Noknok

The Nokia C6-01 is the cheapest Symbian ^3 smartphone yet, and it’s also one of the most stylish. It’s a compact, well made and fully featured handset, and it has the potential to be a best seller. Join us after the break for our Nokia C6-01 review…

The first thing we noticed when using the Nokia C6-01 is that it feels a lot smaller than the other Symbian ^3 handsets. At 3.2 inches – rather than 3.5 – it may not sound like such a big difference, but the Nokia C6-01 is definitely one of the more compact touchscreen smartphones on the market.

Check out our Nokia C6-01 Unboxing

It’s also an impressive handset when it comes to quality. There’s a shiny metal bezel around the 3.2-inch screen, and the battery cover on the rear of the Nokia C6-01 is also made out of metal. All this adds a premium feel, and it’s a surprisingly weighty phone.

The 3.2-inch AMOLED screen is one of the most impressive we’ve seen on a Nokia, using the company’s new CBD (ClearBlack Display) technology. Darker colours are deep and true, and photographs and videos look particularly impressive. Images also look sharp and clear.

Unlike the Nokia N8, the Nokia C6-01 gets both call and end buttons below the screen, aiding usability. There’s a large menu button in the middle, and all three buttons are easy to use. There are three more buttons on the right-hand side of the Nokia C6-01, including a camera button, a lock button and a volume key.

Finished in the same shiny silver as the bezel, they look great, but they’re slightly too thin for comfortable use. The locking key is especially fiddly, although there are plenty of apps on the Ovi Store for unlocking your Nokia C6-01 via the touchscreen instead.

Aside from those buttons, the rest of the design is remarkably free from clutter. There’s nothing to break up the flowing style on the top or left side of the Nokia C6-01, and there’s only a micro USB port, power socket and headphone jack on the bottom.

Software wise, the Nokia C6-01 is the same as the Nokia N8, running Symbian ^3 and offering a very customisable platform. It comes with loads of great apps pre-installed, including Ovi Maps and social networking clients, and it’s easy to add more via the Ovi Store. Swype was the first we opted for, offering an easier way to enter text on the move.

When it comes to features, the Nokia C6-01 has everything you’ll need. There’s an 8-Megapixel camera, which we’ll be reviewing next week, and connectivity is top-notch. 3G offers speedy web browsing on the move, and there’s both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth for fast downloads and wireless file transfers, respectively.

Storage is the only area that Nokia has cut back on with the Nokia C6-01 – with internal memory limited to 340MB. There’s a 2GB microSD card included in the package, however, and the Nokia C6-01 also supports cards of up to 32GB.

We’re really impressed with the Nokia C6-01. Its compact design is a highlight, and although it’s a cheaper handset than the Nokia N8 or Nokia C7, it doesn’t feel like costs have been cut. Check back here next week to see how we get on with battery life, the camera, the onscreen keyboard and other areas of the Nokia C6-01.

Check out our Nokia C6-01 review photo gallery below: