The last time I went to an Alicia Keys concert was on 13th of November 2002 in the Heiniken Music Hall. It was a lot smaller and the concert was part of something called MTV 5 Night Stand. Don’t know what it was but that’s what it says on the tickets I still have. Anyway, Alicia Keys had just dropped her debut album that year “Songs in A minor” and since  I loved the album I went to her concert. I still remember the energy, vibe and ofcourse incredible performance and hoped to catch another concert of hers in the future. When I was in China she came back to the Netherlands for her “I Am” tour and I was pretty annoyed that I wasn’t able to see it. But I got another chance when I heard she was gonna to a concert this year for her latest album “The Element of Freedom”.

On 28th of January when Marco, Jooky and me were having hotpot at Marco’s place we were talking and at some point after eating the conversation went to the fact that Alicia Keys was going to do a concert here in the Netherlands (in the Gelredome in Arnhem) so we decided to check when it was and if there were still tickets left. Well, there were still tickets and in the spur of the moment we decidede to get the tickets and voila. Flash forward into time it’s 8th of May and we were off to the concert.

We left Amsterdam eraly afternoon and arrived in Arnhem at the Gelredome and parked our car there and went off to downtown Arnhem to chillax. We met up with with some other friends of mine (Pamela, Sheng, Yingying, Ying, Sammy, Xuan and a friend of Xuan) that were also going to the concert for dinner and after that we were off back to the Gelredome.

The support act was Melanie Fiona, which when I heard the was like … ehhhh who is she? O_o But when I heard her perform I was like ohhhh I know two songs of hers (“Give it to me right” and the song “It kills me”) But then again, I was there to see and hear Alicia Keys. After the Melanie and a short break the concert finally started and what a perfoemance it was. It was amazing, just like the concert I remember from 2002 and I loved the songs and energy. I am bummed that I didn’t bring my point and shoot to the conert. But I will definatly try to go to any future concerts Alicia might give because I’ve been a fan of her music since her debut album. Though I must admin that I prefer her first two albums more that the last two, but maybe that’s because I need to listen more to them. I had a blast yesterday and the concert was the icing on the cake. I’m off to listen some more Alicia Keys and see you next post. Leaving you behind with a vid someone else made at the concert yesterday. Damn I’m still bummed out that I didn’t bring my point & shoot Anyway, enjoy Empire state of mind. C ya.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z2Gtkx9LN2w

Anyway, I went and looked around at the laptops when this little baby caught my eyes. I was kind of looking for a new laptop which I can use for lightroom and would be much more portable for vacations and stuff. My good old trused Asus M6Ne is roughly 6 year old and had trouble with lightroom where cpu usage shot up to 100% and stayed there when I was post processing raw images.

Like I said, I was looking around at the 13 inch laptops and I already had this model in mind and the Asus U30 (new ones with the new i3, i5 or i7 cores from intel). But since they only had the older versions I started checkin out the HP DV3-2350ed. I liked the specs: i5 Core, integrated graphics AND dedicated graphics ATI 4550, 13 inch, 500GB harddisk etc etc etc … but the price wasn’t that nice € 999,- but since MediaMarkt was having that  offer I decided to see if I could get it with a nice discount. It had to be cheaper than € 780,- since that was the cheapest I could get it for online. I was lucky and together with 3 other people we managed to get a discount of 22,3% making it cheaper then the cheapest online price I could find at that time. So I ended up with a new laptop and I’ve been using it ever since. Battery life is great and I can work on it roughly 3 to 4 hours on one charge.

I do need to still get used to some of the things that are different in Windows 7 compared to Windows XP and since the HP DV3-2350ed comes with Windows 7 Home Premium. Ever since I tried the Windows 7 Beta on my Asus laptop (read here) I’ve been very impressed with it and have been waiting untill laptops started shipping with Windows 7 and meeting the demands I had for them. Because HELL NO I was NOT going to get a laptop with Windows Vista. Granted Vista seems to be good after SP2 came out but I didn’t want the hassle. I know since my gf Ana has a laptop with Vista and she has had a lot of issues with Vista. In short, I am happy with my new portable laptop and hopefully it will keep me company as long as my good old truted Asus M6Ne did because 6 years is a LOOOOONG time in the world of computers. The only thing I need to do is find a nice ghost image program for Windows 7 so I can make a nice image which I can restore shoud I ever want a fresh install. Or I need to check what kind of features Windows 7 Home Premium has concerning back ups. Yep, there’s still a lot to explore in Windows 7 for me. Time to start Windows nerding again …

Anyway, I had to be at the airport at 6am since my flight was leaving at 7am. The baggage drop off went smoothly and after passing through customs I was off to the gate. My flight left on schedule and I arrived at Barcelona airport around 9am. Ana landed at Barcelona at 8am and was waiting for me to exit at arrivals. As I said, flying wasn’t too bad. The only thing that was unpleasant was the moment of landing. The experiences of flight NW253 still came back and I was pretty anxious when we touched down at Barcelona airport. But other than that part I had no problems with flying, I guess the landings will be a bit uncomfortable for me the next few flights but that should be fine in a few more flights.

After meeting my sweetheart we were off to the bus which would take us to the city where we would have to tranfer to the subway. We got at the hotel after an hour of travelling and checked in. Since our room wasn’t ready yet we dropped our luggage and went for a stroll and some lunch at Glories. Our hotel was a 10 minute walk from here and a 15 minute walk from Sagrada Familia. After a bite to eat and a chillaxing sit at Starbucks we went back to the hotel to drop our stuff at the room and were off to downtown for dinner and a quick stroll in Passeig de Gracia.

Saturday and sunday we walked around in the Catalunya, La Rambla, Mercat de la Boqueria, Barrio Gothic and El Born area. The weather wasn’t that warm those days but it was dry and sunny. On monday we were in for a big surprise, in the morning it was raining lightly and cloudy so we decided to take it nice and easy and do indoor stuff. So we were off to La Rambla for lunch and then off to the aquarium where we walked around for a bit. After getting out of the aquarium we was it was snowing lightly so we decided to stroll around in the shopping mall next to the aquarium hoping it would stop snowing by the time we were done. Alas it didn’t and it started snowing harder. Yep we thought to have escaped the cold and snowy weather to end up in … yep snowy weather in Barcelona of all places O_o.

Luckily for us it only snowed on monday, well in Barcelona that is, because the next day it was sunny but cold and the only thing that was a reminder of the heavy snowfall on monday were the snowmen that were scattered around here and there. Tuesday was Gaudi day and we did all the touristic stuff that had to do with Gaudi. We visited Sagrada Familia, Park Güell, Casa Mila (aka La Pedrera), Casa Batllo. We had a lot of luck with the sunny weather and sunset when we were on the roof of Casa Mila. The other places we did the remainder of our vacation were Tibodabo, which was ok. The view is very nice but there’s nothing to do there. And ofcourse we did the Montjiuc area and visited Camp Nou.

It was a very nice vacation, except for that one day of snow, and I can really recommend Barcelona to all of you. I miss the fresh coconut juice at La Boqueria and nice food everywhere. Next time I visit I’ll need to do some more excursions outside of Barcelona. We didn’t manage to see the Dali village/museum and Montserrat. But there’s always a next time, and then probably also try so go to Madrid and Valencia. Anway, the flight back to Amsterdam was nice since Ana was flying to NY with a transfer in Amsterdam. So we flew back to Amsterdam together. At schiphol we had to go our seperate ways, Ana to catch her connecting flight and me to go get my luggage and go home. Can’t wait till July since Ana will be coming to Dutchland for a whole week. But in the meantime I’ll cherish the memories of our vacation in Barcelona.

If you’re curious, pictures can be found here: Barcelona vacation March 2010

See you at the next update.

In the end I started thinking that I really don’t shoot that much wide angle at this point in time so I started looking around at a replacement for the kitlens and after some test shooting I decided to buy the Tamron SP 17-50mm F/2.8 XR Di II.

Well since I noticed I was missing range on the wide end I decided to get a wide angle for my Canon 500D. This time the contenders were the Tokina 11-16mm f2,8 AT-X, the Sigma 10-20mm f3,5 EX DC HSM and the Canon EF-S 10-22mm f/3,5-4,5 USM. Each has it’s pro’s and con’s.

The Tokina has f2,8 across the whole range which is very nice in low light, the price isn’t to bad (cheapest of the three lenses) and it comes with the lens hood. Cons for this lens (at least for me) are, the range is very limited, I don’t like the way switching AF to MF works. Both those cons would irritate me a lot though it’s a nice lens.

The Sigma has f3,5 across the whole range and a better range compared to the Tokina, it also comes with the lenshood and pricewise isn’t that much more expensive then the Tokina and cheaper then the Canon 10-22mm. To be honest I don’t really know why I didn’t check this one out. Probably because the Canon wasn’t what much more expensive compared to the Sigma and I know the Canon 10-22mm is a great lens looking at the reviews and reading user experiences.

So in the end I decided to buy the Canon 10-22mm eventhough it’s the most expensive of the three and it doesn’t some with a lenshood. Really Canon, this lens is mad expensive for a crop cam just like the Canon 17-55mm f2,8 and you don’t throw in the lenshood? Oh well, guess only L lenses get a lenshood included. Though both the 10-22mm and 17-55mm could be considered L class equivalent on crop camera’s imho. Ever since I bought this lens it’s been used quite a lot, specially on trips I’ve made since buying it. During my vacation to Barcelona and my recent daytrip to Dusseldorf I probably used it for 80 to 90% percent of the time and the rest of the time my Tamron 17-50mm f2,8 was on. I absolutely love this wide angle and am able to capture a lot more scenery and it makes shooting pictures of me and Ana (aka self portraits of us together) a lot easier.

All in all it’s a good lens and I am very happy with it. For now I guess I have most of the focal ranges I shoot at covered. Wide angle with my Canon 10-22m and a walk around and low light with my Tamron 17-50mm. The only range  I don’t have it tele but I don’t think I’m gonna get a tele lens soon. And if I do it will probably be eiher the Canon 24-105mm f4 IS or the Canon 70-200mm f4 IS.

I went to a councellor from victim support services because I needed to talk to someone who has expecience with people that experienced terrible things. I did so because I was afraid that I might have a backlash and might not be properly processing the experience of NW253. It was a very productive session and I was glad to hear that I was processing it in a proper manner and that I didn’t have to be afraid of a backlash. Those words comforted me a lot and he also explained why I was restless, easily irritated, less concentrated and wasn’t sleeping well. All of that helped me understand a lot more of what I was going through and helped me reflect on things. He also advised me to take time to heal (for a lack of better words) because it would take time, and at present time it might still take time to get over certain aspects. Like flying for example, on my vacation a few weeks ago I was very anxious during take off and landing. But that will get less in time and with more flying. The main difference with this kind of healing is that it’s not physical but psychological. You can see a scar heal in time because it’s visible, emotional healing is the same. The difference is you can’t see how far that scar has healed.

Like I said, that session helped a lot and I now roughly 3 months after NW253 I am doing fine and moving on with life. I can concentrate a lot better, am not quickly irritated as before, less restless and sleep a lot better. Though I have days that I still sleep very lightly or bad. I appreciate life even more, which I already did after the car accident I was in during my travels in China during the Olympics in 2008. Though I have my moments and still complain. Guess it’s human nature to complain about stuff. But I do try to look at the bright side of life, a cup is half full and not half empty. Carpe diem, live life to the fullest, enjoy the moments you have and the people you care about.

Yeah I know, a lot of philosophical stuff but to end in an a humorous, not so serious and a bit of a sarcastic note. Here’s Monthy Python “Always look on the bright side of life”

www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlBiLNN1NhQ

The next morning after not really sleeping and being very scared to miss my flight I decided to get out of bed around and take a shower hoping that would be refreshing. Which it wasn’t since it was just after 5am. O_o Anyway, I took a shower and packed my stuff in my carry on and switched on the tv and watch some CNN since I still had a  few hours to go before heading back to the airport to catch my flight to NY. Around 7am ish I decided that sitting around in my room wasn’t really helping so I took my stuff and went down to the reception to check out and wait for the shuttle bus to the airport.

On my way to the lobby I met a fellow passenger of flight NW253 and as we were waiting we talked about our experiences on the flight and she told me that she was visiting a friend of hers and that we both didn’t want to fly but if we wanted to get to our destination we had to. While talking in Dutch the shuttle bus arrived and we were off to the airport while talking and making small talk with the other people on the shuttle. We got at the airport and went through security and went our seperate ways. Sadly I forgot to exchange contact info with her. Since I was early I walked around and got me a newspaper and a Starbucks mug as souvenirs from Detroit and waited at the gate to board my plane to NY.

The flight wasn’t pleasant and I was eyes everyone that looked suspicious in my eyes, hey excuse me for being paranoid the day after surviving failed terrorist attack. Anyway, the flight went as scheduled and we arrived nicely on time. But then Murhpy decided to visit and I had to walk around JFK with 4 other passengers to find our suitcases which took another 2 extra hours. Yay not only was I 18 hours later in NY but I also had to spend another extra 2 hours to get my suitcase back starting at terminal 4 going to terminal 3 and finally finding it at terminal 2. Yep I shouldn’t have checked in my suitcase the evening before and should have been worried when the dude at the counter didn’t relable my suitcase ensuring me that it wasn’t nescessary even when I asked him about that.

Ana was waiting for me to find my suitcase, she came to pick me up with her mom and younger brother. I finally saw her and we could go to her place since I was staying at her place and my vacation could finally begin. We got at her place after having lunch and I rested a bit before heading off to Times Square. I had bought tickets for Jersey Boys for that evening and I loved the show. I can recommend it to you all reading this, specially if you like music of Frankie Valli or music from that era in general. The next day we went to Atlantic City to spend a day together and walked the boardwalk and enjoyed the nice sunny weather. We went back to NY the next day and had a slow evening. It was nice spending time with my gf.

Tuesday Ana had to work and I spent a day with my relatives that I have living in NY. A nice family day and it was fun Wednesday Ana and me went to see the Christmas tree at Rockafella Center and met up with Suzanne for some Japanese food. Thursday was New Years Eve and we spent the evening at Applebees. Around 11pm we decided to go outside to get a good spot to see the ball drop and count down. It was raining lightly and it was a bit cold but it was all worth it. The ball drop was a nice experience and I still can’t believe that people actually start standing on Times Square from 11am ish. In the cold O_o

The next morning I packed my stuff and I since I was feeling sick, I spent the rest of the morning and afternoon in bed sleeping. I couldn’t eat and felt feverish. In the afternoon Ana took me to JFK and where I checked in and we enjoyed each other company before I had to board the plane to Detroit where I had to trasfer to catch my flight to Amsterdam. I really didn’t feel like flying with the events a weel earlier still on my mind. Both take offs and landings on the flights back were shitty experiences! Luckily since I wan’t feeling to well I slept through both flights only waking up for landing.

After getting out of the plane and to the baggage claim thinking the trip was over I got another nasty surprise involving my suitcase. Appearantly my suitcase was labled wrongly and I was “Mr. Berger” on a flight from NY to Bergen in Norway! WTF!!! How the hell could my suitcase be wrongly labled after I asked if my luggage would be directly labled to Amsterdam and I got my boarding passes just a few moments before my suitcase was labled! Anyway, after filling out a missing luggage form I went through customs where I was greeted by my parent who were waiting for me and picking me up. We got home and I unpacked my carry on, had some food and went to sleep. Luckily my suitcase was found in Bergen, Norway and a KLM employee called using the number that was on a personal luggage tag that I put on my suitcase when travelling. They said my suitcase was going to be sent back to Amsterdam the next day and that I should have it end of the next day. Which actually did happen the next day and I was finally done with all the crap concerning my travels with Delta/Northwest. I’ve never experienced this kind of suitcase trouble all the years I’ve traveled with different airliners.

Well, eventhough the traveling part of the vacation was total crap I did manage to enjoy my vacation and spend time with my gf and that’s what was important. And ofcourse me still being alive and being able to tell the story of how I experienced flight NW253. Well, this is it concerning my vacation. In my next post the days after coming back and the reality of flight NW253  finally hitting me … and the impact it had and has on me …

I woke up at 4am to catch a quick Skype date for an hour with Ana before she went to sleep in NY. Christmas started perfectly for me as me and Ana skyped untill my 5am (her 11pm aka NY time) when she went to bed and sleep and I could get ready to leave for Schiphol at 6am to drop off my luggage and start my trip to NY which would be going through Detroit. I got at the airport and dropped off my luggage since I already checked in online so I didn’t have to cue up for luggage drop off. After dropping off my luggage I said bye to my parents who were so nice to bring me to the airport and to wish them a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and that I’d be contacting them when I arrive in NY. After walking though customs I called a friend of mine (Vivièn) to meet up since she was working that day and at that time. We spoke for a while, wished each other a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year and she went back to work and I was off to gate E7 to catch my flight (NW253) to Detroit where I would have to transfer to flight NW7274 for NY JFK.

Anyway, I got at gate E7 and lined up behind the other people waiting to be interviewed by security personel about my destination, reason of visiting the States, about my luggage and stuff like that. After being interviewed and allowed to go to the security screening I had to line up again for screening. My bag went through security and I had to take my DSLR bag out of my carry on so it could be scanned properly as I walked through the metal detector. I didn’t have to take off my shoes though … or did I … hmmm can’t really remember that detail. But anyway, I repacked my DSLR bag and everything and noticed it was really crowded at the gate after going through security. The flight was packed and I didn’t take notice of my surroundings since it was crowded and pretty early. Specially since I was already awake since 4am at that time. We all waited till boarding started and off we were in the plane. I went to my seat at 37J and put my carry on away and fiddled around on my E72 on FB that I was in the plane and we were waiting to take off.

Well, take off took like forever, we had a delay of 90 minutes before finally taking off. Because the wings had to be de-iced which took quite a while and we had to wait for traffic control to give the green light for take off. All in all we left 90 minutes behind schedule. The rest of the flight was smooth sailing and pretty boring, just like any flight you might have been on so I’ll spare you the boring description of the plane food and trying to pass time sleeping or listening to music.

Time skip …. fast forward to 30 ish minutes before landing in Detroit.

We managed to make up for the 90 minutes delay and were on schedule like our initial ETA (Estimated Time of Arrival) stated, which was around 12pm. That ment I would have to spend 3:30 hours at the airport since my connecting flight to NY JFK was leaving at 3:30pm. So even if we did have the delay of 90 minutes I would still have more then enough time to catch my connecting flight. At that time I was thinking: “Wow, nicer. I’m impressed we made up 90 minutes delay. Things are going very smoothly after a slight setback at departure.” Boy was I wrong about that … As we were appoaching Detroit airport the cabin crew and pilot started their landing procedures and announcing to the passengers to take their seat, put on their seatbelts, put their seats in the upright position, locking the table tray, switch off all electronic devices etc bla bla bla. As you can read I’ve heard this more than enough times to know what they ramble without actually listening to the announcement. Anyway, we were all busy doing that stuff when suddenly me and everyone in the back compartment started hearing people scream and panic in the compartment in front of us. First thing me and some people sitting around me were thinking was that a passenger had an heart attack or seisure or something like that. The cabin crew started running towards the compartment and then a lot more people over there started sreaming and actually freaking out. All this time we in the back were told to stay calm and in our seats. It still wasn’t scary since I was still thinking a passenger in the front was really having a bad situation untill we started hearing people scream: “Help, oh my god. Fire, Fire. Help!!! etc” and everyone in front of us freaking out. I started smelling smoke from the fire as did the other people in the back and then cabin crew running back to find the fire extinguisher to put out the fire. That is when I started to worry and get scared. At that point just about everyone was either worried, stressed or scared of what was happening in the front. The scary part for me was not knowing what the hell was going on or how bad it was in the front because I could not see anything. I could only heard the screaming and smell the smoke. While all this was going on the cabin crew instructed us to keep our seats and our belts on and try to keep calm. Well … everyone panicking and all the screaming wasn’t helping but everyone stayed in their seat.

After what seemed like ages we heard people clappic and sort of cheering (I can’t really remember it that clearly anymore if they actually cheered) but they sounded relieved and the screaming stopped. Which made me feel a lot safer then the cabin crew screaming to us to stay calm. An announcement was made that someone tried to set the plane on fire and that the offender was being detained and held and that the situation was under control. Well, the steward was announcing that he sounded scared like hell and out of breath. I was joking that his announcement wasn’t really having a calming effect. Well after all of that we started with final approach and landed, which felt like it took ages. When we landed at tome point we were being escorted by a lot of police and security cars to out gate. I could see this since I had a window seat.

After we got to the gate we had to wait for the offender to be escorted out and the people that were injured too. Everyone was getting really anxious to get off the plane because a lot people had to catch connecting flights and all of us were not thinking of a failed terrorist attack at that time. We were all under the impression that some idiot set up fireworks and tried to make a fire on the plane or something like that. But that was about to change after we got off the plane. We were all herded to the baggageclaim area and detained for quite a while. Only being able to have some water from a water fountain and to go to the toilet one at a time. After a few hours security brought in dogs to sniff us and our carry ons and when that was done we had to wait some more without getting information, any food or any medical treatment (the young and elderly) or victim help. And we could not communicate to our loved ones to tell them we’re ok! At some point we were moved to a hallway like a herd of cows, I had no clue why but we had to sit there for about an hour without getting information as to why o how long it was gonna take. We didn’t get any water or food and if we wanted water or to go to the toilet we had to cue up and were escorted one at a time. I felt like I was being treated like a criminal while I was the damn victim.

At some point we got more information that there was more going on and that they had to scan the luggage so it would be safe for us to be in the baggageclaim area. When we got there they finally had a semi game plan on how to proces us like a herd of cows. We had to cue up for interviews with a FBI agent to tell what we saw, heard and experienced during the flight. After that we could go through customs and security and resume our flights or be rebooked etc. Just like that, no NWA/Delta personel helping all of us from flight NW253 with rebooking or hotel or whatever. Nope, we had to arrange all of that ourselves. I mean that’s really shitty crap service to your customers that have been through shit. Like I said, totally no medical care on stand by as far as I could see or any psychological help for the passengers of flight NW253. We were left in hanging in the cold! (If I remember my expressions correctly) A lot of people didn’t want to fly anymore that day but no we had to worry about getting to our destination on our own. Well after being interviewed and getting through customs I had to cue up to rebook my flight to NY which already landed in NY by the time I lined up at 6pm!!! It took another hour for me to get to the desk and had to find out that yes there were still flights to NY but NO there wasn’t a seat available for me anymore.

So I got booked on a flight that was leaving at 10am the next day and got a hotelroom with a food voucher and had to find my way on my own again. Like I said bad frigging service. No wonder NWA and Delta had to merge if this is how they treat everyone when stuff happens. Anyway, after a long day and getting to the hotel and having crap food and talking to other passengers, watching CNN and hearing it was a frigging terrorist attack instead of a nutbag setting of fireworks I posted something on FB and went to sleep.

More about the rest of my vacation aka part 2 coming soon …

Yes, I’ll be spending Christmas and New Years Eve in NYC with my sweetheart Ana. I’ll only be there for a week but can’t think of a better way to spend the holidays than with the one I love. It’s going to be a busy week, saturday we’ll be going to Jersey Boys. Sunday and monday we’ll be in Atlantic City. No plans yet for tuesday and wednesday as of now but probably chillax somewhere. hmmm probably we’ll hit Rockafella center for the Christmas tree and skating. I still need to visit either Empire State or Top of the Rocks for some nice skyline and area shots of NYC. New Years Eve me and Ana will probably be at Times Square between the mad ass big crowd. O_o Well, it’s something I’m probably only doing once in my lifetime so why not. You’ll read or hear all about it when I get back. But for now I still need to get through 4 more days of work and travelling with all this snow. I’ll leave you all with a chrismas song to get you in the Christmas mood. Just love the way she plays the piano in the beginning.

As you can see the E72 isn’t that much different looking compared to its predecessor, the E71. Though ithad gotten a few nice upgrades in certain areas and works and handles a lot nicer than the E71. Main differences:

E71 vs. E72
3,2MP vs. 5MP
S60 3rd edition FP1 vs. S60 3rd edition FP2
normal d-pad vs. optical d-pad
2,5mm jack vs. 3,5mm jack
369MHz CPU vs. 600MHz CPU

E72 specific:
flash light, usb charging and come more things I can’t be bothered to mention

Anyway, since I’ve been using de E72 for a week my old E71 became my business phone. I swapped the simcard from my business phone (HTC Touch Pro T-mobile branded) asap into my E71. I can to everything with the E71 except for proper navigation. That’s what my Touch Pro had become to me for now haha. An PND (Personal Navigation Device) with Windows Mobile Battery life of the E72 has been amazing, but then again I can’t really say anything usefull since I’ve only had it for a week but it lasted 5 days on initial charge and I was playing around with it quite a lot and also using itas my mp3 player. So it this is what I can expect from battery life I will really like the E72. Because my E71 battery has been getting less throughout the year, only lasting me 2 or 3 days max with an average of 3 hours mp3 listening and some texting, calling per day.

There are a few changes that I have to get used to on my E72, the optical trackpad works surprisingly well but it’s still something I need to get used to and most of all, the menu’s have been rearranged. So I have to find my way again on the E72. Mail for Exchange works for synching my work e-mail but the only thing that’s not working properly is that it only gets a part of the e-mail and won’t download the full message. The same thing happens with the E71 but when you read the e-mail it will automatically download the remainder of the e-mail. Whereas the E72 won’t and doesn’t seem to have that option. Which kind of sucks. Hopefully Nokia will fix this problem in the next firmware. Or it might be an issues with how Mail for Exchange interacts with Zarafa (which we use instead of Microsoft Exhange).

Don’t know how long I’ll be using this phone but I know I’ll be happy with it for the coming year. Knowing myself I might buy an eventually follow up for the E72 when it’s going to be announced and released but I am guessing that will take another year or two. The E71 has been on the market for about 2 year by now so if the release schedule of the E72 can be used as an indication it will be end 2011 or early 2012 before an E73 is on the market. In the meantime I’ll be content and happy with my E72.