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MOBILE PHONE
Everything but the kitchen sink, but who needs it?
Okay, pretend for a moment you’re Nokia, the big kahuna in the mobile world, the big cheese, the market-leader. As you survey your domain, you see your little puny competitors scurrying around, releasing phone model after phone model. Then you see the telcos in European countries going absolutely bananas outbidding each other for 3G frequencies. Then you look at Japan, where a strangely named company called DoCoMo is providing future-fantastic services to those tech-nutty Japanese, including video conferencing. So what do you do? Simple, show them who’s boss and throw out yet another phone that you know will crush all in your path.
The Nokia 6680 is Nokia’s newest weapon of mass destruction. It’s a beautifully crafted gizmo with a sublime feature set. Make no mistake about it, this is the shape of phones to come. A vibrant 262k-color display, expandable hot-swap memory, Bluetooth, GPRS that’s seriously turbo-boosted by EDGE, MMS, email, instant messaging and not just one but two cameras! We can go on and on about how much Nokia’s newest is its best, how it’s soooo much better than its 6630 predecessor, a great phone in its own right – but wait, two cameras? What would anyone need with two cameras? Admit it, unless you’re a vain, egotistical and utterly narcissistic camera-whore, why on earth would you need two cameras? Well, think about it. 3G. 3G. 3G. If your lightbulbs need changing, here are two words, Einstein: video conferencing.
One of the cameras, the lower-res VGA is pointed straight at your mug. This serves the dual purpose of capturing your face while you speak, and at the same time hiding all your blemishes with its lower pixel count. The camera in the back is a 1.3 megapixel snapper that takes awesome pics and even comes with a real flash. Now this would be all swell and dandy if it worked, but there is a bit of sad reality: the local telcos here in our country don’t offer 3G services.
Now if that doesn’t put the brakes on your buying plans, we don’t know what will. It doesn’t make much sense to buy something that won’t work to its full potential, does it? The thing is, the 6680 is an excellent phone despite the fact that its most compelling features won’t work on our islands. In terms of usability, this has got to be Nokia’s most user-friendly phone to date. No funky keypads or obscure menu structures. Everything is exactly where you expect it to be. Even the normally static start page has been given a tweak, with five icons that represent commonly used apps (like messaging, contacts and the web-browser) sitting right there, ready for action. Maybe the magic is in the gorgeous 262k-color screen, with its lush detail and vibrant color. Whatever they did, they did it right.
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Two integrated cameras: 1.3 megapixel with flash and VGA camera. 3G (not supported by local telcos) and EDGE. 262,144-color display. Nokia XpressPrint printing solution. PictBridge. Hot-Swappable Expandable RS-MMC memory.
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Self-absorbed? This is the phone for you! Waiting for 3G? Don’t hold your breath!
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So what’s not to like? Precious little. The biggest peeve we had with the 6680 was with the slidy-camera cover thing in the back. It’s all good when it’s in the down position, but slide it up and a horrifying sense of cheapness takes over, like a plastic version of Jekyll and Hyde. It all turns into a squeaky plastic mess of cheapness. But that’s it! That’s the only thing we didn’t like.
The bottom line is that if you’ve heard of 3G services and want to catch a glimpse of it, or if you love yourself so much that you need the shutterbug overkill of two cameras, then get this phone. If you’re neither, then perhaps it’s best to look elsewhere. But if you’re the type who doesn’t mind spending a little extra for the chance to own the latest and the greatest, then you won’t find much to dislike about this phone, especially if you’re a Nokia-fan. Everything here is Nokia at its finest. They’ve raised the bar yet again, all aspects tightened, a weapon of mass destruction aimed straight at the heart of the competition. - Peter de Guzman
 Post your opinion or own review!
T3 Magazine Philippines - June 2005 Issue
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