The Nokia 5300, announced back in September, was only available unlocked in the US up until now, for a price of over $300, and since there's a wide variety of phones that carriers are offering on a contract with lower prices, this handset was most likely not very popular among consumers.

Music mobile phones are becoming the most popular handsets and most manufacturers have several devices to offer the music enthusiasts.

Among a pretty long series of music dedicated mobiles, Nokia is also offering the 5300. The phone comes with a very user-friendly design and a slider form factor, mostly offering music functionality and several enjoyable features.

There's nothing high-tech or advanced about the Nokia 5300, but it still manages to be appealing for most people. It packs a 2 inch 262k color screen with a 320 x 240 pixel resolution, 1.3 megapixel camera, Bluetooth for connectivity and, of course, a music player.

A MicroSD card slot is also provided enabling the user to store a whole collection of tracks if he/she so wishes. It supports MicroSD memory cards of up to 2GB. Because of the 2.5 mm Nokia AV connector, users will also be able to listen to music on their own headphones.

The music player supports several file formats including MP3, Midi, AAC, AAC+,eAAC+ and WMA and the Nokia 5300 also packs a FM stereo radio. While not a multimedia powerhorse, the handset is mostly a nice device for younger, music enthusiast users.

At 3GSM , T-Mobile has announced it will be the US carrier to provide the Nokia 5300 XpressMusic phone. It will be available through T-Mobile for a price of $99 with a two-year contract.