Updated list of my Nokia 5800 annoyances - despite it being a very good phone. I'm also sure they can be easily fixed with a firmware update. I am convinced that the 5800 can learn a lot from its S40-predecessor, the Nokia 5310, which had just the most usable interface.
Updated 05-MAR-2009
Music Player, Realplayer & Radio
* When using the 'find' option in the music player, typing a few characters and then pressing and holding backspace will ask you to delete the currently selected file (if one is selected) when the cursor reaches the beginning. Obvious bug!
* Shuffle and repeat should be available without digging into the menu (toggle by touching the icons on-screen)
* Skip, pause, play, volume should be readily available, wherever you are in the System. Now you still need to navigate to the music player.
* The volume slider should also become available through touching the screen, as is the case with the radio player. Now you still need to use the phone's/remote's volume control.
* An iTunes-style option to level the volume of songs. Nothing is more annoying than having Judas Priest destroy your ears because you increased the volume to hear the words of a softer previous song.
* When you press 'play' on the headset, the player should just start (or the radio, depending on what was used most recently) and start to play, as was the case with the Nokia 5310.
* The equaliser is not available when streaming files.
* Songs show up in the ringtone list and vice-versa.
* Realplayer does not play in the background
* Realplayer lacks connection prioritisation
* Radio does not auto-resume after another application used the audio channel. The music player usually does. Fixed in v20.0.012
Home Screen & Media bar
* There is no landscape mode for the home screen, that's a bit silly if you have it on the table stand.
* The homescreen and the mediabar should have a "menu" button that brings up the Symbian Menu. Having to press the physical white button is such an anticlimax in your touchscreen experience.
* Why not have four contacts of your choice PLUS four favourite programmes PLUS the calendar? The screen is big enough to display a combination of the Shortcut Homescreen and the Contact Homescreen and much more!
* If you launched a program (such as the music player) via the menu (ie. not via the media bar), then the media bar will show no indication that the program is open (little ball in the right upper corner of the icon). This is the case if you start the player from the media bar. Fixed in v20.0.012
Calendar, alarm, clock
* Adding birthdays to contacts is useless as they do not show up in the calendar. Also the anniversary option in the calendar does not provide an alternative, since it does not show the person's age.
* Adding a memo/calendar item/meeting/... through handwriting can be a pain when you get to entering the time. You have to wait until every number is recognised and transferred to the application. If you write too fast, you will overwrite the previous character you've entered. Clear bug. Fixed in v20.0.012
* When I open the calendar, I regularly get an error message: "alarms missed due to time change", which is not the case. Seems to be fixed in v20.0.012
General
* The phone often crashes (some lines + auto reboot) very often (if not always) when the focus is stolen from some applications such as Fring and the France24-player. This happens for instance when someone calls while using one of those applications, or after the call, or when receiving a message. Biggus buggus!
* The remote control (on the headset) has a green phone button. This should only work to pick up the phone or hang up, but pressing it will also change the channel on the radio player and song on the music player. The worst thing is, that this cannot be prevented by "locking" the remote control.
* Selecting/Marking items in a list could be easy on a touchscreen by simply adding checkboxes. Now I still need to go over the menu for every item.
* Scrolling to large lists is a pain, especially without the stylus. Is there a decent solution for this?
* Popup-notifications should disappear on touching them (old annoyance with Nokia)
* It's still impossible to copypaste from the browser. Copypaste should also be available in every menu (over right click for instance), such as the menu where you enter your wireless key. :)
* Right-click (touching and holding to show a context menu) should be available more often and could take some of the load from the soft key menus.
* No way to handwrite hyphens, even though they're pretty common in European languages.
* Not every programme has a landscape mode (such as the calculator and the dialler).
* Touch sensitivity should be configurable.
* The notification light (the white menu button that blinks slowly when you have a new message) should blink a little quicker/more often, as you usually don't stare for five seconds at your phone to see if you have any messages
* Notification light does not work with new e-mail.
* Theme effects flicker. When an animation (such as a toast menu that slides into the screen) comes to an end, the menu will disappear shortly and reappear. This is irritating when you're trying to work quickly and also it looks crap. I guess that's why Nokia disabled them by default. Fixed in v20.0.012
* I miss an option to synchronise the notes I made on my phone. I should be able to quickly access whatever I've been musing on in the train on my pc, so I can start writing. Notes can be backed-up, but not synced. Fixed in v20.0.012
* The accelerometer is way too sensitive, which leads to significant delays. For instance, when the Berlin subway gathers speed, my phone will sometimes think it's being held upright and change its view. Apparently this has been fixed in a new firmware update, which sadly isn't available to me yet. Fixed in v20.0.012
Calling, Messaging & Contacts
* The messaging app often crashes upon opening or retrieving e-mail
* Bring back 'recently used contact'. The Nokia 5310 had a memory of the ten contacts you wrote messages to or that called you or that you called. It also had the possibility to have one favourite contact (which was great as I text one special person quite often).
* Language setting per contact. Wouldn't it be great if you could say: my girlfriend speaks French, so that when I text her, the T9 text predicition will change automatically to French.
* Incremental search in the contact browser was a good idea. However, the keys jump around too much, so you can't really use it in a quick manner. It'd be much easier if the keys kept their position as you type, and if any gaps were filled with new letters. The nokia 5310 was faster.
* Writing a smiley in a message is a pain: You need to go to the special characters tab to write ':-' and then press shift to have your ')', and then back to your alphabet tab. This should be easier, for instance with a smiley tab or something similar. You can already circumvene this by using handwriting shortcuts, but that's not much of a solace when you're using the fullscreen keyboard.
* If the system tray reports a new e-mail, it is impossible to see it if you're in the browser environment. The messaging app opens but switches back immediately to the browser.
* There is no way to save multiple bluetooth attachments at once
* There is no efficient way to leave the messaging app without quitting it (in order not to break off Mailbox connection). Implement a "Hide" button like with podcasting, Fring and other apps, which leaves the app running in the background.
* Deleting an e-mail from e.g. a Gmail account will thereafter take me to the oldest mail (scrolling all the way down) in the mailbox, instead of the most recent.
* E-mail lacks a reply-all function
* Adding a birthday to a contact, will crash the contacts application. Fixed in v20.0.012
Connectivity & Web
* Nework prioritisation should be available in every program and every service. Also, you should be given the option to switch to GPRS when the WiFi connection drops (for instance, when you leave home).
* RSS feeds do not always work (sometimes it says: format error)
Search App
* The search app sometimes does not find songs the first time. You need to search the web first, then return and it will search again, finding the song. Very reproduceable.
* Since v.20.0.012, the search app has improved immensely. However, it opens songs that were found in its own instance of the music player, instead of in the music player itself. This may be a feature, but it's also annoying because it means you cannot search for other things when listening to the song you've found.
Positioning
* GPS ephemerides cannot be received over WLan. Why do I have to use GPRS if WLAN is available?
* The positioning app's A-GPS does not accept default connections like for instance the e-mail app does. This makes it useless abroad.
Camera
* The camera will refuse function after a few times use. The seeker will only display a black image. When you then press the button to shoot, it will take a few seconds and then tell you "error" and to restart the phone. Very reproduceable, seems to coincide with video player no longer showing picture, only music. Update: this seems mostly the case when you used the Barcode reader application (and rotated the phone resp. made the UI rotate).
Today I found a simple solution to stop Vista from using custom folder views for folders that contain media, such as the My Music folder.
A hell of a job and the good old 'apply view to all folders' button seemed to avoid folders with media content.
