One reason we can't wait for 3G to take off in the US
posted Sep 2nd 2004 9:23AM
When the Nokia 6630 (aka Charlie) was announced earlier this year we were impressed with its features, but not taken by the design. Last weekend at a meeting of the Bay Area Mobility Forum I had the chance to play with a real 6630 and all I can say is that, well, I'm sorry Engadget fans, but I am in love with this phone. It's got a beautiful screen, a keypad with a nice layout, and it fits well in my hand. And you should see the photos that camera takes; if you have anything less than a 3 megapixel digicam, just throw it away and get this phone—it's that good and it doesn't even have a flash! And to correct one earlier error, the phone's memory card slot is on the outside, not under the battery.
The only problem with this 6630 is that it's designed for those damn folks in EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) since it's 900/1800/1900 MHz GSM/GPRS/EDGE and 700 MHz WCDMA. Today AT&T Wireless launched 3G WCDMA in two more cities, Dallas and San Diego. AT&T's current 3G handsets are, ummm, less than appealing, but given how small the potential market is for 3G in the US right now, it's understandable that manufacturers wouldn't go to too much trouble. We have to hope that now that AT&T has launched in six cities (Cingular will probably add a few more once the buyout is complete) that manufactuers will modify their newer and better 3G handsets to be compatible with the cellular bands (850/1800/1900GSM and 1900 MHz WCDM) that we use here in the States.
The phone regular (non-EDGE) functions will easily work with T-Mobiles network so there is no reason to talk as if it is limited EMEA. Many people get their hands on phones yet sold in the US by the carriers but that work on their networks.
Hi there,
I know it's more a joke about those "damn" european people but actually: Every American should make a trip to Germany or to the UK ('cause of the language) and test out what real phone and voice quality is!
Think this explains why pagers where so unsuccessfull in Europe:
We don't need them because the phones can do textmessaging since a few years. So why take 2 units with you?
Nice Greetings from Germany (oh damn, it's acutally sunny here) ;-)
Thomas
Once you have the treo keyboard you can never go back. Cool phone, but no keyboard. Therefore I must watch from a distance.
Da best cell phone ive ever seen "Nokia 6630"
how about the muvee function? anybody tried this yet?
The MuVee function is a novelty, not of any lasting use but does make looking at your photos more interesting. I tried the hippee profile and it went a bit Psychedelic!
The phone itself is great, shame the memory is so hard to get in anything over 128 Mb but it will come! Applications are fairly good with about 50% of the non-6630 SIS apps seeming to work very well. I use it as a combined mp3 player, camera, video player, ebook and I sometimes even use it as a phone!!
Hi,
If you are a fan of Mac OSX and use a symbian nokia such as 6630 or 6600, download my Mac OSX theme from http://www.dakkustudios.co.uk This exclusive theme is based on apple OSX interface. I hope you all like it.
Cheers
Dakku