Nokia 5530 XpressMusic impression

I was surveying a new phone to buy after my very old Nokia N73 Music Edition having problems with some of the button not working and also its relatively unresponsive. I been doing a lot of research online but that doesn't have any meaning to me unless I tried it myself. There isn't much phone that I liked or meet the requirement I need for the low budget, and there is very few phone I looking forward to test it, one of them being Nokia 5530 XpressMusic. This is how it looks like:

The review itself on GSMArena is rather good so I decided this phone will be on top of my priority. One being it have WiFi and have a rather big screen because I love to put lost of videos on the phone to watch it on the go but I don't like full touchscreen without any physical keyboard or keypad, so I really looking forward to test this phone to see whether the full touchscreen phone really up to the task replacing keyboard and keypad.

After been surveying around and on the third shop I survey around Plaza Shah Alam (known as Shah Alam Mall, or previously known as Orchard Square when its first open years ago) I asking to test the unit. The price is RM650 with 2GB memory, this can't be right since I read it online it comes with 4GB in the box, but I tried it anyway. The phone feels very nice, though the screen is a bit on the smaller side but 2.9" is not something to be sneezed at, and the image quality is impeccable. Ultra sharp and way better than its bigger brother, the 5800 XpressMusic that have larger screen (3.2") but blurrier image quality. This going to bode well if you like to watch movie or video on the phone! See the three button below the screen? Its touch sensitive! A big surprise to me, I thought it a physical button like its bigger brother. The frame surrounding the front is metal and chrome plated, again its a very nice touch and adds some elegance compared to plastic bigger brother that looks like kids toy.

It weighted just nice and very pocket-able as well. Image quality from the camera wasnt so bad either, it autofocus speed is rather fast and saving and previewing speed is good as well. Navigating the menu is a bliss, the touchscreen response rather well even though its using resistive technology, the phone reaction time is fast too, opening up image gallery, opening up program is fast and fluid. I very impressed with the unit. The biggest surprise is texting, I thought it going to be bad but it manage to kept typing error to a minimum and response to every keypress with great speed. Another thumbs up from me.

The bad thing? The phone only comes in white color in that shop. It looked ridiculous since it have a light blue stripes on it (the left pictured above), and to be honest this phone don't look great with while color despite it looks okay on the promotion picture above, so I wander off and see other shops. The last shop got the black color I wanted, looks way WAY better than the white one, and the shop gives RM630 with the right 4GB memory. Looks more elegant and contemporary.

But in the end I don't buy it, because I felt like I need to wait a bit more till my phone really busted. There are more interesting phone comes out in few weeks that meets my requirement especially a QWERTY keyboard so I rather wait for it, and by the time I will have more money and more phone options as well. For me I rather wait for the best than buy cheap stuff because money is hard to come by.