Best available non-Colour phone . Review on Nokia 2300 Cell Phone

This is my 1st (out of hopefully many) reviews on mouthshut and I am going to talk about my Nokia 2300 mobile phone.

After getting admission into a college in August 2004, the 1st thing I wanted was a mobile phone. I wanted to buy a Nokia phone for they are the leading mobile phone sellers in India and have a good brand name as well. At that time, colour phones of Nokia were available for well over Rs. 6500.(Now they are available for as low as Rs. 4500). I, then bought the Nokia 2300 mobile phone for Rs. 4300 at that time(it costs Rs. 3600 now). The features which attracted me towards this phone was the FM Radio, Polyphonic ringtones and its amazing design. Now for the review -

Looks - The Nokia 2300, is a great looking phone provided you go for the Graphite colour. The other colour, is too girl-ish and does not look good on men. Looks 9/10

Usage - The Nokia 2300 is of the best phones to use. Its usage is very simple and any one can understand it easily. Its 4-way scroll makes it more easier to use and there is even a Right scroll key setting as well which you can use as you like. Usage 10/10

Entertainment and FM Radio - Being a non-colour phone, it provides less amount of entertainment as colour phones do. However, there is a good amount of entertainment with the inbuilt FM Radio which makes the Nokia 2300 a cool phone. The FM Radio, has 10 channels and can be listened by attaching the headset to the phone. The loudspeaker of the Nokia 2300 is also great. The best thing about the loudspeaker is that you can listen the FM Radio from both the headset and the loudspaker at the same time. This feature is not available in FM Radio enabled colour phones. Also, the clarity of the channels and the antenna of the Nokia 2300 is also very strong. The FM Radio of Nokia 2300 works clearly when other FM Radios get poor signal. Also, the games like Snake-II provide a lot of entertainment with both the classic and campaign modes. Entertainment 8/10, FM Radio 20/10

Display - The display of the Nokia 2300 is great with the white lighted display. Also, its white light is stronger as compared to green light phones and in the absence of light, this white light of the Nokia 2300 comes in as very useful. Display 10/10

Ringtones - THe Nokia 2300, offers a ringtone composer to create unique ringtones and to bring out the musician in you. Also, with the composer, there is a unique ability to SMS Ringtones to others. This feature of SMSing Ringtones is a feature provided only by the non-colour phones of Nokia and the Nokia 2600 phone. This feature, makes the Nokia 2300 a unique phone. Ringtones 10/10

Handling - The Nokia 2300 is the most unbreakable phone ever made. I use a Nokia 2300 and it has fallen over a 100 times and there isnt even a scratch. Sometimes, even the battery came off, but once I put in the battery and Switched on the phone, the phone worked perfectly smoothly giving no problems. Once the mobile, even fell off from the 1st floor and nothing happened to it. The phone, still works smoothly as ever with no scratch at all. Handling 12/10

Battery life - The Nokia 2300 takes less than 2 hours to be fully recharaged and it the phone isnt used, the battery lasts for 3-4 days without recharging. The Nokia 2300. does not offer a good battery life as compared to other phones. On using the phone, the battery gets used up within 2 days and on listening to the FM Radio, the battery will vanish within a day. Battery life 7/10

Other Features - The best available other features is the in-call timer. With most mobile networks offering 1 minute pulse, you do know when you are nearing the 1 minute and you disconnect the call. with this feature, I have disconnected many calls after talking for 55-59 seconds or 1min 55-59 secs. Normally, when you are calling anyone 55-59 seconds are enough to send over the message and this feature prevents the calls from just crossing the 1 minute mark and it is very frustrating if your call duration reads 1 min 5 secs for in that case, you are billed for 2 calls. This amazing feature of the Nokia 2300 prevents getting overbilled and allows you to make more calls and even save others from getting overbilled and saving their calls. Other Features 10/10

Overall Rating 10/10

The disadvantages of using the Nokia 2300 -

No GPRS - The Nokia 2300 does not provide GPRS and there is no way to download polyphonic ringtones on the mobile. The only polyphonic ringtones which you can hear are the 36 in-built Nokia tones. In the 7 spaces meant for empty ringtones, you can download only monophonic ringtones.

No Picture Editor - The Nokia 2300 does not provide a picture editor for creating own picture messages. This feature, however is available in the Nokia 2100 phone.

Overall, the Nokia 2300 is a good phone for those who are looking for a basic mobile phone in the range of about Rs. 3000-4000. This phone, is good for those people who are buying their 1st mobile phones and it is a cool phone for college goers as well. With the FM radio, you can even listen to your favourite songs or hear commentary of the ongoing cricket match anywhere.

I am quite surprised by the lowly 39% recommenedation of the Nokia 2300 phone on mouthshut. I expected it to be over 80%. After an initial software problem last year, The Nokia 2300 phone models, made or repaired after November 2003, gave no software problem. Earlier, the phone used to go Switched off itself without pressing the Switch off button. I believe, the Nokia 2300 will become the next Nokia 3310 and be a hit everywhere. You will surely be the center of attraction with a Nokia 2300 mobile phone unless your friends have phones like Nokia 7610.