Nokia N76 (red, Unlocked)

When you think of sleek and sexy cell phones or smart phones, chances are you probably don't think of Nokia. However, the Nokia N76 certainly changes that perception. The Symbian handset boasts a beautiful and slim design, yet manages to pack in a boatload of features. Like its N series sibling, the Nokia N75, the N76 has a heavy music focus, as it's equipped with a robust music player, an FM radio, and a 3.5mm headset jack, so you can finally plug in a pair of decent-sounding headphones. What's more, the sound quality of the phone's speakers for music playback was one of the best we've heard to date.

However, the N76 has a number of shortcomings. First, there are a number of design flaws that make this otherwise stunning smart phone unattractive. Second, it doesn't work on our 3G bands and there's no support for the A2DP Bluetooth profile. And once again, battery life is an issue. So without the backing of a U.S. carrier, is it worth paying $500 for an unlocked version? Well, it's a bit heartbreaking. General performance is good, but for the money, we want a better design and other connectivity options.

Design
From the outside, the Nokia N76 is sexy and fun with its hot red casing (also available in black), but it's not all rosy; there are some major design flaws that detract from the overall attractiveness of this device. We'll discuss them throughout this section. Taking a page from the Motorola Razr's book, the N76 measures a tight 4.1 inches long by 2 inches wide by 0.5 inch thick, weighs just 4 ounces, and boasts a sleek profile. It's slightly on the long side, especially when open and held to the ear for phone calls, but it can still easily slip into a pants pocket.

The front cover features a 1.3-inch external screen that displays an impressive 262,000 colors at a 160x128-pixel resolution. It shows all the standard information, including time, battery life, signal strength, and caller ID, and it acts as a viewfinder for the camera. In addition, like the Nokia N75, you can use the dedicated music controls located right below the display to call up the music menu and radio, fast forward through your tracks, view song and track information, and more. It's nice that you can do this without having to open the phone. Once the backlight turns off, the screen blends into a mirrored surface that dominates the flip cover. While it looks very cool, it has quite a tendency to hold smudges and fingerprints, and you'll definitely want to take care not to scratch it.

You wouldn't think flipping open a phone would be a point of contention, but the Nokia N76 requires a little more work than other clamshell models we've seen to date. The flip mechanism is really stiff, and it's not easy to find a groove where you can open the phone with your thumb, so one-handed operation is quite difficult. We often just used both hands, and even then, it was a bit tricky as the surface of the phone is quite slick.

Once you do get the phone open, you're treated with a gorgeous 16 million-color, 2.4-inch internal screen with a 320x240-pixel resolution. Images pop with vibrant color, and reading messages and viewing Web pages is a delight on the sharp display. You can change the display's brightness and font size, and personalize it with various themes and wallpaper designs.

The N76's keypad is very reminiscent of the Motorola Razr with its flat, metal buttons. In addition to the alphanumeric dialing pad, you get Nokia's standard navigation array of two soft keys, Talk and End buttons, shortcuts to the Main and Multimedia menus, an Edit key, a Clear button, and a four-way toggle with a central select key. We had no real problems dialing numbers, but ran into a bit of trouble with the other controls, particularly the four-way toggle. It's cramped, and it's very easy to press the OK button by accident since, like all the keys, it's flush with the phone's surface; the only distinguishable separation between any of the buttons is a very slight raised line. Also, like the external screen, the metal surface can get quite dirty with smudges. On the bright side, the keypad is nicely backlit so you won't have problems dialing and texting in darker environments.

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