The Nokia 3200 (Nokia 3200)

Member Name: xynix

Product:	Nokia 3200
Date:	16/12/03 (5100 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Price, Toys!, Exchangable Covers

Disadvantages: Case might break, Covers don't cover sides, Might be hard to transfer pictures

My previous phone was all business, the Nokia 6310i.

Once I saw the 3200 on Nokia's site I had to have it. I remembered the days when I had to have every bell and whistle in an electronic product and that?s how the perception of the phone came across. We'll, receiving it hasn't disappointed me.

First the cost. Street value is 250-300 euros without service. I was able to upgrade and got it for only 49 euros on a corporate account. There are other specials available for 50 euro purchases around Ireland as well from the 3 main carriers. So price was right up there with perfect, considering another new 6310i would run me 100 euros on the same corporate account.

The gadgets. This is a swiss army phone. The only thing it's missing is a bottle opener, and for that I can still use my teeth.

Changeable cover: This is really cool. Nokia sends 3 cover inserts with the phone. Each one is made of the bumpy plastic that moves as you move the phone. So it's a little animated and comes through the clear cover nicely. These covers don't wrap around the phone like I thought but just cover the front and back. The sides remain an of off putting light gray and you can see parts of the interior. Not the best design, but it doesn't bother me personally. It also comes with 10 templates to either print or draw upon. You can also use plain paper. Software is not included but can be downloaded from Nokia's website free of charge to design the covers of pre-existing .jpg files.

Camera: The camera is about as good of quality that you're going to get with a phone like this. It's hot key enabled so you simply press the central control key in the up position and the camera is activated. At the highest quality with a few apps or games installed you can easily store 20-40 images on the phone at a time. You can use the supplied software to shrink the image and assign it to contacts so when they call, a picture pops u
p showing them. Fun :P

Radio: Yeah, weird.. a radio. However the first night I had it I went out to 'the town.' The cabbie was listening to some old Irish music and the radio immediately came in handy. Plugged in the head phones, turned it to my fav station and walla.. i was immersed in Friday night dance music. The radio works everywhere, Europe and the states. Not the easiest to control stations but it does have an automatic search function that really doesn't work well. So use the manual tuner, then save the station to one of 20 assignable slots for easy recall. You can use the radio over the external speaker but you have to plug the headphones in first for some strange reason. You can't just turn it right on to the speaker. Headphones and hands free kit are included with the phone.

Flashlight: I don?t know, I?m sure it will come in handy one day. It's not all that powerful and it's actually two clear LEDs that shine not so well. It would be great to find an earring or something in a dark pub, or a keyhole if you're really to drunk to find it in the dark. But then you probably wouldn't be able to find your phone or keys either. Anyhow, it's there if you need it.

Menu and interface: Menu is simple enough, i prefer having icons to a text list and it makes it much easier to access favorite areas. There are shortcuts you can assign for hotkey access. A menu is a menu...

Quality: Construction quality is nice enough. The keys are tacky clear-coated plastic and they don't feel cheap which is an important quality. The case feels like it couldn't take much of a beating though. This is obviously because it uses exchangeable cover inserts .. but that?s a trade off. I prefer the inserts and a cheaper case. I would imagine you'll be able to buy replacement covers quite cheaply in the not to distant future.

Software: As I mentioned, you can download the software from Nokia's websi
te for free of charge. It comes with several tools. You can edit any jpg and turn it into wallpaper for the phone (which is color of course). Use the IR port to then send the image to the phone. It also comes with a music utility. You can find a website that has MIDI files and use the software to convert the MIDI into a ring tone and then send that to the phone as a polyphonic tone. Add contacts and manage SMS. You can also sync up with an MS Outlook calendar if you desire (I do, and it works great). There are a couple more tools that come with the software as well.

Over all quality: Excellent.. It's a great phone, especially for the price. It's a lot of fun and comes with a lot of little entertaining gadgets. It's also easy enough to download new apps if you want games. The color screen is great quality as well and fast motion games consist of very little 'blur.'

Be aware though. There are 3 methods to get your pictures off the camera. A cable which is NOT supplied. Using an IR port, which most desktops don't have. Or by uploading the pictures via GPRS which can be pricey if you're a top-up customer. I suggest buying the cable which is around 10 euros or so.

Summary: