Hi there! Could you please give some feedback about the major & minor differences between E61 and E61i? Is it worth the upgrade?

I want to buy either an E61 or E61i, but cannot decide which one.

The differences I know are:

E61i:
Has a better QWERTY keyboard.
Has a Navi-pad instead of a joystick.
2 Megapixel Camera.
Thinner & looks better than E61.
MicroSD instead of MiniSD.

So what other differences are there?
Is the E61i faster than E61?
Is the browsing experience the same on both mobiles?

Any info would be highy appreciated. top

My first visitor in months!!! *LOL*

Sarah, the E61i is not any faster than the E61, at least in my experience. The browsing experience is pretty much the same too. The feature changes and bug fixes are quite minor and you should be able to find out more if you do online searches. However, the 2 most noticeable differences are the different in size (numbers cannot explain the hands-on difference… the E61i looks and feels quite small next to the E61) and the addition of the 2MP camera (which, in my opinion, does not match the quality of other Nokia cameras… my 7610 and 6680 take better photos with their 1.0-1.3MP cameras).

Something else that takes getting used to on the E61i when coming from the E61 (I understand this is not your case) is the D-pad which replaces the joystick. It looks 100 times better, but, in my opinion, is not as useable. While using the joystick, if you had to go up, down, down, left, up, etc. (in a game, for example), all you had to do was shift the pressure in a different direction. Using the D-pad, you need to release the down button and press the up button, then release the up button and press the right button, etc., so your finger needs to travel more. Make sense?

Last, but not least, is the fact that yes, the E61i has 2 extra buttons that add welcome one-click functionality, but they also take room from the 4 most used buttons on the phone after the navigation, which are the Call and End buttons and the 2 soft keys. These are now smaller and pushed out closer to the edge of the phone, so your fingers also have to travel further to reach them. On the E61, these buttons are quite long and extend almost all the way to the joystick, so there was no way you could miss them when typing quickly. And speaking of typing, the most people won't notice the differences in the keys between these 2 phones, but the E61i does indeed offer a better experience. For example, the keys aren't as flat and kind of bulge out more in the middle, so you feel more like you're pressing them, hence enhancing the tactile feedback.

Given the fact that you can get an E61 for a lot less money than an E61i (and that there's also rumor of a "real" update from Nokia in the future… I've read the name E68), unless you need the camera, give the phone size (mostly thinness) a big importance or love the way the E61i looks much better than the E61, I would advise you to go with the E61. Me? If I had both to pick from, I'd go for the E61i again, but I have gotten used to the size and camera and wouldn't go back to what my friends used to call "brick" and "shoe". ;-) top

Thank you so much for the detailed reply. It really helped. :) I think I'll go for the E61 right now, and get the E68 when it arrives.

I had read loads of reviews and blogs but still could not figure out what to do.

You write really well, and if you wrote regularly I'm sure there would be lots of regular visiters coming in, including me.

Thanks again! :) top