maemo.org - Talk - Nokia 5230 Nuron (Tmobile)

My experiences with Nokia 5230 Nuron (Tmobile branded) on Tmobile USA

I have recently purchased two new phones. I wanted something I could tether with, must be 3g, but I didn't want to pay a fortune. I looked at many deals and ended after a long search on the Nokia 5230 Nuron.

The phone runs 3g on the 10$ unlimited data plan, it has GPS with a fast fix, usually under 15-20 seconds. No wifi. I installed Opera Mobile, putty, youtube works great, google maps with voice control. "Find Taco Bell" Running mame, with a BGP100 bluetooth gamepad, fits nicely with the 5230. The Nokia su-8w keyboard works also if you really need to bang out some long emails. I can take video and pictures and post to facebook with one button which I use to post family pictures. (took some time to get working)

Drivers for both the BGP100 and Nokia were hard to come by, but I eventually got both. I used the Nokia driver for the S60v3 and it worked fine, but it did not say this anywhere, not sure why?

I was unhappy with the phone interface, or I should say, I liked the Nokia 5230 better than the Nuron Tmobile branded version. It has a contacts and music control on home screen. I decided to order two unlocked Nokia 5230's from Newegg and return the tmobile version.

I received the Nokia direct 5230's and was soon disappointed, they would not do 3G. I was getting edge speeds about .15-.19Mbps, on the Nuron I was getting .86-.99Mbps on the speed tests tethered via bluetooth to my Linux Laptop (CENTOS).

Additionally the Nokia (NON-Tmobile version) required the 25$ a month plan instead of the 10$ plan. However if you use the 10$ plan and change your APN to internet2.voicestream.com instead of epc.tmobile.com it works fine. I called tmobile and they said this was fine to use that APN on the 10$ plan. However contacts app and the music player did not make up for the lack of 3g working. I tried all the settings but could not get better speeds. I am sending the phones back to Newegg, and I lost 25$ on restocking fee on one phone and the return shipping. If I would have read clearer I would have seen ATT 3g only. Oh well, I have paid much more for my stupidity. I would say its a great phone for ATT, but I think they charge 30$ for data

There is not a ton of apps, well, I only look at free apps, but its a nice low end smartphone.

It runs Symbian OS and I am overall very pleased with the phone.

I bought the phones outright for 179$ a piece from tmobile and saved 20$ per month on my plan. so I was able to lower my monthly payment by 20$ per month, changed my plan to have more minutes, with unlimited texting on 3 phones, and unlimited web on 2 phones. The phone was 69$ on 2 year contract, but my plan would be 20$ more per month, so paying for it upfront makes sense.

Anyway, overall on a scale from 1-10, I give this a 9 for price / performance. The phone has its quirks and shows the NOKIA overall lack of QA and conformity.

I used to own a Nokia 6682 and I swore I would never own another Nokia phone. However this feature rich gem is a diamond in the rough.

What amazes me is Nokia could actually polish this up and make a really amazing phone at a cheap price. Although I think they are more interested in selling 500-800$ phones.

Anyway, my two cents, I thought might be worth sharing

Oh and before I go, one more thing I must mention, I hate the freaking OVI store. Slow to search on phone, hard to search on a computer. Overall stupid interfaces with that don't work well either on the phone or on the computer.