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The camera, on the other hand, is a bit of a mixed bag. It doubles for making video calls. With its lens swivelled towards you the two sections of the phone form a makeshift stand, and the handset can sit happily on a table in front of you at the right angle to capture your ugly mug. Using it in this way is quite comfortable.

Meanwhile for photography if all you want to do is hit the button and capture an image you are on easy street. But making settings via the soft menus is fiddly because the number pad section necessarily sits at right angles to the soft menu buttons and joystick. Hitting the buttons is OK, but pushing the joystick to, for example, change the image resolution, control the flash, use the self timer or select panorama mode is a little awkward.

It is also difficult to use the camera one-handed. Activating it via the swivel really requires both hands and thereafter balancing the phone in one hand to take a shot can be tricky. You can use the camera with the phone in ‘flat' mode, but you must either activate it through the Nokia menus or assign a softkey to it as there is no dedicated on/off controller for it.

Image quality is variable but generally not too hot. The coloured dish, photographed under normal household lighting is dark and grainy. Outdoor photos were sometimes acceptable such as the apples, sometimes not. The passion flower is dreadfully over exposed while the surrounding foliage gets better treatment. The usual additional range of S60 applications is here, including email, calendar, calculator, converter and Web browser.

Verdict

The 5700 MusicXpress is a nice phone for music fans, a less nice one for photographers, and the bottom line is that other handsets are better at both things.

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