Nokia 6610 review

I'd like to apologize first for the long time it took us to re-organize and re-launch PhoneArena.com. The transition is already over and now I can start posting reviews that are long due. I'll try to have a new one every single week.
Nokia 6610 is currently (as of 02/14/2004) offered only from T-Mobile in the US. I chose to review it because of its low price and appeal to the average user. It is very similar in terms of feature to Nokia 7210, and it resembles Nokia 6100 in appearance.

The phone does not lack almost any feature required by the average user, except voice-dialing and voice-recording. I assume the reason for lack of the voice features is the limit of the system memory available.
The Main features of the phone are Java, MMS, speakerphone, color screen (I am not delighted about the 4096 colors only), tri-band operation, organizer and PC synchronization via Nokia PC Suite.

Nokia 6610 compared to SE T68, Nokia 3650 and Sony Ericsson T610

Nokia 6610 compared to SE T68, Nokia 3650 and Sony Ericsson T610

Measuring 4.2" x 1.8" x 0.7" (106mm x 45mm x 18mm) and weighting only 83oz the phone is what most people will find comfortable. It is very well built – with no loose or creaking parts. Keep in mind that I have seen some reports of tendencies to creak, so check your handset before purchasing it.

The infrared port and the power-on/off switch are located on the top of the phone. The power switch is very tiny and kind of hard to press if you are nailess.

Pop-port and the charging port are located at the bottom of the phone. Pop-port is Nokia's proprietory standard that is used to connect headsets, cameras etc. The only gripe I have is about the volume control which is located on the left hand-side. I had several people asking me how to manipulate the volume. The reason for the confusion is the rocker switch. It is hard to find, hard to press and there is similar non-operational switch on the right hand side also.

When the back cover is detached it reveals the BLD-3 Lithium-Ion batter and behind it is the sim card holder.

Back cover removed

The phone feels very comfortable in my hands, and as you can see it is not very longer then a credit-card.

Nokia 6610 next to credit card (ATT Sim card)

Nokia 6610 in hand

Nokia 6610 Display

Nokia 6610 features 128 x 128 pixels display with 4096 colors. The image quality is OK and the screen is viewed fine in most weather conditions. The screen is very bright for passive matrix, but can not be compared to the active matrix ones. The colors are saturated. I experienced some flickering when playing games and same ghost effects (the screen is not re-drawn fast enough so you see a trail after the moving object on the screen). Overall, for that class of phone, I am pleased with its screen.

Keypad
The phone keys are well positioned and large enough for comfortable dialing (even though the space between them is slim). A notable feature  - the keys from in the three columns have different shape so you can actually dial a number without looking at the keypad. Mastering this takes some training but since the phone lack voice-dialing, knowing the keys may come handy while driving.

The 6610 has four navigational keys, two select keys and dial and hang-up key. All the keys are very easily pressed with good clicking response.

Nokia 6610 keypad

Nokia 6610 is based on the Series 40 platform. All menu items are very well organized with help text that appears after 14 seconds of inactivity.
The speed of opening menus and performing actions seems to me somewhat sluggish compared to Nokia 6200 - a similar Series 40 phone.

1 - Phonebook:

The phonebook can hold around 300 entries with support for caller groups. Multiple-numbers per name can be added plus e-email address, web address, street address and a note. Unfortunately it lacks picture ID capability (showing you the picture of the caller). Overall the phonebook is very easy to search, navigate and operate. As I mentioned earlier, there is not voice-dialing also.

2 - Messaging:

After MENU is selected, Messaging is the first possible option. It allows the creating of text messages, multimedia messages (MMS), start a chat session or retrieve any voice messages. The phone supports long messages (up to 450 characters).

Predictive text input or the traditional "multi-tap" methods can be used to input the text.
To create a MMS, you have to follow a similar procedure - type the test, then add image or sound file. When done, you can send it to an email or to a phone number. The MMS feature supports the following picture formats: JPEG, GIF, PNG, OTA-BMP and WBMP and MIDI for audio.

If you are a heavy "SMSer" you will like the CHAT feature. To use it, you have to choose the phone number of the person you will be chatting with, select screen name and the fun begins. Receiving and sending messages looks like doing ICQ/MSN chat. One difference between regular SMS and CHAT SMS is that the latter can not be saved. They are only viewed while chatting.

This is how the chat looks like

3 - Call Logs:

Call log stores information about the last 10 missed,
10 received, or 20 dialed calls. It also adds the total
duration of all calls. When the number of calls
exceed the maximum, the most recent call replaces
the oldest.

• Missed calls (last 10)
• Received calls (last 10)
• Dialed numbers (last 10)
• Call timers (duration of last call;# of received calls, # of dialed calls; duration of all calls)
• GPRS data counter (shows the amount of sent and received GPRS data)
• GPRS connection times

Profiles:

Phone profiles allow you to customize your phone's behavior in different environments - for example you can set it to a "Meeting" mode and it will not ring. The following profiles are available for Nokia 6610:

• Normal
• Silent
• Meeting
• Outdoor
• Pager

In addition, every profile can be set when to expire ("timed profiles"). The customization for each profile consists of ability to change:

• How to ring (Ring, Ascending, Ring Once, Beep Once, Silent)
• Ringing tone 
• Ringing volume
• Vibration on/off
• Message alert tone (which sound to play when you receive a message)
• Keypad tones volume
• Warning tones on/off
• Alert for - allows you to select when the phone to alert you if a member of selected group is calling. Default is all, but can be changed to Family, VIP, Friend, Business etc.

Settings:

Nokia 6610 settings menu

Settings menu allows the user to control the main features of the phone. The main options are:

• Time and Date settings - change time, date; allows you to enable the Auto-update feature which changes the time automatically, but the service provider has to support it
• Call settings - includes options for making and receiving calls
• Call forwarding
• Anykey answer on/off
• Automatic redial on/off
• 1-touch dialing on/off
• Call waiting on/off
• Summary after call (shows the duration of the call after it ends)
• Caller-ID on/off
• Phone settings
• Language
• Automatic keyguard (locks the phone keys automatically after a period of inactivity)
• Cell info display (shows the current cell identity)
• Welcome note (enter text which will be displayed when the phone starts)
• System selection (set to automatic by default, but allows you to select different phone provider if you want and if you are authorized to do so)
• Help text activation
• Display settings
• Wallpaper on/off (allows you to select which image to be shows on the screen)
• Color schemes - (You can change the color of some display components in your phone, such
  as indicators and signal bars. Available schemes are: blue, violet, red, orange, gray, green, turquoise and pink available )
• Screen saver timeout - sets how long the screen saver will be on before going into power-save mode (turns off the screen)
• Display brightness
• Tone settings - allows you to modify all the options that were listed under Profiles.
• Accessory settings - sets how should the accessories behave (like headset, radio)
• Security settings - allows you to secure the phone against unauthorized use
• PIN code request (asked for PIN when the phone is switched on)
• Call restriction (requests the system to restrict calls from or to the phone)
• Fixed dialing on/off
• Closed user group
• Security level on/off (The security level determines your access to features when a “non owner” SIM card is used. A “non-owner” SIM card is one (other than the original)
  that is inserted after you power off the phone)
• Access codes (allows you to change any of the phone codes)
• Restore factory settings - restores the default factory settings without affecting the phonebook entries, language settings, counters or game scores.

5 - Alarm clock

Nokia 6610 alarm screen

The phone supports only one alarm, I`d like to see at least 3. The plus is that it even works when then phone is off

When the alarm sounds, you can SNOOZE it (love this feature at 6am) for 10 minutes or STOP to shut the alarm off.

 6 - Radio

Nokia 6610's FM radio works only if you have the headset plugged in. It is kind of disappointment, but in order to get decent reception, the phone uses the headset's cable as an antenna. The sound produced is very loud and clear. Nokia 7210 / 6610 also allows the radio to be heard via the built-in loudspeaker! 20 different stations can be bookmarked and automatic or manual search is available. In my test I was able to listen to the radio for around four hours (via the loudspeaker) before the batteries ran out.

 7 - Gallery

You can save pictures and ringing tones to folders in the gallery, or create folders of your own and
save them there.

Nokia 6610 main screen	You can create, edit, rename folders
Folders that I have	Files inside the folder

Additional picture and ringtones can be downloaded via MMS, WAP or the Nokia PC Suite. Keep in mind that the available phone memory is only around 300 kb, and the pre-installed images already occupy around 170kb and pre-installed tones are around 82kb, so unless you delete them, you do not have a lot of space left for MMS, JAVA application or more pictures.

The phone supports 4-voice polyphonic ringtones. It is better then monophonic, but can not be compared in any way with Samsungs 40-voices. Other then that, the speaker is very loud and clear.

8 - Organizer

Nokia 6610 features organizer with Calendar and To-do list. I have never been a fan of Phone's organizer because of the time wasted to create calendar entries or to-do items.

The calendar allows you to keep track of reminders, meetings, birthdays etc (up to 250 total). An alarm can be set to sound for any event. Five type of notes can be stored:

• Meeting
• Call
• Birthday
• Memo
• Reminder

The to-do list allows you to keep tracks of any tasks you have to do. Maximum of 30 notes can be saved, depending on their lenght. Three different priorities can be set.

9 - Games

Nokia 6610 comes with two pre-installed games - Chess Puzzle and Bounce. Of course the phone supports JAVA (J2ME) so you could download more games. The maximum application size is set to 64kb. Again, keep in mind that the phone's screen has low refresh rate which create flickering and ghost effects while playing games with fast moving objects.

10 - Applications

As I pointed out above, Nokia 6610 supports JAVA (J2ME) applications and games. New application can be downloaded using the Application Downloads shortcut. It leads to the T-mobile's wap site in my case, because my phone was purchased thought T-Mobile. Another way of downloading new applications is using Nokia PC Suite.
The two pre-installed application are Portfolio II and Converter II.

11 - Extras 

Nokia 6610 comes with several features under Extras - Calculator, Currency converter, Countdown times and Stopwatch. The only notable think about them is that the Stopwatch can measure split time and lap time.

12 - Connectivity

You can make a serial connection between your phone and a PC using the DKU-5 data cable, which is available for purchase as an accessory. Once you establish this connection, you can access phone information from your PC, or use your phone as a wireless modem. It may also be possible to make this same serial connection between your phone and an Infrared-equipped laptop or IR-equipped desktop PC using your phone's infrared port. 

The phone also features GPRS high speed data which is used to send MMS or use the web browser. 

13 - Services

Nokia 6610 has a built-in WAP browser you can use to connect to selected sites on the Internet.

PC Suite 5.0

PC Suite is included in the standard sale package. The software allow you to create own wallpapers, ringtones, to synchonize the data and edit the phonebook.

RF Performance, Battery life and Sound quality:

All three are very good. RF performance (aka "reception") is excellent. I have been always very pleased with Nokia's ability to create handsets with internal antennas that have better signal then the ones with external. Battery life is also great - around 3.5 - 4 days between charges.
The sound produced by the earpiece is loud and clear. The same can be said about the speakerphone.

Conclusion:

I am very pleased with Nokia 6610. The battery life is excellent - around 3-4 days normal use. It has most features the average user wants - Java, WAP, polyphonic, speakerphone. It is very well built with classic design. The sound quality and RF performance are excellent. Overall the phone is HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.