I bought this phone on July 17th. This is my first smart phone. I have been using cell phones for the last 5 years.
I am going to write this in order to help people to make a decision. So, I plan to put in what is not normally available on net. For latest spec visit Nokia site.
I feel 3230 is a first effort for a all in one smart phone for all from Nokia.
My 3230 has firmware version 3.0505.2. Press ’’ *#0000# ’’ to know the firmware of the phone you are inspecting.
Pros:
1.) Easy to use series 60 UI.
2.) Voice quality: good
3.) Display quality - good
4.) Build quality : good
5.) Not bulky compared to other phones with similar features (did a volume weight comparison)
6.) Very good stereo FM radio
7.) good for playing games with joystick
8.) You can download several games/java apps and enjoy.
9.) Comes with a cool highly addictive game called ’’agent v’’
10.) Buy a bluetooth USB dongle and sync the phone content to either outlook or lotus notes on your PC. You can also take phone backup on PC
11.) Good for programmers/engineers.
12.) Pretty stable (switched off only 6 times in three months).
Cons:
1.) Mono MP3 playback (check is it the same with new firmware?)
(however this pain is doped by a pretty good stereo FM radio)
2.) Beep before a call
3.) Bit difficult to input text
4.) Camera lag (picture is captured say two seconds after the shutter sound!!)
5.) Bit slow in opening contact list, if you have too many numbers (I have 283, it takes about 3 secs)
6.) Battery life is just enough to last for two days with moderate talking. Battery drains mainly because of playing games, camera and bluetooth.
7.) Only 32 MB rs-mmc card (however you can buy 1GB rs-mmc outside anyway!)
8.) Back cover is bit tricky to remove till you get the hang of it!
So, 3230 is a mixed bag. I would recommend this phone as a entry level smart phone. You may ask why not 6600?.
Compare the specs of 3230 with 6600. 6600 lacks in the multimedia domain (radio, camera, video formats etc).
You will find that 3230 has features of a top end smart phone. However, the platform of 3230 is may not be fast enough (lack of performance) to exploit all the future applications which will be developed by people. But till then, I would recommend this phone. I give it 3.75 out of 5.
Cheers.
kprasad