Nokia makes yet another stab at the smartphone segment with its camcorder-styled 6260; Jørgen Sundgot investigates, finding a solid smartphone with an unnecessary gimmick.
Despite having traditionally loathed the clamshell form factor, Nokia has lately made several forays into what was once a design niche pioneered by Motorola and Samsung. Now, the Finnish manufacturer has released its very first clamshell smartphone, the 6260, opting just as well for the latest and greatest by including a swiveling screen. Hype aside, does the spanking new form factor offer any actual usability gains? Let's find out.
 | The 6260 flips, swivels and twists in all sorts of directions
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Design
Make no mistake: the Nokia 6260 is every bit as big as its picture makes it look. At 130 g, it even outweighs the manufacturer's upcoming Series 60-based 3G smartphone, the 6630, and at 102 x 49 x 23 mm, petite is not a word that springs to mind. Fortunately, the 6260 manages to maintain an adequately slim form factor when closed, but when open it is - quite frankly - large.
When closed, a LED on the front signals alerts of various kinds, whilst the 0.3 MP digital camera is - more on this later - placed far up on the left side of the handset, pointing left. On the right side, we find volume up/down controls and a dedicated camera button, whilst the top harbours the charging slot and a proprietary Nokia Pop-Port connector for USB connectivity and accessory purposes.
The 6260 opens to reveal a staggeringly bright and generally excellent display as the centerpiece of the upper half, below which is placed a navigational array consisting of a five-way navigational pad, flanked by two soft buttons as well as the typical buttons for calling up the menu, input options and erasing text. Meanwhile, the lower half simply contains a standard-fare numerical keypad with call/hang up buttons.
Although all buttons offer good tactile feedback and emit little noise, that of the navigational pad could be better - and it's also difficult to discern between volume up and down controls due to the design of this rocker-like solution. More troubling is it then that the decision to move the navigational array to the upper half makes for a very uncomfortable setup, verging on the ergonomically unsound.
Of course, this solution is also what makes it possible to use the 6260 with its screen twisted 180 degrees counter-clockwise and folded back onto itself; a position in which it is quite comfortable to use. The screen doesn't stop at 180 degrees of rotation, however: it rotates a full 270 degrees, and if done so 90 degrees either clockwise or counter-clockwise automatically activates the camera application to let the 6260 take on the shape of a digital camcorder.
In short, this is a useless gimmick as long as the integrated camera is 0.3 MP only, and to top it off the hinge solution feels rather rickety at that. Furthermore, despite being an attention drawer, this makes it difficult to capture photos discretely (please remove your mind from the gutter immediately) - but at least it makes it simpler to shoot self-portraits.
Connectivity
As always, Nokia smartphones shine in the Connectivity department. Available in two versions, with either GSM 900/1800/1900 or 850/1800/1900 MHz and GPRS Class 6, the 6260 offers excellent signal reception and voice quality both through the internal speaker, bundled headset and in loudspeaker mode. Also, support for HSCSD and Fax modem capabilities are included.
Bluetooth 1.1 is supported with an adequate set of profiles; an Infrared port provides legacy support, and finally, a proprietary Nokia Pop-Port connector offers USB and accessory connectivity.
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