Nokia -6233 is a good phone-strong and robust. It assimilates the good qualities of cheaper versions of Nokia like 1110, 3315 etc and the higher versions like the N series ones.
I purchased this phone after deliberating for quite a long time-nearly six months.It was first recommended by my friend who was very lenient and confident while speaking good of it. The fact that it was affordable, long battery, 2MP camera and plays music caught my interest. I intensively read the reviews here and there and also compared its features with other phones from across-brands. I was quite aware of the shortcomings and hence was not disappointed later.
First the good things:
1)Phone is not very costly. In stores like mobile store, mbazaar it may cost Rs 7100 and in Subhiksha it may cost Rs 6750. In Nokia showrooms or authorised sellers, the same set will cost RS 7400.(These prices were around June, 2008.) I suggest that you purchase the mobile from Subhiksha as **the phone is just fairly good that you may not have any complaints with it-and this is the only reason.
2) a) It has dual speakers, and when on maximum, are loud enough that even if you are in a high density traffic with city buses horning and bikes roaring-lots of din and noise- you can comfortably receive calls and listen to the caller by bringing the phone near to your ears(with speakers on). The point is---it has powerful speakers.
b) The clarity of the speaker is very good. There are not any disturbance or ’grains’ in the incoming sound.
I found the speaker quality to be better than Sony Erricson..esp with 700i. I prefer to make calls with 6233 with speakers on rather than 700i.
However, be assured that when you are playing songs on your mobile, its the sony’s sound that IS more digital. and better
3)The phone’s battery lasts long enough. Talktime is approx. 3.5 hrs. On standby, it lasts three days i.e. 24x3 hrs. After that I have taken precautionary measure to charge the battery. Even if Nokia claims that on standby, it will last 9-10 days, I am sure it wont’t
4) The phone has inbuilt memory of 6 MB and they also give you a microSD card of 126 MB along with it. This is a good deal. You will not run short of memory.
5) It has many regular features like-----2 MP camera, radio (supporting 20 stations), SMS, MMS, PTT(if you like using it), alarm clock that can be set to recurring and snoozing, to-do- list, calendar, stopwatch, countdown timer, world time, calculator, voice recorder etc.
6) It operates as GSM as well as UMTS. However, UMTS is not supported in India. So, at times when you do not want to receive ANY call, then you can set the phone to UMTS mode. The other person trying to call you will get to hear that the said phone is not reachable...rather than getting to hear that the phone is switched off....you can avoid your bosses or pestering friends without letting them know that you have switched off.
7)The phone can be set to flight-mode in which the phone is practically switched off but you can use the phone as a memory/music device.
8)Connectivity via bluetooth, Infrared, USB. You can browse internet too.
9) The operating System is fast unlike the Nseries. It takes not more than 30 seconds for the phone to boot up which is very good.
Summarily, its a phone with good battery, camera, music, speakers-all within a reasonable range. You can purchase the mobile.
But there are some shortcomings that you should know.
1) Though you can connect the phone to USB port, the phone does not come with USB cable(of course they give the CD). So you have to purchase the cable on your own. At a nokia store, they said its for Rs. 1600...I purchased the local-maal kind of stuff for somewhere around Rs. 400(still it was costly...)so the phone price becomes 7100+400=7500(other stores); at nokia stores 7400+1600=9000 which is NOT CHEAP.
2) The phone has no torch and even the backlight is not that powerful. You will never be able to use this phone ’as a source of light’ as you can with models of Sony W series or K series.
3) The camera quality is not-that-good. Images are kinda-OK but Sony’s images are much better even though they both are 2 MP. Images have many grains...Thumbs down.
All in all, phone is good but with USB connectors and 2GB card(maximum), phone is not that so cheap but still good.
Compare with Sony’s model.
Also I have heard that Samsung J210i is very good and costs much less. around 5k.....so do find about those cells before you purchase.