Nokia's C3 looks at first glance to be every inch a high end messaging phone. But it is in fact a mid range handset, the price indicating that it can't possibly offer top end smartphone features.

The most serious negative point is the absence of 3G. Anyone keen on web browsing or downloading mobile email, for example, will find its absence a real downer. Wi-Fi is here, so you can use data at reasonable speeds in situations where you can get onto a network, but when out and about you may have trouble. There is no GPS, either, but that is less of a surprise in a handset of this price.

The C3 is very well made. With a solid build and an aluminium backplate, the handset feels a lot more expensive than it really is.

It has a superb QWERTY keyboard that is relatively large and well made. The keys travel a fair way when pressed and Nokia has thought carefully about the design. There is a separate key for the ‘@' symbol and another for a full stop, so entering email addresses and web addresses is straightforward. And there is a nice large space bar too. We found we were able to tap it with a fair amount of speed easily enough.

Above this is the shortcut buttons area and this houses six buttons and a large D-pad. Two soft-menu buttons and the Call and End keys are augmented by a pair of customisable shortcut buttons.

The screen is small at 2.4-inches and it delivers just 320 x 240 pixels of viewing area, so if you are a keen browser of the web you might want to steer clear and look for something larger and with more pixels. The screen is not touch sensitive, either, so you are reliant on the D-pad to get you around.

Facebook or Twitter feeds can be sent straight to the main screen, which also houses five application shortcuts and shortcuts to your five favourite contacts.

The Nokia C3 runs Symbian S40, which makes it somewhat underpowered in the applications department in comparison to many other phones. It does come with Ovi Maps and Ovi Chat, but it just doesn't have the all-round capability of S60. It will be fine for many people but it is relatively unsophisticated.

The camera shoots at 2 megapixels and it has no flash. It is short on settings and the shutter is a little slow, so you have to hold the camera still to avoid blurred images.

Although there is only 55MB of built-in storage, Nokia provides a 2GB microSD card to augment this. The card slot is on the left side of the casing. Battery life is quite good and you ought to get two days from a single charge.

Verdict
The Nokia C3 is well made, has good battery life and sports a superb miniature QWERTY keyboard. But 3G is notably absent, making the Nokia C3 somewhat hamstrung.

Company: Tulip

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Tags: nokia ovi maps symbian qwerty microsd nokia c3-00 web browser meego