The Nokia 6681 smartphone falls a few features short of the 3G-enabled 6680, but still manages to come across as impressively well-rounded. A review by Jørgen Sundgot.
Review summary of the Nokia 6681:
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Full review of the Nokia 6681:
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Alright, Nokia, we get the point: you've got making smartphones down pat, but we cannot admit to being particularly pleased with your recent rapid-fire approach to pushing out new models. Fortunately for everyone, however, that's why we're here - and this time around, we take a gander at the 6681, the less-capable clone of Nokia's first dual-camera smartphone, the 6680; cheap knock-off or sensibly feature-shaved?
Well hello there
Arguably somewhat better looking than its dusty blue, 3G-enabled sibling, the cream white 6681 (also available in blue) shares both the weight and size of the 6680 - yet for some unholy reason is marginally thicker at 108 x 55 x 21 mm and 133 g. Like the 6680, its design is a bit unfortunate, and in our opinion Nokia would have done well to stick with the more pleasant appearances of the maker's previous-generation smartphone, the excellent 6630.
Fortunately, however, first impressions can be deceiving, as the 6681 plays host to a typically excellent interface including a more than decent and relatively quiet blue backlit keypad as well as a good five-way navipad. We're less than impressed by the chromed buttons flanking the keypad as reflections make them hard to spot at times, yet are even less so with concern to the input alternator button (also know as the ABC button) being placed to the right of the numerical keys. For right-handed users, this means alternating between text input options and selecting multiple objects are now progressively cumbersome affairs; a bit of an oversight.
Similarly, a hot-swappable RS-MMC slot placed on the right side is a step in the right direction, however although the hinged cover is now of aluminum (as opposed to the plastic variety found in the 6630), we're not entirely sure where its tolerance level resides.
Moving on, we find an utterly superb 262K colour display with a resolution of 176 x 208 pixels and user adjustable brightness, which is what we've come to expect in high-end models from Nokia. Visibility is good both indoors and outdoors, and there's also an ambient light sensor to automatically adjust brightness to conserve power; a nice touch.
Mind the cyclops
Lacking support for 3G, and thus video calling, there's no point to why the 6681 should have both a front-mounted and a back-mounted camera, and indeed it doesn't. The 1.3 Megapixel camera found around the (hump)back remains excellent with regard to performance, however, and is protected by a handy slide-down cover (which cleverly also activates the camera application when opened) on the back.
A LED flash is also present on the back, but as one would expect has a limited range and effect. Similar to other recent smartphones from Nokia, the 6680 also comes with a full compliment of video and imaging tools, including an alternative 'rolodex' style image viewer, video and image editors and also printing tools.
The 6680 is also well equipped in the connectivity department, with tri-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE 900/1800/1900 Mhz under its belt along with support for the classics including CSD, HSCSD and Fax. Having realized there are markets where 3G still isn't present, Nokia quite simply dropped 3G support in the 6681, but fortunately kept a comfortable selection of Bluetooth profiles and USB 2.0 connectivity courtesy of Nokia's proprietary Pop-port.
As we've come to expect from Nokia, voice quality and signal reception proved outstanding in the 6681, however we're a bit disappointed that speaker independent voice dialing still hasn't made its debut on Series 60. On the upside, the loudspeaker mode works very well indeed, and we're quite satisfied with a battery life averaging between two and three days.
I've got good news, and I've got bad news
Equipped with 8 MB of non-volatile memory, the 6681 pulls it down a couple of notches from the 10 MB of the 6680 - a little short, as far as we're concerned. A bundled 64 MB RS-MMC card provides additional storage and is also loaded with several high quality applications; we would certainly have preferred for several of these to be loaded into system memory, but expect most users will simply offload images and video periodically to a PC negating a potential memory crisis.
Fitted with the usual assortment of Series 60 applications, the 6681 shares both the strengths and weaknesses of so many of its predecessors on the software side. With general performance being snappy, it impresses with high quality PIM and messaging software, also adding a very apt suite of productivity applications in the Microsoft Office compatible Quickword, Quicksheet and Quickpoint trio. Worthy of particular mention is improved e-mail support, with the client now supporting scheduled retrievals, the subscription of IMAP subfolders and a range of attachments including .ZIP files.
The usual drawbacks remain, however, with local synchronization of PIM data towards Lotus Notes or Microsoft Outlook not only being partial but also an agonizingly slow and cumbersome process - a problem that, incomprehensibly, has not been addressed since the introduction of the 7650, Nokia's first smartphone, over three years ago. Proper built-in support for over-the-air groupware synchronization could to some extent have mitigated this issue for business users, but as is it remains a royal cock-up.
There is one surprise in the 6681, however, which is the transformation of the standby screen into a more functional area as opposed to merely a picture holder. Now, the standby screen holds a line of application shortcuts, as well as a list of upcoming calendar appointments; the latter a concept first introduced by Microsoft at the unveiling of its Pocket PC platform - and, incidentally, an utterly brilliant idea.
Availability
The Nokia 6681 is at the time of press available throughout Europe, selling in the €520 EUR range without subscription.
Price and availability
The Nokia 6681 will start selling for TBA () in December 1969.
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