The plastic exterior of Nokia 5200 ($388 without operator plan) suggests the kind of phone that attempts in vain to snag a trendy, music lover. Only teenagers are likely to pick it up as it lacks the sleekness of a music phone when compared to other pricier music phones such as the Nokia 5700 ($658 without operator plan).

If you think you’ve seen this model somewhere before, it might be because it bears a distinct resemblance to both LG’s Chocolate design and Sony Ericsson’s W550i. There’s nothing spectacular about its red and white (or blue and white) themed casing, or size and measurements (according to the official Nokia website, it weighs 104.2g and has dimensions of 92.4 x 48.2 x 20.7 mm) but that’s pardonable since the phone is targeted at teenagers with a tight budget.

The keys and buttons are mediocre. I could navigate my thumb with ease but perhaps my thumb is oversized as I was inclined to press the wrong button several times before getting it right to unlock the phone. Typing text however, was more pleasurable. There was distension on the number buttons that prevented the above scenario to occur when typing a text message or a telephone number.

The easy-to-glide sliding function is probably the most attractive part of the design since the phone looks a bit too tacky for my liking. I had a ball of a time sliding the phone for no particular reason when my fidgety fingers were unoccupied.

The features of the phone are nothing to impress either since we’ve seen it all before. However, given the price, I’d say that it’s worth what you’re paying for. It has all the regular features such as Bluetooth technology, GPRS, infrared port, Stereo FM radio and a camera. This brings me to my next point, the camera.

While other Nokia counterparts and phone manufacturers are coming out with camera phones of almost the same notch as that of a digital camera, this phone humbly comes with a VGA camera with 4X digital zoom. It allows you to take pictures, but a slightly unsteady hand will cause the pictures to blur, and you won’t be able to tell if the picture is blurred from the 128 x 160 pixels CSTN (colour super-twist nematic, a colour form of passive matrix LCD) display screen. So be ready to be disappointed by the quality of the pictures you take from this phone.

If anything, the music note printed next to the screen screams out that it is a music phone. With that that in mind, I decided to put the sound quality to test.

The music junkie in me was excited to start filling the phone up with songs with the phone’s USB port. But while copying them into the phone, I realised that this supposed music phone only has 5MB of internal memory space. I kid you not. I had to compromise on the quality of my songs so that they could fit into this pathetic memory space. That said, the phone does come with a slot for a memory card (which unfortunately, I don’t own) and can store up to 2GB with its external memory. So I suggest that you invest in a MicroSD card if you intend to get this phone.

After deleting all my low quality songs so I can fit one high quality song, I concluded that the phone did live up to the expectations of a music phone after all. Its audio quality is comparable to an MP3 player and would have passed off effortlessly as regular portable speakers. According to the box the phone came in, the phone’s headset is built to optimise music as well.

Another good thing about the music player is that it doesn’t just allow MP3 files but its manual claims to be able to play AAC files too. That means you don’t have to bother changing the format of your songs to MP3 the way certain MP3 players require you to.

The Stereo FM radio and Music Player are set on the main background by default for easy access. The FM radio doesn’t have very good reception, but the impressive sound quality while playing recorded music makes up for that.

This phone is neither for the sophisticated, nor the fashionable. There’s nothing stylish about it, but what more can you expect from this price? So it’ll fit the bill if you’re looking for an affordable phone that can play your music files with superior audio quality and have all the fundamental features of a mobile phone.

The Nokia 5200 is available for $388 without operator plan.