contacts Bar, Media Bar and clever shortcuts from the homescreen to menu items such as calendar, profiles and clock."

Nokia 5800 will become available worldwide starting the fourth quarter of 2008, and will have a retail price of about 279 EUR without taxes. Given the 60+ language support, it's almost 90% certain you too will be able to get it in your own language.

Here's a video presentation with the brand new Nokia 5800 XpressMusic:

Photo Gallery (4 Images)

Nokia XpressMusic 5800
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