Review - Nokia 6235

The Nokia 6235 is one of the latest offerings from the Reliance stable and is a welcome change from the usual dull and boring handsets they had on offer till now! It looks sleek and professional is a vast improvement over my old LG mobile that I've had for about 10 months now! Here's a blow by blow review of the main features:

Screen and User Interface
The screen is a 65k colour TFT LCD. Very colourful indeed but somehow seems a little dull compared to a few other phones I've seen. The 5-way joystick is pretty useful but takes a little time getting used to. The other thing is that it seems way too tight and can be painful sometimes!


Keypad
The keypad buttons are separated horizontally by what I can best describe as vertical dividing strips. The keys are at the same level as the front panels on the phone and not raised like in most other phones. This makes it slightly difficult while typing messages but shouldn't be too much of a problem as the keys are soft. On the whole the tactile feel is good but could have been better.


Power
The battery was a major consideration when changing my handset. My old RD 2130 used to last just over a day during the last few weeks. So far, the battery backup on the 6235 has been decent. It usually lasts two whole days and some. The maximum I've got is two-and-a-half days with medium usage. Charging usually takes about an hour and a half (I could be wrong about this as I haven't measured it accurately!)


Audio
The sound quality is good both with and without the hands-free kit. I've had no problems even when travelling on the road with the usual traffic noises all around. Haven't used the FM radio too much but from what I have I can tell you that it sounds very good indeed! Speaker output too is loud enough I guess.


Camera
The camera captures pics. at 640x480 pixels. So far, pictures I've taken have turned out pretty decent. Quality is good when light is adequate but is very pixelated in low light conditions. The only way I managed to transfer pictures to my PC before I got the DKU-2 cable is thus: Sent images via IR to a Nokia 6600 and from there to my PC using Bluetooth!


Connectivity
The phone can be connected to a PC using a DKU-2 USB cable that costs around Rs 1600/-. Installed Nokia PC Suite first and then connected the phone my comp. The phone was immediately detected and the device registered. Transferring images from the phone was a breeze and the pics. once transferred seemed in good shape too. Setting an image on the comp. as the phone wallpaper is also a pretty simple task. The image cane be scaled and lot of other effects can be applied before you set it as the background. Other things you can do include manage your contacts, set ringtones, organize multimedia content like video and recordings, manage schedules, install applications etc.


Miscellaneous features
On my old LG phone, whenever I added a new contact from either a received message or a call, the recent call list and the message recipient would get updated to show the contact name instead of the number. However, on the 6235, the call register and the message recipient don't change immediately. Its only the next time a message or a call is received that the contact name is shown. Guess its the same with all Nokia phones...

Another nice feature on my RD 2130 was the facility to set multiple alarms. I could set upto 3 alarms at a time which was quite useful particularly whenever I travel. Here, the only option is to change the alarm time which could be dangerous if I forget to change it back to the original value !


My experience with this phone so far has been reasonably good. It looks sleek and also has a professional touch to it. Its two shade grey colour is quite well suited for the workplace as it isn't too flashy.