Nokia 3660 is Coming...
Mobile-review.com got their hands on a 3660 and gives it a quick workout. It seems just as capable as the 3650 (in other words, an amazing smart phone) but with the more consumer-friendly keypad layout and a nicer screen. I wonder how long it'll be before this phone is generally available? It's really too bad the Americas are getting the 3620 which is the same thing, but not a world phone.
There's two things that bug me about the 3660's launch. First, I wish they were upgrading the OS as well, it's still stuck on Series 60 v1 and Symbian 6.1 rather than moving up to the next versions like the Nokia 6600. Secondly, even though the 3650 is a kick-ass phone, it's also *huge*. The window for that phone was last year - all the newer phones are much smaller now. Yes, if Nokia had put a normal keypad on that phone last year, it would've been an even better seller, but they didn't. I don't think there's any way to un-do that mistake. Launching this phone now a year later doesn't make up for it. Better to concentrate on the 6600 models instead. By the end of the year, the 3660 is going to seem even more enormous. I guess maybe Nokia is thinking that it was such a popular phone that they can milk it some more with just a few tweaks. I'm sure designing and developing a whole new phone is just a ton of cash - better to tweak something that's working instead of starting from scratch again?
Interesting side note in the Mobile-review article: Siemens is also redoing their S60 phone, the SX1, as well with a standard keyboard. That's very interesting. I know these guys design the phones years ahead of launch, but still, it's a real shame that these two kick-ass phones had to be hindered by the wacky keypads. From that perspective it's nice to see some sanity returning.
Now if only they'd take some design cues from SonyEricsson...
-Russ
A day later: It's here!