Nokia N73

In common with other Nokia 'Nseries' and 'Eseries' phones of its time (late 2006), the N73 comes loaded with many software applications, including contacts, messaging, picture and video galleries, a music player, a Visual FM Radio, RealPlayer, an IM client, a WAP browser, a full web browser based on KHTML/WebKit, a Microsoft Office document viewer, a PDF viewer, an Adobe Flash Lite viewer and some games.

The majority of these applications support background execution; for example, one may listen to music while browsing the Internet, and then may switch to write a text message or e-mail, without having to close any applications. With the exception of the newer Sony Ericsson phones like K550 and W610, feature phones typically cannot do this or can do it in only a very limited way; for example, only the music player can run in the background.

Java applications as well as Symbian (S60 release 3) applications can be installed to or removed from the phone by the user, using either the Nokia PC Suite software, which is included with the phone, or the installer application on the phone itself.

The N73 uses a database system for the supplied 'Gallery' applications (which permanently run in the background, in order to reduce seek and operation times) and again these databases can be updated locally on the device itself. This means that supported image, video and audio files can be placed almost anywhere in the file system and browsed easily, and in the case of MP3 audio files, by ID3 tag (e.g. 'album', 'artist', etc.).

Notably, Nokia supports firmware upgrades to the N73 to be made by the user via a module in Nokia PC Suite or directly over-the-air.

Besides the original edition, Nokia released three other variants of N73.

All three versions of the N73 appear to have been updated to the same software as each other. The update on 26 June 2007, updates the standard N73's Music Player to the same version as the Music Edition's enhanced Music Player detailed above, while keeping the 'multimedia button' function, essentially making it an Internet Edition.

In 2008, updates with the standard features with Nokia Maps Application installed by default (but requires an external bluetooth GPS receiver), Nokia Lifeblog, PTT, and Search applications carried on from the previous updates, plus the addition is the Nokia Mobile TV application also installed by default (requires an external Nokia Mobile TV Receiver SU-33W) which is an application available on N77. The camera is much improved from earlier firmware. In this update, the phone takes 27 seconds to boot, compared to 42 or more in previous versions. Also, the N73 has 20 MB of RAM available after boot. A little change was users may not be able to install the N-Gage application which is modified to work in N73. Making it better compared to ME because of its multimedia keypad rather than having only a single usage button, same features of Music Player like ME that supports album art and visualisations, enhanced control interface and also available on start screen when menu key is pressed and hold after the phone boots up.

Also, during recent UK Nokia poster campaigns, the black (ME) version of the phone was advertised without the term 'Music Edition', and the O2 UK shop sells the N73 in both Silver/Plum and Black, with the Black version having the multimedia button rather than the music button.

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Nokia N73.

• Official Nokia N73 Product Page
• Nokia technical specs
• Bluetooth Qualification Program specifications