Lots of toys, when they work... (Nokia 7650)

Member Name: TheDF

Product:	Nokia 7650
Date:	22/04/03 (635 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Colour screen, Camera, Style

Disadvantages: Size, Battery life, Poor Usability

What a piece of kit! Or so I thought. I've owned a string of mobiles now, and I've found Nokia to be consistently the best manufacturer to suit my needs, and always capable of providing a good quality, solid, reliable (ish), and extremely user friendly phone. How disappointed I find myself with Nokia's latest offering is incredible. Why I hear you ask - let me begin.

The Nokia 6210 I was using previously was an excellent phone, solid, dependable, easy to use, but ultimately quite dull. After one and a half years with my network provider, I decided it would be time for an upgrade, and lo and behold, the idea of the 7650 was sown. Now, I will admit at this point, I was a bit of a shameless whore to try and get a free upgrade, but after several weeks of being told that the upgrade cost for the phone was going to cost me more than just getting a new connection, I decided enough was enough, and cancelled my contract.

And so the quest really began - after failing to get the PAK code to keep my number, I went through a couple of weeks of trawling the internet (and the high street) for a bargain, I had found nothing. However, on a chance visit to one of the major retailers out there on our old friend the high street (who shall remain nameless), I found a deal for a free phone on the tariff I was looking for. Joy! Or so I thought...

After looking into several contractual obligations to get the phone free (chiefly using a third party network provider), I decided to use a competitor for some serious price matching. With a little bit of haggling (actually I thought that even Mohammed Al Fayed couldn't orchestrate a deal of the magnitude of what I had achieved) I got the phone free on the tariff I wanted. And so, a full six weeks down the line I was happy. Well, to be honest, I nearly wept with the extreme satisfaction this had bought me.

But it's just a phone. I know that's what you're thinking. How could you possi
bly say that! I mean look at it, it's another classically designed piece of beauty from Finlands' finest - a work of art, that makes phone calls, and has a camera on it! As far as style icons go, this was as cool as the phone in The Matrix. Except you didn't need a leather trenchcoat to stop you looking like a sales manager.

So, that's a hefty chunk of the background out of the way - now down to business. Why did I go to such great lengths to get the 7650. Well, the stats speak for themselves - full colour screen, in-built digital camera, downloadable software, high-speed GPRS internet access, and Bluetooth connectivity. Damn, that's a great specs list whichever way you look at it. Or so I thought. I, unfortuneately brought the great hype.

Let's go through those again in a little detail shall we;

1 Full colour screen

At first, this is a truely great feature - especially when you get going with that lovely little camera toy that you get. But before the end of your first month, you'll notice that the contrast, whilst adjustable, is never quite right. Not only that, but all the little fingerprints and minor scratches that were never a problem on your last phone really annoy the hell out of you now. The applications already on the phone don't really make full use of the colour palette, and it's really just a great way to kill your battery (hence why the new non-colour phones really do last for days on a single charge)

2 In-built digital camera

This, I have to admit, was the ultimate selling point for me. I mean just think about never having to pay to develop a film again. Imagine being able to send pictures direct to other phones, or straight to e-mail. Picture it ever working to something like your expectations? I did, but I was wrong. The camera, whilst functional as a nice toy, really can't cut the mustard as a tool in any sense of the word - to get anything like a decent ph
oto out of it, you need to get the perfect lighting, judge your distance from the subject to the nearest micron (because the zoom is frankly pathetic), and have a hand steadier than Everest. Frankly, you've got more chance of seeing explicit snaps of me and Kate Moss cavorting on a billboard on the M25 than you've got of ever seeing a truely good image on this phone.

3 Downloadable software

Another great idea that really hasn't been properley implemented. Unless you own a laptop PC, the chances of you actually trawling through the net on GPRS to actually download any software are quite slim. Unless you want a phone bill that would be of equivalent cost to funding a revolution that is... Some of the bits and pieces that I have painstakingly searched for are actually fantastic little things. Assuming that is that you firstly, don't mind using a wealth of install once demos, and secondly, can actually find anything of any practical use at all. I've used a couple of games to kill the odd bus journey to work, but other than that, I'm really not going to pay $50 for a decent money management package. It defeats the object - you really need a PC to get the software, and you've got a PC, you can get better alternatives on that...

4 High speed GPRS internet access

At last, something that does what it says! The internet access on this phone is indeed extremely fast. In fact, it's quicker than the very 56kb modem I'm using right now, and the net is a dream on this phone. However, as the network providers have invested a lot of money into this new functionality, it means that checking my Hotmail on the go costs about as much as a fortnight in a five star hotel with all the trimmings. It's really great to be able to check your e-mails and the latest sports results, but when you consider that it's cost you less to go the game or send a letter, it's really a bit of a sham.

5 Bluetooth conn
ectivity

Having had the data kit for my last Nokia, I was quite concerned about being able to backup all the numbers, texts, and settings on my PC. Imagine my annoyance when I found out that Nokia designed the phone without provision for a data cable, meaning that a Bluetooth adapter for my PC would be required. A snip at a mere £65 quid (and even then, that's for a generic, non-Nokia approved item). Even more annoying (especially considering the bulk of the phone) is that the Bluetooth on the phone only supports data transfer. So no Bluetooth hands free kit then. Hurrah! All in all, I think I used the Bluetooth seriously once - to send my new number to a group of people.

And that's just the major selling points for the phone! On top of all these failed promises, I've found the my phone has an intermittent keypad fault, the PC Data Suite provided refuses to find my phone, and the fact the my keypad no longer recognises letters (meaning no texts, and frustratingly, no new contact entries)...

All in all, I would simply advise you to leave this phone alone. The Sony Ericsson P800 has all the same features, The Nokia 7250 has none of the same faults, the Samsung camera phone offering is smaller and has a protected screen, and the Nokia 6310 is a far greater business tool. This phone is a toy, and very little more. The call quality is average at best, the polyphonic ringtones are far too cheesy (although that is an endemic fault of all mobile ringtones), the user interface is so dramatically differnt you'd be hard pushed to believe it's a Nokia, and to add one further insult, Nokia made it the size of something you'd nromally need a mortgage for...

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