Nokia 3600 slide review: Smooth glider

Nokia 3600 slide is one of those handsets which no one seems to covet, love and lust but everybody ends up buying or having. It's a straightforward guess that a S40 handset of subdued but comfortable styling and sufficient skill will simply go around. The neat and compact Nokia slider has all the basics duly covered and strives to deliver beyond its price in terms of imaging. A 3.2 megapixel camera, VGA video and TV out should be enough of an identity booster.

Nokia 3600 slide official photos

Key features:

• Quad-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE support
• 2" 16M-color QVGA display
• 3 megapixel camera, autofocus and LED flash
• VGA video recording
• S40 user interface, 5th edition, FP1
• Bluetooth with A2DP, USB
• Stereo FM radio with RDS
• microSD card slot (up to 8 GB), 512MB included
• 2.5mm standard audio jack, TV-out
• Rich preinstalled content
• Nokia Maps
• Voice commands
• Compact and lightweight
• Nice oval shapes and neat slider design

Main disadvantages:

• No 3G support
• Average camera image quality
• Very rigid shutter key
• Rigid battery cover latch
• Memory card slot under the hard-to-remove rear cover
• The battery falls off immediately when the rear cover is removed
• The bottom row of keys gets scratched by the sliding action

The Nokia 3600 slide views

Catering to the mid range is by no means an easy task. Affordability goes without saying, but you won't do without personality. How do you set your goods apart without ending up with a niche product? Plus, the midrange is a stretchy concept already. The limits are blurring over megapixel count, 3G and multimedia. Last but not least, yesterday's high-enders are getting cheaper, to make the utterly overcrowded midrange extra unfriendly.

Those are the kind of issues for Nokia 3600 slide to tackle and it chooses to do so by focusing on imaging. The 16M-color screen, 3 megapixel autofocus camera, VGA video and TV-out are the only goodies that are a bit too haughty for the midrange. The rest is plain and simple stuff that comes by the handful. The 200 euro package includes an audio player, FM radio, stereo Bluetooth, EDGE and expandable memory, all on the fit and reliable S40 platform. The smooth slider casing and neat looks round it all off.

It does come out as a comprehensive feature set, but 3G would've really made it hard to resist. The 3600 slide still has enough to keep us busy, so let's get down to it. Unboxing and hardware inspection are this small jump away.