The Nokia 5300 belongs to the XpressMusic series, which is at the tip of Nokia's sword for battling Sony Ericsson's Walkman brand. The most notable features on the 5300 are the new 2.5mm earphone jack and dedicated music keys. Now we will see if the 5300 can really substitute your music player.

Physical Aspects
At first glance, the Nokia 5300 looks like a sports version of 6111. From the color to the material used, you can tell that this device is targeted at the youth market. The main colors used here are chalk white, silver grey, and scarlet red, and they match well with the built in themes. This not a particularly small device, measuring 92.4mm x 48.2mm x 21mm (3.64" x 1.90" x 0.81"). The device is not especially light either, but the 107g (3.76oz) mass does not counteract the toy-like and plastic feeling during use. The whole body is made of hard plastic and the red band is anti-slip, which will make it more stable when you slide open the phone. The build is not particularly good though, and the slider does wiggle around, even when closed.

The 2.5mm headset jack is found on the left side, together with three dedicated music keys. The Infrared port, camera, and volume buttons are found on the right. The power button, power jack, and USB port are found on the top, whereas the camera and speaker grille holes are found on the back. Notice that the music keys slightly protrude, making it easier to skip tracks in your pocket, though they can be a bit hard to press. All in all, the Nokia 5300 has a well thought-out design. It would have been better if there was some protection to cover up the USB and power ports, though.

I have not mentioned the microSD slot thus far, as it is not visible from the outside of the handset. To swap your cards, you must open the battery cover. You do not have to switch the phone off and remove the battery, but it is still a hassle.

The keypad on the 5300 is one of the best out there. The keys are large and the tactile feedback is excellent. My only complaint actually arises from the built quality, and it is the obvious when you are text messaging. When you reach up for the d-pad, the slide will wobble, making your grip unstable. Apart from that, the whole keypad is extremely ergonomic, and even the lowest row of keys is very usable, as they are not that close to the edge of the device.

The half auto-open sliding mechanism works fine on the 5300. The only trouble would be the build, as we mentioned earlier, since it will not lock itself when slid up.

In terms of physical design, I am really happy with the 5300. It is a good-looking and ergonomic phone. The build problem and hidden microSD slot are relatively minor.

Multimedia
The main display on the 5300 is a 262k color TFT LCD measuring 2.0" diagonally. Color is vivid and visibility under the sun is excellent. It is funny that brightness cannot be adjusted, though the screen is already bright enough in most conditions.

The music player interface is completely revamped from older S40 devices, making it easier to skip tracks with just the d-pad. One thing that I miss from the older interface is the display of the song list under the on screen controls. In any event, you can still sort your music by artist, album, genre, and even composer. You can add files to your track list on the go, and the phone supports memory card hot-swapping. The built in memory is only 5MB, but the phone can take microSD cards up to 2GB. Formats supported are MP3, M4A, AAC, AAC+, eAAC+, and WMA. This should be enough for most people. Nokia claim that the 5300 can last for 12 hours for music playback.

Music can thankfully be played in the background, and I have not noticed significant slowing of the phone while doing so. Sound quality is decent, but not the best out there. There tends to be a hiss in the background, treble is a bit harsh, and the bass is not thumping. On top of the 3D widening effects available, users can choose from five equalizer presets, with two of them being user configurable. The built in 2.5mm headphone jack is a step up from the usual Nokia Pop-Port connector, though too bad it's not a standard 3.5mm jack. There is, however, a bundled 3.5mm adaptor, and while it doesn't look too attractive, it does the job, and allows use of any of your usual headphones. Notice that there are only two channels on the 3.5mm adaptor as oppose to three channels on the bundled handset (the third being for microphone in). If you use your own headphones you will not be able to use an external microphone.

The 64 voice polyphonic ringtones come out nicely. The 5300 is louder than the 5500, but loses out to the 6233 in terms of quality. Sound does get coarse at maximum volume, but I would say it is on par with the 6133, which is still not bad.

The camera on the 5300 is just a 1.3 megapixel CMOS unit, which is slightly below average nowadays. Photos can be taken up to 1024x768 pixels and videos at 176x144 pixels. Shutter lag is about half a second, and it usually takes about two seconds for a picture to be saved at highest resolution and quality.

The pictures turn out to be just okay, not great. White balance is a problem - the presets never seem to be accurate, especially indoors. Pictures at night are noisy, and compounded by the shutter lag, they generally turn out blurry.

Loading picture thumbnails in the gallery is quite fast, and it takes just two seconds to open an image full screen. I was impressed that the thumbnails of videos in the gallery will actually play when you highlight them. Once you open the file, you can subsequently zoom in and pan around the photo, or pause and fast-forward a video. Sending your media files via Bluetooth and Infrared is not limited unless there is DRM protection on the file.

The 5300 is able to play 3GP videos at 176x144 pixel resolution. You can view videos full screen, and even set them as video-ringtones.

Apart from the camera, I am quite happy with the 5300. It makes a good substitute for your personal audio player, but sound quality is not the best.

User Interface
The 5300 runs on the 3rd edition of Nokia's S40 user interface, and compared to earlier devices such as the 6233, the system on the 5300 is only slightly updated. The most striking improvements would be the completely redesigned Music Player interface, and the native support of A2DP, OMA DRM2, and Flash Lite 2. You can now also set Flash files and video files as wallpapers. Though some of these extra features are gimmicky, they are still welcomed.

There are a couple of things that make the S40 interface a lot more user-friendly than S60 devices. Firstly, you can change the font size and apply it to your message screen or even phonebook screen. This can make things much easier for people with less than perfect eyesight, and the difference is especially recognizable when you type in Chinese.

A welcome feature carried over from Nokia's S60 smartphones is the Active Standby screen. This allows you to have shortcut icons to your favorite programs, the music and radio stations you are listening to, upcoming appointments, notes, and alarms all on the standby screen. On the S40 user interface, you can customize the layout of the Active Standby screen, or you can simply turn if off.

The main menu is a 3x4 icon screen by default, though you may switch that to a list or a tab based view. The built in themes are all reasonably attractive, and this time the icons and icon animations have been updated. You can of course download or create your own themes. I am happy to say that full screen wallpapers are supported on S40, unlike S60 devices.

Apart from the layout out and the icons on Active Standby, users can also customize a "Go To" menu. This is another list-based menu that can be called up with the left soft key from the standby screen. If you choose not to use the Active Standby feature, you can set all four directions of the d-pad as shortcuts to applications.

In terms of user interface, Nokia has done a great job. The screens are easy to read, attractive, and highly customizable. Together with the fast response and great keypad, operating the 5300 is effortless.

Phone functions
The Nokia 5300 is a tri-band phone supporting GSM 900, 1800, and 1900MHz, though the American version supports 850MHz instead of 900MHz. Audio quality via the earpiece is loud and clear, and the speakerphone works fine too. Though not extremely popular where I am, Push-To-Talk is supported. Also, you can multitask in the middle of your conversations; apart from just recording or muting your conversations, you can even run the camera and snap a few shots at the same time.

Not counting the Flight Mode, there are six ring profiles that are fully customizable. You can change the profile any time by pressing the Power button, and you can also turn the phone to silent mode by holding the # key. Take note that timed profiles are also supported.