UK mobile phone reviews - Nokia 5230 Review

Your Nokia 5230 Reviews

Click here to add your own review for the Nokia 5230


Reviewer: Ian - Glasgow, UK
Date: 26th Jul 2010

Great, cheap Smartphone with decent sat nav (get an in car charger as it eats batteries, so does using the Web).

BUT, the screen is very hard to see on a sunny day & Nokia Ovi store & Ovi software are incredibly frustrating to use. I got my phone 2 days before going on holiday, I finally managed to download maps of my holiday destination using Nokia Ovi PC suite about a week after I got back!

---

Reviewer: Anon - US
Date: 19th Jul 2010

This phone is very easy to use. I upgraded from a 6301 Nokia which is basic & I know how to work this thing after 2 weeks. One bugbear, the SIM card & memory card flaps are awkward & very flimsy.

Overall I am very impressed.

---

Reviewer: Andre Patterson - UK
Date: 15th Jul 2010

Was happy then I was not (repeat this phrase) this is because a website I use updated saying I needed a flash adobe player so a friend told me about skyfire through ovi store however for some reason the phone would not connect to ovi sending me to both t mobile & Nokia for solutions who blamed each other for the problem. Eventually I replied to a email from Nokia & somehow was able to enter ovi & download skyfire. For a while things were running smoothly until my skyfire would not connect something about (APN) & at the same time I cannot connect to ovi I am so fed up & my phone still won't update strange someone please help.

---

Reviewer: Kev - UK
Date: 9th Jul 2010

Only paid £48 new for this, really can't complain, it does everything it says it does straight out the box.

I had a problem with Internet access costing a fortune, but O2 sent new settings & it's working a treat. This phone accepted all 4 SIM's belonging to the family all from different suppliers. I am only comparing this to the 2 Tocco's in the household but have to say that my wife, daughter & myself prefer the Nokia, son says it's OK but prefers his BlackBerry.

---

Reviewer: Pat - Canterbury, UK
Date: 1st Jul 2010

Horrible, cheap & nasty!

I got one today as an unwanted upgrade from my contract - certainly not an upgrade from my Nokia N95 which I shall continue to use!

Nasty flimsy plastic case, felt it might break as I removed the cover to insert battery, very poor camera & it seems to want to connect to the Internet at every opportunity so beware! I haven't even bothered to register it, & it will be on eBay later today with no reserve.

---

Reviewer: Peter J - Burton on trent, UK
Date: 6th Jun 2010

Totally frustating & is driving me mad, therefore it be going back ASAP.

---

Reviewer: Ivan - Swaffham, UK
Date: 26th May 2010

I brought my 5230 as a replacement for a Samsung J700 last month. I was torn between the 5230 & a Samsung Tocco at the time of purchase, but the Nokia piped the Samsung on its features.

It was brought from Carphone Warehouse on Vodafone pay as you talk for £89.99 (including £10 top up). I also brought a 4GB micro SD card & leather pouch, bringing the total purchase price to £113.97. Overall, I am quite impressed with it.

It has a loud ring which I like to have at work, even with a song MP3 set as a ringtone, & even in its pouch I can feel it vibrate & hear it ring. My only niggles are I can't delete music files from the music library I have added, the battery doesn't last as long as I would like, so now I have a car charger, & it has an annoying habit of freezing or locking up on me for no reason.

I have also had some issues with it running very slowly. I downloaded ovi maps with navigation for free, but I am not impressed with it, as it uses loads of battery in drive or walk mode, & can't find its way home from 4 miles from my house.

The other thing that annoys me some of the settings are automatically designed to connect to the net, if you are unaware of this, it can take lots of calling credit, as other Vodafone users will testify!

Overall I am happy, & hope its last me a while.

---

Reviewer: Unimpressed - Glasgow, UK
Date: 13th May 2010

Maybe a bit unfair because I've only just got it, but I am already fed up, & I am just trying to set it up. I just bought a 5230 & an iPhone for myself & my wife (she didn't want us to spend the extra for two iPhones. Boy oh boy, chalk & cheese. Two hours of intuitive fun setting up the iPhone & it's brilliant. My nine year old keeps running away with it. TV, games, useful reference etc etc. Each time I switch it on I discover something cool.

An entire night I am still trying to just transfer existing contacts to the Nokia. A Pain. If you want something that just works find the funds for an iPhone. I am sure the Nokia is fine if you're a tech head. Or don't have something else to compare it to. This is going back.

---

Reviewer: Ludwik - Leeds, UK
Date: 11th May 2010

- The phone gets better with use.
- Call quality is still very good.
- GPS works very well with both OVI & Google maps.
- Voice recognition in Google maps works quite well 70%.
- Built in Nokia browser still giving me problems, so have downloaded opera mini 5, Opera mobile 10 & skyfire as alternative web browsers. Opera mini 5 is very fast, No flash & sometimes poor at rendering with text overlapping. Opera mobile 10 is slower, but has flash lite support & better rendering. Skyfire, full flash support, even allows me (sometimes) to watch bbc iplayer & itvplayer videos & live bbc tv! But this beta version is buggy.

---

Reviewer: Duffy - Newcastle, UK
Date: 5th May 2010

This phone doesn't have it all but it does have enough & for the price the features are excellent.

Pros.
- Camera, yes it's 2MP but the quality of the lens produces some decent shots, image size isn't too large either.
- 3.5G, required due to lack of Wi-Fi, speedy connection.
- Design, not to every ones taste but quite pleasing on the eye.
- Touchscreen, not capacitive but good feedback & minimal incorrect key presses, scrolling is OK.
- Shortcuts, Symbian is great if you're used to it & the widget feature on the home screen is a nice touch.
- 3.5mm, very important to me, hate 'own brand' headsets.
- OVI Maps, Free navigation can't knock it works better than my tom-tom, couple it with the own voice app in the store & you can have hours of fun.

Cons.
- Wi-Fi or lack of.
- Camera, performs well but a flash of some kind would be nice.
- Touchscreen, down as a pro but some selections when browsing refuse to accept.
- OVI Store, getting better but not quite there yet.

On a personal note I picked up a Samsung Genio Slide by chance & found it appalling, screen resolution was shocking & despite some good features it just did not appeal to me.

Swapped for this little beauty & was glad I did, my E71 is still in my drawer but I refuse to give that up!

---

Reviewer: Greg Kemble - Lincs, UK
Date: 28th Apr 2010

Had this phone for just over a month & love it, it's simple to use & the touch screen is very responsive, this is my first touch screen & after toying with this & the Samsung S5600 I opted for this one, I had a friend who had the Samsung & she hated a few bits with it but they were both good cheap contract deals on 3.

Love the OVI maps & app store where there are a few useful & a few fun things to get for free, the best has got to be the Skyfire web browser, it plays all videos online it seems,

I've even dropped it onto a concrete floor from about 5 feet up & it's survived!

To me the only 2 things that would make it a great phone for the price would be Wi-Fi & a built in stylus, it does come with a plectrum shaped stylus but I don't like it therefore don't use it

All in all very happy.

---

Reviewer: Stuart - Greenock, UK
Date: 31st Mar 2010

I've had this phone now for a month, I am quite happy with it but battery life is shocking. With moderate web browsing & texting a fully charged battery is down to 1 bar of life when I get home from work. If this phone was used for work I'd be in real trouble. As for no wifi I am having my previous Nokia E71 unlocked & going back to it.

---

Reviewer: Matt - UK
Date: 28th Feb 2010

Just purchased this device to replace an upgrade phone that I have gotten rid of due to it failing within 2 months & have been having a play around for a couple of days.

First impressions were very good, although I was slightly disappointed that no USB cable is included in the box.

The phone itself looks very smart & seems well made for the money. In my opinion there is no better mobile available at the moment that has so many features & good design for such a low price tag.

The screen quality is superb with bright vivid images thanks to the high resolution (which I believe is nHD). The touch screen is really responsive as well & the haptic feedback is great.

Web browsing is fast & intuitive, thanks to the HSDPA & 3G.

The camera, despite being only a 2MP is capable of taking pretty decent snaps & the device processes pictures very quickly indeed. The biggest downside to the camera is that no flash is included but doesn't bother me that much.

The Facebook shortcut that came preloaded on my home page is a very welcome feature & has proved to be very easy & trouble free to use, I particularly like the camera button which allows you to take a picture & upload it to Facebook straight away. This feature also allows you to tag your pictures at the same time.

Another cool feature is that you can set up your email account & the device displays your email status on the home screen & allows direct access to your full account instantly.

The OVI store is great & I have downloaded various free applications. My device came preloaded with OVI maps, which works well.

The internal memory is a bit lacklustre but easily upgraded thanks to the MicroSD slot which accepts up to 16GB, I opted for an 8GB & that's more than enough for me.

One unusual thing about this phone is that the SIM card & MicroSD slot are situated on the outside of the handset, covered up by two little covers on the left hand side making it so quick & simple to insert or remove either.

Battery life so far seems very good aswell, I have been messing about entering all my numbers, changing settings, taking pictures & recording video (excellent quality with 30 fps), made a couple of 30 minute calls & the usual texting & web browsing, despite all this I have still got 4 bars left on the battery after 2 days!

You may have noticed that I quite like this handset, & you'd be right. I really cannot find a single thing to dislike right now & for the price (around £100 payg on various networks) I strongly advise taking a closer look if you're looking for an attractive & feature packed moby.

---

Reviewer: Ludwik - Leeds, UK
Date: 23rd Feb 2010

I had this phone for a month now.

- Call quality is excellent.
- 100% & so is music playback.
- Call & music volume through earphone & loudspeaker is very good 90%.
- Texting is easy because the virtual keyboard is accurate & responsive 95%.
- Handwriting recognition is good 90%.
- Camera, only 2MP, but 2MP is enough, it's the quality of the lens that matters. Phones with 5MP & 8MP cameras can give rubbish results if the lens is poor & you end up with large files clogging up memory. So lens is very good & the size, shape & weight of the phone means it is easy to take shake free photos 85%.
- Video camera full VGA 640 by 480 at 30fps 95%.
- Screen, resolution is fine, as are colours & contrast 85%.
- Sunlight legibility 35%.
- Google maps & Ovi maps are fast, got a GPS lock within a couple of minutes to within 50m accuracy 85%.
- Gallery able to review photos & videos from other sources good on large widescreen. AS is flicking from photo to photo 90%.
- Mobile Internet browser? !? ! very mixed results. I also downloaded mini opera 4.2 to use for comparison. Nokia browser was update to flash lite 3.1.
- Viewing flash content 50%.
- Speed of loading ages 35%.
- Built in font, Yuk 25%.
- Speed of scrolling around loaded page 10%.
- On some phones kinetic scrolling is like driving a luxury car. Here it's like driving a car with 4 square wooden wheels!
- Bugs in Browser. Some items on a page cannot be selected. I have tapped, double tapped & held the screen down. Instead of selecting the item, the magnification changes by double tapping. (Yet these pages work fine on other phone browsers! )
- Sometimes it takes 4 or 5 taps before the keyboard appears when trying to input data.
- No 4 way pad or trackball. You have to use the screen.
- Full help text provided in the phone.
- No memory card or CD software or case included.

---

Reviewer: Tikru - Finland
Date: 26th Jan 2010

Pros.
- Price (cheap compared to all the features).
- GPS (there is this newer version of GPS, AGPS, which is better than standalone GPS, faster start up & works indoors).
- Free maps & navigation (from Ovi & Navteq starting this week).
- Fast data connections.

Cons.
- No WLAN (you need a fixed rate data contract to fully use this phone).
- 2 mp camera without any fancy focus things, okay anyway.

---

Reviewer: Jason - Hong Kong
Date: 25th Dec 2009

- Nice phone.
- Cheap, seems durable.
- 2 GB memory card bundled with it.
- It's a little bit thick, but it's not very wide so that's an okay trade off.
- No true GPS, just AGPS.
- No video calling either.
- Good web browser.
- Occasionally frustrating S60 (do you want to connect to this app? Are you sure? ).
- Silly things like having to double tap on some icons, & the Facebook app not saving your password.
-the haptic feedback is very nice, a slight pleasant buzzing.

All in all, a very good phone for the price.



Click here to add your own review for the Nokia 5230

---

Home  |  Useful Phone Resources  |  Webmasters  |  Your Privacy  |  Our Legal Disclaimer
Nokia 5230 Reviews & Features © 2006 - 2010, Your Mobile Phone Reviews UK Limited