Nokia 6301 (T-Mobile)

I picked up the 6301 because I was intrigued by the UMA feature. I figured it was a chance to save a few minutes on the family plan.

In It's Favor:

°It's slim.
°It's light.
°It has a genuine AV port, not some hokey Pop-Port for the headphone/microphone. Thank you Nokia!
°It takes the ubiquitous and inexpensive BL-4C battery.
°The Nokia 6301 can support a maximum of 4GB microSDHC memory card.
°I easily was able to "drag and drop" from my Nokia 6290 music collection to this phone.
°UMA is simple to setup. It hooked up to Skyriver in under 15 seconds.
°Synching with the T-Mobile on-line phone book took all of 35 seconds when it came time to transfer to the new phone.
°Voice dialing takes about two minutes of training by repeating a series of key phrases so the phone can get a clue to your accent. It is very accurate after the training in distinguishing between "Home" and "Joan" in 95% of attempts while dialing in my car, not the world's quietest environment.
°A metal battery cover that is not flimsy gives a very solid feel to this handset.
°It takes good photos outside.
°The charging stand is a nice touch. It looks cool and reduces the amount of time I spend looking for my mobile in the morning.
°The new AC-4U charger is more energy efficient using about a tenth of the energy the old style AC-3U charger used when sitting idly in the receptacle waiting for a phone to charge.
°Ringtones are loud, clear and can use just about any sound file supported by the phone for a ringtone.
°The keys have a wondrous texture to them. They feel great under the fingers. They are unlike any other manufacturer's phone keys. They are not slick or sticky or plasticky. They have a texture to them that allows you to feel the key and grip it with your finger pad. Go to a T-Mobile store and check it out, you'll see.
°Personal Informaton Management is intuitive and fairly complete. PC synch of the PIM is not straight-forward until you use Nokia's PC Suite.

It's good but not perfect.

¤The screen washes out in outdoor light, even on overcast days.
¤It could use a flash for the camera.
¤The UMA sometimes hands off to the tower base station between picking up the phone and hitting the send button.
¤It sometimes forgets it is connected to the router.
¤The headset that ships with the phone is a wired stereo headset. Please ship it with a mono wired headset as well.
¤The design offers no protection for the lens over the LCD.
¤Bluetooth + UMA = Needs more power than the BL-4C provides, another 1mm, or less in thickness would have allowed the BL-5C to sit in the battery compartment and add 25% more oomph, and it really needs that.
¤Firmware 8.22, recently released seems to have addressed most of the issues I previously raised in this section. Use Nokia Software Updater Software (NSU) to install it. Very automated process, easy to do.

Overall this is an excellent phone. The positives far outweigh the negatives. The User Interface is quick. The phone memory is large and expandable, signal reception is excellent and sound quality is Nokia - none better

Beware of the Look-a-like 6300 which is easily mistaken for the 6301.
RM-323 = 6301b (North America)(850 MHz 1800 Mhz 1900 Mhz + WiFi) T- Mobile/Fido
RM-322 = 6301 (Europe/APAC) (900 MHz 1800 Mhz 1900 Mhz + WiFi)
RM-217 = 6300 (Europe/APAC) (900 MHz 1800 Mhz 1900 Mhz)
RM-222 = 6300b (North America)(850 MHZ 1800 Mhz 1900 Mhz)
ASK THE SELLER!