Recently released, the E66 is more like a new E65, it takes from the E65’s form factor, design, target market and builds on it to introduce a very slick handset that’ll take Eseries one step further when it comes to customer adoption.
Here is a head to head between these two devices showing the improvements that were introduced to the line with the E66 and the compromises that had to be carried in order to obtain the smoother look.
Dimensions
Talking about the physical aspect, the E66 is taller than the E65, and although it looks wider, both of them are almost the same width. When the sliders are open though, the E65 is a bit taller than the E66.
The E66 is much thinner than the E65, and that is mostly due to the fact that the upper slider part (ie the one that holds the screen) has been on a very extensive diet. The lower is almost the same thickness between the two.
Design
The E66 sports a more modern design, with the shiny dark metallic finish, compared to the E65’s matte silver metallic look. Personally, I prefer the E66’s appearance, even though it means more fingerprints, but it doesn’t get ugly, at least not on the front.
The true repulsive thing is the battery cover that collects fingerprints like it’s a job, and takes different shades accordingly. The E65’s battery cover is a matte leather-textured material that won’t show any fingerprint at all. This is probably the one and only thing where the E65 is superior to the E66.
On the left: dirty E66 back with fingerprints, smudges and color variations. On the right: well cleaned E66 back.
Another difference is with the E66 sporting the new design strategy from Nokia that was introduced with the N78: when the top-slider keys aren’t lit, they disappear as if there wasn’t a button. Only the green call key and the red end key are still visible. This isn’t the case with the rest of the keypad on the slider (the keys are visible even if not lit), but it does give the E66 a very slick look compared to the E65.
Keys
The E66 cramps 9 keys on the top slider part, other than the d-pad, whereas the E65 sports 10 keys. Although the E66 keys aren’t raised and might look a bit non-responsive, I was surprised by their overall performance and would rank them amongst the best keys on a Nokia handset so far. The Calendar, Messages and Contacts keys can be mapped to launch any application on a normal press and an extended key press. That means that you have 6 available shortcuts on the handset, compared to the E65’s fixed shortcuts.
Concerning the rest of the keypad, the E66 has by far one of the best keypads I have ever had under my fingers. It beats the N95 by miles, so let’s not mention the N81, N76, N73, 6120… It’s probably as good as my old 3250. The feedback is perfect, the keys have a nice coating, are a bit raised and very well individualized. If you compare it to the E65′s keypad, you’ll notice that the E65’s keys are taller but much less wider which makes them less comfortable for typing. I only wish the E66’s keys were a bit taller, but not as much as the E65.
Compared to the E65, the E66 lacks the pen key, and although I have been a bit worried about it before, I think that I got used to not using it. My only problem so far is with X-plore (my favorite file manager) not supporting multiple selection with the # key. The E66 adds a very important key though, the camera key. My main gripe so far is that it doesn’t launch the camera (why, oh why?! WHY?) , but it allows using the autofocus and snapping the picture or starting and stopping video recording. One more thing that I noticed is that the volume up key on my E66 isn’t very responsive (almost not responsive at all). I don’t know if this is an issue with my particular unit or an overall design flaw in the E66 line. I hope it isn’t the latter.
Ports
The E66 replaces the pop-port on the lower side of the E65 with 2 different ports: a microUSB and a 2.5mm plug for the headset. The 2.5mm plug makes you almost wish that they kept the pop-port!
Screen
As you must have noticed, the E66 screen is much bigger than the E65 (2.4” vs 2.2”) and although the difference is small on paper, it does make a great impression on the device itself.
This is it for the physical differences between the E65 and the E66. I will later tackle the hardware and the software improvements that the new handset introduces.
