Nokia N91 smart phone

Could this smart phone be the new iPod?

The long-awaited music phone from Nokia is here, with a 4GB hard disk and a smart, stainless steel 3G handset. iWho?

Below the screen are dedicated music-player controls, including a button that starts up whatever you were last playing. There's no scroll wheel, but you can slide the controls down to reveal the keypad and skip through tunes by tapping in the first letters of an artist, song or album name, which we found much quicker.

Sound quality is as good as that of the iPod and the Sony Ericsson W800i, but we got less than 12 hours out of the battery when playing music. Used just as a phone, the handset didn't need recharging for just over a week, though.

We managed to get just over 1,000 MP3s onto the hard disk by dragging and dropping via USB. Although there's no memory card slot you do get Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connections. The headphones socket is a standard 3.5mm mini jack, so you can upgrade the supplied cans - but, unlike with the W800i, you will lose the in-line remote control if you do.

Using the device as a phone, we found the keypad buttons a touch on the small side for our big fingers. The operating system is the standard, easy-to-use Series 60, which looks better than ever on the large, superbly sharp LCD.

The emphasis is on music, but Nokia hasn't forgotten that pictures are almost just as important. A two-megapixel camera provides decent stills and video, but it's not quite as good as the snapper on the N90.

This is a power-packed handful that genuinely offers you the choice of leaving your iPod at home - it's just a shame it's a little too big to love.