First a bit about the Nokia C3 – Its a nice looking QWERTY phone with a 2 megapixel camera (no flash though) and a 3.5mm audio jack. It does not have 3G but features WiFi (which turns out useless – explained later). The C3 also includes SMS with threaded conversation mode, email with support for POP3 and IMAP accounts, and the Nokia Mobile Communities app featuring Facebook and Twitter clients with a pre-installed home-screen widget.

To be honest its a nice phone for those who love to text (sms), especially with its threaded conversation thing. But what puts back this wannabe smartphone are the following:

1. Its built on the Symbian series 40 platform (most Nokia smartphones including E63 and E71 are built on the more advanced Series 60)
2. Browsing the internet on this phone is a pain in the a**.  Reasons: a.) For some reason the WiFi can be utilised only for connecting the inbuilt  communities application which lets you connect to your twitter and facebook accounts;  if you want to browse other websites in the browser you can only do so via your mobile operator. Why have a WiFi then? b.) The speed of the internet (both GPRS and WiFi) is quite slow c.) The included Opera browser doesn’t work.
3. From point 2(c) above, comes this third point – quite a few important in-built applications just DO NOT WORK in the Nokia C3. For example, besides Opera not working, I cannot get to work the Nokia Ovi store application on this phone. Every time I open the Ovi store, I get the error “To use Nokia Ovi Store, you must be connected to the internet.” I get three options to choose during this error – log, select and exit. The log button only shows a log of this error. Clicking the select options shows the application is connecting to Ovi store but returns the same error. I don’t need to tell what exit does.

I must say I am not tearing this phone apart in a hurry, its been more than a month now that I’ve been using the Nokia C3. I know I should not expect smart-phone level features with this cheap phone, but at least the functionality and software that Nokia promised should work! If you’re going to suggest that I should do a software update, I’ve already done that! Did not make a difference really..the things that didn’t work still don’t work. The GPRS is slow and WiFi can only be utilised for the Communities application (Facebook and Twitter).

And did I tell you that the Facebook interface that you get on the Nokia Communities app is horrible. I wish I knew how to take a screenshot in a mobile phone (I guess you an do that in the Androids an the iOSes?)  and explain how dumb it looks.

The only feature I like in this phone is the favourite contacts widget on the top of the home screen where the pictures you associate with your top contacts are visible instead of their names. Its gives the screen a cool look.

I absolutely miss my E71. Read this blog I wrote this very month a year ago – Why I love my Nokia E71.

Nokia showed off the Nokia Tube in a presentation slide noticed by Infoworld at a software development conference in California Monday. The Tube, like the iPhone, is a touch-screen phone that can be manipulated using your fingers, and is Nokia’s “first touch device.”

More details about the development have surfaced, days after its existence leaked out at a developer conference. Here’s a rare first look at Nokia’s cool device:

The “Tube” will arrive in the second half of this year, according to Symbian Freak. A Nokia spokesman confirmed the timing to Computerworld but didn’t offer any further details other than the obvious notion that the “Tube” will use Symbian’s S60 operating system. Nokia owns a large stake in Symbian.

According to Symbian Freak, the Tube (real name TBD) will come with:

- 3G,

- Wi-Fi

- GPS chips

- a screen sized between 3 inches and 3.5 inches (similar to Nokia N 73 but wider)

- built-in camera that can also support geotagging of photos

Of course, the above are just a small highlight of the expected features in Nokia’s most advanced offering. There are bound to be many more old and new features. Keep visiting to be regularly updated!