Nokia 7380: Love at First Sight?

Nokia has high hopes you'll fall head over hills in love with their 7380 model cell phone. They packed nearly every feature they have into this little gadget, what's not to love about this L'Amour series model? Well, the navigation for starters.


The first question you'll ask is "Where's the keypad?" The answer – there isn't one. What you get is a menu button on the left, a Send and End button on the right and a circular dial that iPod users will be very familiar with. There is an additional Select button in the center of the iPod-esque dial. That's it for navigation.


Making a phone call, if the name isn't already in your contact list, requires you to navigate to the Call menu then scroll through a number line to select the seven to ten numbers you need to make a call. Scroll, select, scroll, select, scroll, select… The process easily takes three times as long to dial than on a traditional keypad phone.


Text messages are just as difficult, if not more so. Without a keypad, you have to navigate through the alphabet for each letter you want to input. Nokia did try to make this easier by adding a recognition feature that lists the five most-used letters at the start of the alpha scroll. Still, sending a text message is a real pain on the 7380.


To counter the text messaging deficiencies, Nokia added voice messaging. This is great if you want to tell someone something without giving them a chance to talk back. If you text message to avoid making a sound, voice messaging doesn't help. If you text message because the recipient can't access sound features on their phone, voice messaging won't help. You'll probably find it easier to just call someone than to send an voice or text message.


The camera feature is much easier to use than basic and even mid-line mobile phones. Snapping shots is just two quick button pushes and one scroll away. The 2 megapixel camera takes a good picture in sunlight, though the contrast is a bit on the heavy side. Night mode is so-so. Pictures up-close of friends in a pub or nightclub are better than many other camera phones but don't expect to catch Kodak quality moments on this (or any) mobile.