Nokia X3-02 Touch and Type

Yesterday, our friends in Finland unveiled the latest iteration to join the X-range of phones, the Nokia X3-02; which will sound extremely familiar to anyone that used to watch a Sci-Fi series named Stargate SG-1, where the X302 was a prototype starship meets fighter jet. The (slightly less cool) Nokia X3-02, will probably be better knows as the X3 Touch and Type, which also gives us the first clue as to the nature of this phone; Nokia first ever phone to incorporate both an alphanumeric (0-9) keypad as well as a touchscreen. The X3-02 is also set to be the first S40 touch driven device to be released on a global scale, proof enough that Nokia are setting their hopes high with the Touch and Type; so what can we expect from the touch and type collaboration? Well, starting with it’s looks, the touch and type takes Nokia’s favourite candybar form factor and most of it’s design cues from the current Xrange phones with colours ranging from white silver, dark metal and petrol blue to pink and lilac versions.
The touchscreen is a resistive 2.4 inch unit, making it one of the smallest touchscreens on the market being even smaller than the screen found on the ever popular Sony Ericsson x10 pro, and is said to be combined with a keypad to ‘give the best of both worlds’. Whilst we agree in theory with what Nokia are saying, we’ll wait to get some hands-on experience with the X3 before passing judgment either way. Our initial thoughts would be around the optimisation of the interface and how well the UI has been designed for use with the tiny resistive touchscreen, this will be paramount to the success of the Touch and Type collaboration.
In terms of other specs, the X3 is far from lacking despite it’s rather ‘plain Jane’ looks, there’s Wi-Fi, 3G, HSPA, Bluetooth and MicroUSB connectivity ob-board as well as the industry standard 3.5mm audio jack for headphones, which brings us on to one of the key selling points of the X3. It’s designed with media in mind and because of this, Nokia have incorporated a dedicated hardware key to Music Playback offering instant access to your music collection.
Despite being only 9.6mm thick, the finn’s have also managed to squeeze a 5.0 megapixel, fixed focus camera in the chassis, not bad for a phone of it’s size. Keep your eyes on the blog for details about release dates and price and in the mean time, check out the promo video below.