| Mini-Review of the Nokia 3120 |
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The Nokia 3120 is yet another boxy style-resistant GSM entry from Nokia that doesn’t seem to bring anything new to the table except expand the number of model designations you can choose from. This is essentially an entry-level phone, despite its rather steep $209 no-contact price at Rogers Wireless. Last Updated: 10-Oct-2004 |
Before reading this review, please read Some Thoughts on Phone Reviewing.
General
This is only a mini-review, meaning that I only had an hour or two to play
around with the 3120 over at Square One. Fortunately I was able to put the phone
through most of the standard tests, and I played with it enough to get a feel
for what it could and could not do. On that score the phone was a
disappointment, in that it seemed no different from countless other Nokia phones
I’ve played with in the last year or so. It has the same 128x128 color screen,
the same menu system, the same basic feature set, etc.
It also has one of Nokia’s current trademark design flaws; an attempt at a funky
keypad that just doesn’t have the functionality of a well-designed traditional
model. The keys are butted against one another, which greatly reduces your
ability to feel which key you are pressing. Like many other keypads of this type
the phone must be looked at to be dialed. This a definite problem when you try
to use it while driving (but hey, you aren’t supposed to do that anyway).
The usual assortment of polyphonic ringtones was nice enough, but the ringer
wasn’t particularly loud. As I’ve often said, a loud ringer is a necessity when
the phone is used in a noisy environment. A vibrator-alert can help, but you
can’t always feel the vibrations through thick clothing in the winter.
RF
Performance and Audio Quality
Due to the phone’s lack of distinction in terms of functionality I’ll skip
right to the bottom line, which is RF performance
and audio quality. In terms of RF performance the
3120 was a reasonable performer, though in the Hall of Shame at Square One it
failed to match my 1900-MHz-only Nokia 6310i.
Granted, the difference was marginal, but the 3120 just couldn’t hold onto a
call as well as the 6310i when the signals were substantially weakened.
Incoming audio quality had a nice tonal balance, but it seemed to suffer from
way too much high frequency distortion. Many people who experience this
distortion describe it as HISS, which isn’t far from the truth. However, unlike
background hiss, which is independent of the audio, and subsequently constant,
the effect on the 3120 varies with the audio. This makes it far more annoying
than ordinary background hiss. Overall I found the sound reproduction
sub-standard.
Outgoing sound quality was okay, but hardly stellar. Like many Nokia phones it
managed to pick up background noise too well, and as such it made it sound like
you were in a nosier location than you really were. Sound quality was only
average and ever so slightly muffled compared with much better phones like the
Nokia 3650.
So you wouldn’t find me using a 3120. The poorly-conceived keypad, the distorted
incoming audio, and the sub-standard outgoing audio just don’t add up to a
quality GSM phone.
