Like diamonds, sliders are forever, or so it seems. While phone fanatics focus on touchscreens this year, the slider form has persevered, as Nokia's latest announcements attest to. The 6700 Slide continues a proud tradition of Nokia mid-range devices, offering users a swath of desirable tech without the budget-stretching prices of the company's high-end N-Series. We take a look from afar at this newest Nokia to see if it offers the same bang for your buck as its predecessors.
Upside
Considering the most important aspects of a smartphone, Nokia has included most of today's available best technology. The 6700 Slide sports HSPA data (high speed upload and download speeds) and the latest version of Bluetooth with support for stereo music streaming. The 6700 Slide is a world roaming phone capable of communicating across the most common GSM and WCDMA radio frequencies.
Media lovers will find a standard suite of tools for both capturing and playback, with no really outstanding features to note. There's a 5-megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics and an LED flash, and the 6700 Slide supports Windows Media and Real Audio files, and MPEG-4 video formats. The accessible internal memory is a paltry 45MB, but Nokia includes a 2GB microSD card to store your pics and videos, which is decent.
The official images we've seen so far also indicate an enhanced home screen interface for the Series 60 platform. This overhaul seems to focus on a more consumer-minded approach, with the photo contacts bar that we've seen on Nokia's touchscreens making a prominent appearance here.
Downsides
Current owners of smartphones looking to upgrade might be disappointed to learn that the 6700 Slide lacks Wi-Fi connectivity. The ability to connect to wireless networks might not be a priority for a range of mobile owners, but dodging carrier data charges by piggy-backing on the network at McDonald's has obvious advantages and it's a shame the 6700 Slide doesn't support this.
We also have reservations about the design of the phone. We love the range of colours (including the dubiously titled "petrol-blue") and the large navigation panel is welcome, but the numeric keypad layout looks like the flat, curved design we came across on the Nokia N96 which we weren't great fans of. This coupled with the 6700 Slide's uninspiring 2.2-inch QVGA screen could push this model down your list of prospective phones when compared to mid-range touchscreen smartphones from Samsung and HTC.
Outlook
Nokia's mid-range 6000 series has enjoyed enormous success in the past, and the 6700 Slide should garner the same mass appeal. The strength of Nokia's mid-range phones is that it has the ability to offer a simple user experience to those who only require the basics, while delivering a well-rounded smartphone to customers who want their phone to double as web browser, email client and media hub. The 6700 Slide looks like a smartphone for the masses, with a good mix of technology you'll probably use and expensive tech you might not find you'll need.
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