Many people consider it a flagship product, though it’s not so in fact. Nokia have worked out a rather successful promotion strategy, positioning the device as an image solution with a nice face, but actually it’s a bright star in the middle class sky. Its functionality isn’t brilliant though there is everything a real user may need. Therefore that does not remove from the agenda a question concerning the flagship of the Nokia ordinary phones range and not the PDA one. If everything is perfectly plain with the latter ones, Nokia N95 being an obvious leader, the situation with the former devices isn’t quite clear to the customer. In fact Nokia 6500 Slide is the functional flagship of the Series 40 line.

	Main specs of Nokia 6500 Slide
Supported networks:	GSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 850/2100, EDGE class 10
Storage:	20 Mb of user memory, a 256 Mb microSD card comes bundled, up to 4 Gb capacity is supported
Display:	2,2" , QVGA (240х320), 16M Colors
Connectivity:	USB2.0, Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR, A2DP is supported
Camera:	3.2 Mpix, Carl Zeiss Optics, auto-focusing with a flashlight
FM-tuner:	+ RDS is supported
Battery:	BP-5M, Li-Ion 900 mAh up to 5,5 hours of talktime up to 12,5 hours of standby
.5x46.5x16.4 mm	96.5x46.5x16.4 mm
Weight:	125 g
Guiding price: €360	€360

An interesting fact is that the novelty has got a sibling – the 6500Classic model which will be also popular in its class, but it’s rather difficult to call it a flagship. The latter one is the slimmest of all Nokia phones (9,5 mm), it is mostly an image solution though the handset is going to be more popular in demand than 6500Slide due to its lower price. The customer won’t have to take his choice between the pair of Classic and Slide. They are too different products and taking into account a rather small difference in price ranging from 50 to 60 euros, 6500Slide is an obvious leader.

Positioning

The Nokia flagship-phone turned out to belong to the 6000 series, at that this series offers products to any taste and targeting different audiences. There is no use seeking for flagships among other series, for their positioning is quite logical. For example, the 1000, 2000, 3000 series are inexpensive devices which a priori cannot lay claim to the role of flagships. The 5000 series include music-oriented solutions and mechanically protected devices, the 7000 series are so-called fashion-phones, well, and the 8000 series belong to a premium-segment the point of which is positioning and price. And so there remains our favourite 6000 series that gave rise to a large number of flagship-products - 6230(i), 6233, 6131 and 6280, at that it’s interesting, only the former two handsets are implemented in a monoblock form factor, the others being a clamshell and a slider. Some of them were released when the other device was in its glory and that did not at all prevent them from coexisting peacefully with each other. Just as in our case, 6500Classic and 6500Slide are going to be sold simultaneously with each other, the price difference being $120-140. Nokia 6500Slide will be more expensive than its sibling and will cost something like $550. One shouldn’t expect a major price adjustment in the nearest future for several reasons. First, Nokia don’t hurry to reduce the selling price of the product. Second, if the demand is great, the price both for the former and the latter models will be reduced with reluctance. Distributors will like to line their pockets from the handset popularity as they quite successfully do nowadays from the 6300 model.

Nokia 6500Slide is a slider and the other phone is implemented in a classical monoblock casing. Both devices will be popular in their niches, Nokia 6500Classic being intended for a more general audience while the slider in view of its price and functionality is going to be sold in smaller quantities. In the present-day market the price of devices influences the sales greatly (it would to a greater extent hold for middle class devices), but on making use of both the 6500 handsets we’d like to note that the Slide model doubtlessly wins in the aggregate of specifications while the Classic one looks more like an assortment solution. That’s accounted for by the availability of the moderately priced but highly successful 6300 enjoying comparable specifications, the as well moderately priced 5310XpressMusic and the showy image phone 7900Prism. The 6500Classic will naturally attract customers’ attention because of its fine "seamless" design, acme of slimness, but there is no uniqueness in it, while Nokia 6500Slide has no analogues in the product range of the manufacturer. The device is unique and wears its own face.

Let’s say some words about the names of models. As is easy to see, the Nokia Company in their attempt to differentiate one or another product give it a code name which is meant not only to mark it out against the background of siblings (Luna and Navigator) but also to refer it to a certain segment (Classic, Sport and Slide). In our case both devices have the same digital index. Many customers have already got used to call handsets from Suomi by these indices, for example, just say - 6500, but here one should also add a postscript. With all this going on many people will be hardly able to explain satisfactorily, wherein essential distinctions between the two novelties lie. One cannot avoid confusion at first.

Marketing perspectives, competing models

The Nokia Company has begun to pay attention to any other form factors besides a monoblock just in the last couple of years and has achieved positive results, which is no wonder - the brand is strong nevertheless. However the path was long and thorny; for example, let’s take the slider form factor that the reviewed device belongs to. While Samsung were expanding their portfolio, releasing phones in the sliding casing, the Finns did not hasten to follow their example. Even nowadays the company haven’t got too many phones in this form factor. The 6270/6280/6288 series of devices occurs (one shouldn’t forget the 6111), which was a success because they were the Nokia sliders though there was nothing substantially new in them: neither an original design nor features stuffed inside. Later on the e65 model hit the shelf which caused only positive emotions. But that is business-series smartphones; the company had had no bright slider-phones in their product range until Nokia 6500Slide was released. Just for that reason the marketing perspectives of this device look very promising in spite of the considerable pressing on the part of the competitors.

Theoretically among the main competitors positioned in this price segment and implemented in this form factor one can mention Samsung U700, Motorola Z8 and Samsung G600. The flagship of The Ultra Edition II product line of Samsung has got some features to oppose to the competitors in the market for it sports a slim casing as well as a number of interesting and innovative solutions (however, the majority of the customers will never learn about them - in a number of a cases it doesn't matter at all; the point is that it looks fine). The handset from the American company stirs up an interest because of, first, the original design of the casing and second, the unusual innovative interface, but its multimedia features fall short of up-to-date standards (the weak camera, the lack of FM radio) and the date of the model’s release is constantly altered. Both the handsets are niche devices, Samsung U700 being exclusive to the Vodafone network and as for the Motorola Z8 its sales level is too low due to poor distribution and not the most correct positioning for the device to be considered as a competitor. Thanks to the company’s awareness of such cheerless perspectives of the device, its updating has been already announced.

And the recently released Samsung G600 can offer stiff competition to the product of the Finnish manufacturer, providing a 5Mpix camera among other comparable features. The price for G600 at the moment of 6500Slide release will be just a bit higher, which automatically puts the handset from Samsung in an advantageous position. Nokia 6500Slide, in its turn, can boast of the camera optics by the prominent manufacturer, rather advanced music capabilities and solid appearance. However, each device has its own advantages and disadvantages; the contest between them is going to be interesting. But let’s turn to reviewing Nokia 6500Slide.

Design and Ergonomics

Nowadays plastic has long since quitted being the principal material of a mobile phone casing; it gives way to original materials, from leather to stainless steel, at that we’ve already got somehow used to them. The utilization of quality materials is no longer a privilege of expensive image products only; the casing employing metal has passed to the medium (Nokia 6300) and even budget (SonyEricsson T250i) class. In our case, Nokia 6500Slide makes use of stainless steel parts, the very steel that caused the device to noticeably put on weight to 125 g. Rather considerable weight adds to some solidity of the device in certain consumers’ opinion, besides the metal pleasingly chills your hand. The music-oriented version of this model, Nokia 5610XpressMusic, is a little bit lighter due to the replacement of steel by parts made out of anodized aluminium; it weighs 111 g.

So, the exterior of Nokia 6500Slide is subjectively similar to a well dressed person in a crowd of bright and striking attires; it catches the eye with its usual but expensive, well-cut dress. Silvery metal parts coupled with glossy black inserts stick in mind, there being neither excessive solidity nor any special orientation towards the business segment. The handset will look appropriate both at a business meeting and at a night club. Almost the whole upper part and the back cover are made from metal and that means minor scratches which can possibly appear on the casing if handling the device carelessly. However, one can avoid this looking after the handset. Even the navigation block is implemented out of stainless steel which is quite unusual. The coating is textured, it’s not smooth; the light pleasantly plays over the anodized metal.

I’d like to note, that glossy plastic is utilized for the back side of the slider; as a rule the manufacturer passes it by. The Nokia 6500Slide designer gave attention to it as well. That’s a trifle, which is all the same pleasant. To say the truth, the screws on the back surface could have been concealed; they a bit spoil the appearance. The slider mechanism of this handset, as well as that of the e65 model, is very good, no fault can be found here. The smooth slide will be estimated at its true worth. The device has stored up for the customer no unpleasant surprises abundant with the 6270/6280/6288 series. There isn’t any play either, the phone is monolithic; the casing doesn’t creak even at strong squeezing.

The handset measures up at 96.5x46.5x16.4 mm, it can be called neither slim nor tiny, but the dimensions are in full agreement with the status and positioning of the device. The phone sits in hand quite comfortably, though it will pull downward in a shirt pocket due to its considerable weight.

Keypad, slots and jacks

The numerical keys, unlike those of the navigation block, are made out of plastic. They are large, therefore the problem of stray keystrokes will never occur. The luminance sensor similar to that with smartphones should be considered as a distinguishing feature. It automatically adjusts the backlighting of the keypad and the screen and cannot be switched off. The keypad uses a white backlighting; it’s not too bright, but very even and well-visible in all kinds of environment. The disadvantage is that the block of numerical keys employs black glossy plastic, which is exposed to fingerprints. That’s not quite practical.

The right edge hosts the volume control rocker button as well as the camera launch button. The latter is traditionally two-positioned; the volume control buttons are utilized for digital zooming when using the camera. The opposite side can boast of nothing especial. The upper edge of the casing features the 2.5 mm headset jack, but for comfortable listening to music you’ll need a 2.5-to-3.5 mm adapter. The model is not a music-oriented one, so you shouldn’t expect too much of the headset that comes bundled. The microUSB slot is found nearby; it serves for data cable connection and battery charging (an innovation relating to the new Series 40 5th Edition software platform). The slot is new, so no accessories are available for it at retail yet. It’s nice to have a firmware cable included into the sales package. Besides charging via USB cable the traditional method of charging is possible, a slim 2.0-mm charger slot is also put at the upper edge. The USB protocol version is 2.0, Mass Storage mode is supported. You can choose the way you want to use the phone during the phone-to-PC connection: Mass Storage, PC Suite or modem connection. When connected as a mass storage device, the phone retains much of its functionality and is still able to receive calls, which is an advantage.
Near the slot there is a small plastic button which acts as a back cover lock. The arrangement of ports and sockets can be called convenient; when the accessories are connected the handset remains as handy as usual.

Below the battery cover there is the microSD memory card slot with full support for hot swapping and the typical package for the majority of regions includes a 256 Mb memory card. As specified by the manufacturer, the maximum supported card capacity for this model is 4 Gb.

Battery

The model utilizes a Li-Ion battery with a standard capacity of 900 mAh. The handset is able to endure about two days of moderate duty (about one hour of talk time, up to two hours of listening to the player and the radio, an hour of menu operations). The result is standard nowadays, sufficient for the majority of users.
A full recharge cycle takes about an hour and a half.

Nokia 6500 Slide Battery Characteristics

Model	Nokia 6500Slide	Samsung U600
Moderate Duty	2 days	1,5 days
Multimedia cycle, video (3GP) 2:30 1:50	2:30	1:50
Multimedia cycle, audio (MP3) 11:10 8:50	11:10	8:50

Display

Nokia 6500Slide sports the screen typical of this kind of devices - the resolution of 320х240 pixels (a 2.2” diagonal) with a color palette of 16M colors. As a matter of fact, it is one of the best matrixes in the market which offers bright and rich colors. The sun-resistance is in charge of a mirror-plated substrate, so the information remains easily legible even in direct sunlight, as well as with Nokia 5610. In general, as regards sun-resistance the screens of most devices of the Finnish manufacturer are optimal.

The luminance sensor adjusts the screen brightness automatically depending on the environment, it cannot be switched off. Therefore in some cases the screen may be taken as not bright enough, that is a peculiarity of the device. In comparison with Nokia 6500Classic, image quality is almost identical except for a slightly colder palette, the Nokia 6500Slide screen tints blue. The field of view is quite good; the information on the screen is easily visible from different angles.

Below the display there is a small finger rest for opening the slider.

Connectivity

The device is designed to operate in GSM 850/900/1800/1900 networks as well as in WCDMA 850/2100 ones. Both GPRS and EDGE are supported.

The Bluetooth protocol version is 2.0 + EDR, the following profiles are supported:: A2DP, AVRCP, DUN, FTP, GAP, GAVDP, GOEP, HFP, HSP, OPP, SAP, SDAP, SPP. The availability of the A2DP profile allows the usage of a wireless stereo headset - a feature standard for a modern handset. The extras include the adjustable Bluetooth visibility timeout (varying from one minute to one hour), however there's no setting that would allow you to automatically shut down the running Bluetooth service completely after a specified period of time.

User interface

Nokia 6500Slide is designed on the basis of the fifth edition of the Series 40 firmware platform which is a matter of great interest. This handset is one of the first released devices based off the new version of the platform (among the already released devices one can mention Nokia 7500Prism, 6267, 7900 Prism available on the market in China) Series 40 v5 was announced on 7th May, 2007. Among its key features there is full support for MIDP 2.1, JSR-248 and other specifications. There seems to be little difference as compared to the 3rd edition of the platform Feature Pack 2, to some users it won't appear anywhere different, but from the point of developers it’s a great achievement. The development of the JSR-248 final version was finished on December 21st, 2006 by the instrumentality of the Vodafone mobile service provider to support a common set of Java standards with the products of other manufacturers. JSR-248 was also considered to be one of the key components of the S60 firmware platform which is sure to secure a high compatibility for Java applications developed both for S40 and S60 platforms.

The MIDP update from 2.0 to 2.1 also introduces support for media keys in Java applets (for example, Nokia 5300 cannot use its media keys to control Java applets while newer handsets will get rid of this limitation).

As compared to earlier models, the new features include the Java API update for Bluetooth (JSR-82) from v1.0 found with Series 40 v3, FP1, FP2 up to v1.1; Mobile Media API (JSR-135) – Java applets can now gain exclusive access to audio and video storage; Security and Trust Services API (JSR-177) now utilizes SATSA-CRYPTO; Java applets now have 3D sound support (JSR-234); Adobe Flash Lite Player is updated to v2.1

The changes are quite significant; as we’ve already mentioned, the main focus is the higher compatibility between applications and platforms alike. The software support for dedicated media controls as secondary controls in miscellaneous 3rd party applications is another great step forward. The future feature packs are estimated to extend the functionality of the fifth edition of the Series 40 platform even further though no radical changes can be expected – the firmware’s good reputation and the user interface approved by time need little to be changed; just some additional features may appear.

The Nokia 6500s user interface has undergone almost no changes, most of them being application-specific. The player and the radio get a few extra features though all the controls remain the same, and the Go-To active standby mode hasn't been changed at all - however its customizability is already maximized at the moment, so wishing more hardly makes any sense. If you don't like lots of indicators and shortcuts on your mobile desktop during standby, the active standby mode can be manually deactivated.

In the standard view the active standby mode with Nokia 6500s as well as with other Series 40 handsets engages a row of icons serving as shortcuts to 5 applications (the number is customizable and the icon bar is scrollable, if you want more or less icons to be displayed on the screen simultaneously). It's needless to say that it's absolutely up to the user to pick the applications out of a long list regardless of their native or third-party status. For instance, a custom ICQ client can be as easily given a shortcut on the bar as an embedded function. Up to three applications can be set to submit statistical data to the screen while in the active standby mode. By default, these are the mp3 player/radio, calendar and reminders. The player shows the current playback status; the calendar displays the daily schedule and current tasks (and is also browsable with the navigation button without having to interrupt the standby status, just press left and right to scroll through event records associated with the current date). The reminder is just a custom piece of text which stays on during standby. The rest of the applications which can submit stats to the screen are the timer, the regular status indicators and the My Presence application. The order in which the data tabs follow is also customizable, and the number of lines can be decreased at will. In other words, everything is fully customizable, ranging from an empty to an info-packed screen in the standby mode. The Active menu is an addition to the active standby mode, which also hosts a number of application bookmarks.

The main menu, similar to a number of newer Nokia models, has a total of four viewing modes available: list, icons, footnoted icons, tabs. The regular list and icons aren't much of a sensation though the two latter modes are quite interesting and new. The submenus look like lists with smaller icons, clear and simple. The font size is only customizable for the three applications: Messages, Contacts and Internet. Quick jumping between the icons is done by pressing the associated numeric keys or via the voice control feature, which doesn't require any learning curve.

The menu items can be swapped in a custom order (though submenu items are tightly fixed so you won't be able to customize the order for them). Almost any of the phone’s functions can be added to the menu or to the desktop in the standby mode; every application can be accessed through a few clicks. Navigation button functionality is fully compatible with the standby mode (up to three button position is configurable in this case; the fourth is reserved for navigation during active standby).

Likewise with the majority of Nokia’s products, a number of interface themes are available to the user, changing not only the wallpaper and the background, but the very appearance of menu items, an animated screensaver and so on. The embedded themes are interesting; it is also possible to add new ones.

Phonebook and call service

The phonebook capacity didn't change from Series 40 v5 and is limited to 1000 contact records; each record can store up to 5 phone numbers and an extended address line. The contact memory isn't dynamical, once you add a contact record with a single associated phone number it eats up a full one cell in the memory - just as much as a record with 5 phone numbers would take. However a 1000 record limit practically means no limits for most humans. The five phone numbers are Generic, Cell Phone, Home, Video, Work and Fax. The Address field prompts you to specify the street/city/region/ZIP code/country formula, the PTT address, the e-mail field, the online/offline status indicator, the note field, the image and the video. Each contact record (not a group) can be given an individual ringtone.

There are three viewmodes for the contact book - List of Names, Name and Number, Name and Picture. The call icon size is rather large and can actually take up almost the whole screen with the person's name and number displayed overriding this picture when an incoming call pops up. If the picture is too bright, you risk not being able to see those clearly. In this case the font colour customization may be useful. The VideoID function means that a custom video clip can be set for playing each time this particular person calls you. If both a picture and a video are specified, the video is preferred, and the ringtone is replaced with the video's soundtrack, which is not always interesting.

Up to 25 user groups can be created in the phonebook, though no group presets are available. Collisions are allowed, that is a single contact can be a member of more than one group. If a contact has a specific ringtone associated, this will override the group's ringtone, which is quite logical. The group affiliation is indicated right in the contacts list, indicated by a corresponding icon. The speed dial is quite a standard feature; the numericals from 2 to 9 are used as the shortcuts.

The call log shows all types of calls, - that is dialed, received, missed alike, - and every call record comes with a small icon which indicates the call type. This approach seems to be very handy, every time you press the call button you see all the calls sorted by type thanks for the icons or just the contact names if a number has a name associated with it in the phonebook. You can extract the phone number right from a call log record and create a phonebook record based upon that number immediately. Also you can select a call log record to send a message to that particular number, view the call time and date, duration and so on.

Messaging

The Message service includes SMS, MMS and E-mail, audio messages and quick messages. SMS is just the good old SMS services save for the small addition of a shortcut bar for immediate access to the media content. The message view/send interface went through a few cosmetical changes that basically affect nothing. You are still able to insert into the message contact numbers and names, emoticons, change the message type from SMS to MMS and backwards - the overall usability is a bit higher than it used to be, you no longer have to call on the contextual menu. In the message editor you can always insert a text template, an audio fragment, an image or a video clip. Once you add something of the kind to an SMS, it's automatically converted into an MMS.

The message system features a call log of its own, so if you write to someone frequently, the corresponding contact record is sure to appear somewhere in the upper sections of the list, so you won’t have to looking it up in the regular phonebook. The call log's recent records are also added to this list, which only improves the usability further. A message can be sent to a whole user group. There's also an option that lets you specify a default (so called 'favorite') phone number to which all the messages will be sent automatically unless specified otherwise by choosing another number.

The MMS-service is quite standard; the interface was changed a bit though the impact on the functionality is equal to zero - a pure aesthetical improvement. The message size limit is 300 Kb. A specific setting will automatically resize the image attachments to fit in, if activated. The voice messages are just automated MMS messages which work in the following manner: first he voice recorder is launched and when the record is over it's immediately wrapped into an MMS message ready for sending. Then you specify the recipient and you're done.

The embedded e-mail client supports POP3/IMA4/SMTP/APOP protocols. E-mail attachments are supported, the attachments are read by the phone itself. The principal issue considering e-mail functionality is still present - in some cases, the Cyrillic symbol table support goes wrong, however the phone does its best at interpreting KOI-8 and win-1251 coding. If the mail header doesn’t include a code table signature, expect problems. The mail options are: load message headers only; specify the message size limit; the secure authorization method; the default encoding. Image attachments can either retain their original size or downscaled to 1280х960, 640х480, 320х240 or 120х160 pixels.

The text copy and paste function first emerged in Feature Pack 1 devices like Nokia 6132, 6233. The access to this function is only granted from the contextual menu because there's no dedicated text edit button that is inherent to most S60 smartphones, which is far from being comfortable, yet the very possibility of text copying and pasting is a big plus.

The message settings (global parameters, SMS, MMS, E-Mail settings) include such features as sent messages saving, the possibility to change the font (tiny, small, normal and large), support for smileys and icons. MMS also lets specify the maximum picture resolution (up to 640x480 for a normal message, no limits for MMS-plus here though) and the slideshow period.

On the whole, the messaging service is quite good, everything's up to the modern level, we were never able to spot any serious problems on this front.

PIM

The personal information manager comprises the following applications: Calendar, Tasks, Reminders, Timer and Stopwatch. The calendar supports viewing the data either by month or by week, the latter variant also submits hourly schedule for each weekday. Five types of events (meeting, call, anniversary, note, reminder) are available, recurring events are supported, any event can be given an expiration period ranging from one day to one month, after which it will be automatically deleted..

The tasklist is just a regular schedule with an option to set the priority status for each task and specify an expiration period. The reminders are even simpler, just pieces of text limited to 3000 symbols per each. The alarm clock supports both one-time and weekday-scheduled action. Any sound file can be assigned as the alarm signal.
The stopwatch, the timer and the world clock service are quite standard, there's nothing special to be said about. The currency converter supports 7 kinds of monetary units, everything is quite simple.

The Calculator has been vastly improved, it now sports a well-designed interface and expanded math capability with a lot of math functions supported. The Loan Calculator will be of use to anyone willing to do a quick count of their monthly payouts and things alike.

Multimedia features

Nokia 6500Slide doesn’t belong to the multimedia phone class as the manufacturer sees it (this role is played by Nokia 5610XpressMusic), though it sports almost everything. The following audio formats are supported: AAC, AAC +, eAAC +, MP3, MP4, (SP) MIDI, (WB-) AMR, WMA, XMF. Among other things one should note that the audio player features a unique interface. As compared to handsets based on S40 v3 FP2 there’s a significant number of changes in appearance, functionality stays the same and it’s as easy to use as it used to be. On the other hand the appearance is of utmost interest owing to the customizable player skin with a few ones to choose from, which places 6500s close to smartphones. Preset player themes look quite original and independent from the menu and standby mode themes. Comparing this functionality to the interface of the third revision of FP2 (which is the same for all FP2v3 devices regardless of positioning) makes you think that this personalization feat is something that will be highly appreciated by all the users since no alternate solutions is available from the competitive brands.

In the playback mode it's possible to assign a picture or an album cover to a track or a number of tracks so it will displayed during playback. The picture is large and looks advantageous. Depending on the selected theme, this album cover will be displayed either in the center or to the side of the track title and performer name.

The equalizer has five bands and two user presets. Keeping up with the main player interface, the control elements of the equalizer are easy to use; the interface animations are rich and amusing. The enhanced stereo setting resides in the Multimedia menu, though no radical changes are introduced on activation.

A variety of miscellaneous options are available: sorting content by performer, album and genre as well as repeated and random playback. Switching between tracks and performers is done by pressing the navigation button; the controls didn't change from the previous versions. The player application submits a summary of the current playback parameters to the screen during standby and can function in minimized state, at the same time a single Java application can be functioning parallel to it.

The sound quality of Nokia 6500Slide is fair, provided that you employ a good headset by a 3rd party manufacturer – the bundled one (HS-47) leaves much to be desired. This comes true with a firmware accessory (a jack adapter with a response button on it from the 5700XpressMusic sales package is perfectly identified by the device), as well as with adapters by 3rd party manufacturers. The slot is conveniently positioned at the top edge of the handset, being no obstacle for keypad interaction. Nokia 6500s can stand up to 12-13 hours of pure playtime; it’s an average value as compared to SonyEricsson music phones, for an example, or the same 5610XpressMusic which sports a number of energy-saving features during the music playback never seen before.

Video playback is possible in the MP3 player mode with the same interface as when playbacking music files. Fullscreen viewing is supported.

The voice recorder supports phone talk recording, just bind this function to the navigation button and the recording will start once you press it. The recorder issues beeps to warn the person that the talk is being recorded. The record settings are minimal, just the files save location is customizable. Maximum voice record length is limited to 1 hour.

As a unique feature of the device one should consider the presence of TV-output used to establish a phone-to-TV connection in order to play video clips and view photos stored in the phone on the large screen. The two possible settings include NTSC and PAL standards.

Applications, performance

The pre-installed applications include five games: Golf Tour, Backgammon, Highroller Casino, Snake III and Rally 3D. All games have good graphics and leave a positive impression, being rather involving and helping to relax. They are interesting.

Besides the games, the device sports a variety of preinstalled applications which include a content downloads manager which lets automated purchase and downloading of extra content. The interface is rather simple, three folders are available (downloads, subscriptions and favorites) to which the selected files go. Searching through content, data viewing and some other functions are available.

Opera Mini, first introduced as a full-blown Java-based web browser in Nokia 6300, is the most powerful Java-powered web browsing application up to date. The very fact that Opera Mini comes as a preinstalled application can hardly be underestimated. In real life, very few phone users trouble themselves with downloading, installing and configuring third-party software for their cell phones. Thus such a versatile, comfortable and absolutely free addition as Opera Mini makes a brilliant selling point for the latest Nokia handsets. The Yahoo! Search feature comes as an integrated feature, and so does the Wikipedia Search feature. All the standard page viewing parameters like the font size (3 variants) are fully customizable.

The next point of interest is the Yahoo! Go! application optimized for comfortable Internet browsing, it's also good for searching and supports Yahoo! Mail. The measures converter is among the image phone's strong points, too. It's comes in rather handy.

The manager of presentations allows you to manage PowerPoint presentations on a desktop using your handset. You’ll have to get connected via Bluetooth and install the Nokia wireless Presenter application that comes bundled on a software disk.

The search feature can be optionally integrated into the standby mode (as an additional screen bar), this function's name is quite self-explaining. An important difference from the Nokia smartphones is that you can only perform web searches, but you can't do a search in your local content.

The phone supports all Flash Lite applications; the only thing you need to install one is just to copy it to the ROM storage area. No actual installation process is required in fact; the only necessary operation is just sending the .jar file via Bluetooth or the data cable in the Mass Storage mode. After doing so, you can launch Java applications right from the gallery without any preparatory proceedings. The bad side of this feature is that you can't minimize a Java window without having to terminate the process completely, the only exception being the mp3 player application. The Java multitasking isn't supported; only one Java application can be run at a time. The maximum size of a jar file is 1 Mb; the heap size is limited to 2 Mb.

Performance

The performance is up to the modern level, quite characteristic of the most Series 40 v5, the results are quite comparable to Nokia 6300, 6280, 6500c - nothing too unusual about it, the test results aren't outstanding but the overall performance level is quite good. It's quite natural to expect a performance improvement in the fifth revision of the platform due to the MIDP 2.1 upgrade and the introduction of the improved JSR, but in reality this difference is virtually imperceptible.

	Nokia 6500Slide	SonyEricsson W910i
Jbenchmark 1.0.1 Score	1619	7391
Text	380	2214
2D Shapes	400	1884
3D Shapes	265	800
Fill Rate	177	555
Animation	397	1689
Jbenchmark 2.0.1 Score	218	617
Image Manipulations	223	365
Text	199	667
Sprites	337	620
3D Transform	286	615
User Interface	114	15100
Jbenchmark 3D HQ	127	168
Jbenchmark 3D LQ	239	318
Triangles ps	31793	33010
Ktexels ps	1161	1213
Jbenchmark HD Gaming Score	104 (3.4 fps)	83 (2.6 fps)
Smooth triangles	59456	43296