3 steps that ease the switch to Nokia E61i
I have started rolling with the Nokia E61i on loan from WOM World - and to be perfectly honest, I am not immune to its charms. Since this is my first experience with a QWERTY keyboard handset, I am starting to get these heretical thoughts late at night - when I have put my N95 into offline mode. Will I develop a serious affection for QWERTY and if so, how am I going to cope once the E61i goes back to WOM World?
But I am getting ahead of myself, since I have decided to put my thoughts on the E61i's hardware and ergonomics in another post.
For now, I will focus on three steps that help make migration to the E61i, from another handset, as smooth as possible. It is by no means an exhaustive list of migration tasks, but just some steps I took notice of when swapping my regular work phone for the E61i.
Transfer stuff from old phone
When switching phones in the past, I have transferred items like contacts and messages from new to old phone either manually, or using an online service like ZYB. Although I think I have been vaguely aware of the "Transfer" appplication (called "Switch" in newer handsets), I have never used it. Shortly before receiving the E61i I read Symbian-Guru’s "Ultimate Guide To Switching Devices", which is excellent and made we want to try "Transfer"/"Switch".
A cool thing about this application is that it works even between newer and older versions. I transferred stuff from my N95 to the E61i using "Transfer", even though my N95 has the newer "Switch" application. Not a problem. Symbian-Guru reports it even works between S40 and S60 devices.
As you can see from the screenshots below, using "Transfer"/Switch" is pretty straightforward. Pair the handsets before using "Transfer" to avoid too many dialogues during the actual transfer.
Look for the Transfer shortcut in the Tools menu.
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Transfer main menu.
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Select the device to transfer from, or choose "Other" to search for devices.
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Select how to transfer data.
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Start bluetooth on other device
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Select device.
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Select what to transfer from the other device.
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Transfer summary from log.
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Use "Transfer"/"Switch" to migrate contacts, messages, calendar items, browser bookmarks, call logs and more - if you want to migrate additional data, say navigation landmarks or words added to a T9 dictionary, go read Symbian-Guru’s "Ultimate Guide To Switching Devices". It covers more advanced stuff that you cannot do using "Transfer"/"Switch".
Sort out network connections
If you have not used an E series handset before, you are going to love a feature called "Access point groups". This feature allows you to define groups of prioritized network connections, which is then used by applications instead of individual access points. So lovely flexible! It is a feature the N series community has been lusting for, and thankfully, it has been added to all S603rd devices with Feature Pack 2, in a revamped version called "Destinations".
However, using access points groups requires a bit of organizing - if planning to set up any kind of push email solution on the phone, it is prudent to take this into account when putting together access point groups. There are also some limitations. Individual access points can only belong to one group, for instance. Also, not all applications are actually able to use the access point groups feature - the most notable example perhaps being browser.
You need to consider it you want to check for mail using 3G (GPRS) data connections, or do you only want to do so when WLAN connections are available? Also, check if your specific e-mail setup is able to disable itself when roaming. Organize the access point groups accordingly. For instance, I only want the E61i to check for mail when a WLAN connection is available and I have thus created an access point group that only contains WLAN access points. I use that group for my e-mail setup.
The access point groups setup is found in "Tools" | "Settings" | "Connection" | "Access point groups":
Define access points and access point groups.
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Existing access point groups.
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Edit a group.
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Access point in group.
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Add access point, or edit prioritization.
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Add access point to group.
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Take a first stab at e-mail
If you have opted for the E61i, I take it you want to use it for some heavy-duty messaging, especially e-mail. That is sort of the raison d'être for that QWERTY keyboard, right? I am very new at mobile e-mail and I have quickly learnt there are several different approaches - different applications - to mobile e-mail. It is likely you will need to try a few different setups before you find the one, which suits your needs as well as preferences.
I suggest to try out the builtin mail client - it is very easy to set up and works very well, although it probably will not hook you up with your corporate mail account. Using it, you can have a go at mobile e-mail using a personal account, which can be an POP3 or IMAP account. I have tried both: a regular POP3 account and IMAP access to my Gmail.
I will not cover how to set up an mail account since it is no different from setting up any other mail client. The interesting parts are the connection and automatic retrieval settings.
Email accounts in the E61i Messaging application.
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Open account to edit settings.
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Note connection and automatic retrieval settings.
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Connection settings for incoming mail - use access point group.
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Specify when to check for new mail.
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When deleting messages, you can choose to also delete message on server.
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When setting up network connections to use for retrieving e-mail (see right-most image in second row above), this is where you need that smart access point grouping I mentioned in the previous section. It is too bad automatic retrieval cannot be set to more often than 30 minutes - the e-mail client on my N95 can be set to check at intervals of just five minutes. From time to time the e-mail client fails to connect to the mail server - see image to the right - it happens both when retrieving messages automatically, and when I manually try to download the body of a message.
A few other details regarding e-mail: The e-mail client retrieves headers from mail account, if a message is selected in the inbox, you are prompted if you want to retrieve the message body. Copies are kept at the server and you can choose to delete just the local copy on the phone, or both. If using "Send copy to self" (found in User settings) it it possible - either manually, or using a rule - to update your mail account with message replies sent from the phone.
A few closing remarks, which are very indicative of how integral messaging is to the E61i:
Notification light (white LED in upper left corner of the E61i) - "Tools" | "Settings" | "Phone sett." | "Notification light"- select which events will trigger the notification light, and how long the light should blink after being triggered.
D-pad e-mail key - "Tools" | "E-mail key" - default action is to open default mailbox, but the key can be customized.
Finally, specify which mailbox to include on the active standby screen - go to "Tools" | "Settings" | "Phone sett" | "Standby mode" | "Active standby mailbox".
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July 24th, 2008 at 14:03
[...] Gersbo has been writing on his blog about the transition from T9 Nseries to a QWERTY Eseries device, and how the journey can be made easier. [...]
July 24th, 2008 at 19:54
[...] Gersbo.dk - 3 Steps to ease switching to the E61i [...]
August 21st, 2008 at 02:14
I have recently bought an E61i, and I am not impressed with the email capability, particularly since my previous phone was a Windows Mobile 5.0 one. The main issue: the built-in email on the E61i is too slow since it only downloads headers (I have set it up to connect to my corporate email using IMAP), and Nokia Mail is useless for me since it doesn’t delete any emails on the server (so deleting an email on the E61i is useless since I see the same email when I use Outlook on my laptop again, effectively having to delete the same email twice). Any suggestion on how to make the built-in IMAP email download email bodies, or alternatively, is there a good pushmail client that I can use to connect to my corporate email (vs. the email server of my phone company)?
August 21st, 2008 at 02:43
Hi Charles, maybe ‘SEVEN’ will suit your needs? I tried the free consumer version with my GMail account on my loaner E61i and it seemed to work just fine. Unfortunately, I have now returned the E61i so I cannot verify if it is able to download full messages and delete messages from server.
To get hold of SEVEN, you need to enter their BETA program (free) by registering here. Maybe this quick start guide can help you decide if SEVEN is worth trying?