Nokstalgia: HMD Global introduces yet another homage to the past – a 4G rework of the Nokia 6300

HMD Global has served up another ladle of Nokstalgia*, with one more remake of a classic mid-2000s phone - a 4G-capable rehash of the corporate-tastic Nokia 6300, which first saw a release in 2007. The original Nokia 6300 was a conventional candybar-design handset, and touted features found on premium handsets of the era. …

[AMBxx]

Tempted

Addition of 4G makes tethering a cheap tablet to a cheap phone more attractive. I use my bulky, rugged phone with OS Maps app for hiking. Smaller phone in pocket with tethered tablet would give the best of both worlds.

[werdsmith]

I will look out for one of these. My backup phone, a HMD 3310 was supposed to be RRP £39.99 but I grabbed one for £19.99 so I hope to pay a bit less and 60 quid for this. It will be great to have a 4G hotspot available.

[druck]

Heavy metal only

The whole point of the 6300 was its metal case.

I've still got mine somewhere. it was a backup phone for a long time until I got tired of the SIMs expiring.

[Pascal Monett]

Cool

I'll be happy to have a phone like that when I retire.

[BrownishMonstr]

Re: Cool

When is that? Tomorrow? Next year? 60 years? Never?

[MacroRodent]

Text

Text input in a keypad worked surprisingly well after some practice. The touchscreen keyboards are not ideal either. But I always turned off predictive text input, because it does not work so well for Finnish, where words are longer and have complex conjugation. Entering the first few characters gives the system little clue about how it ends.

[mark l 2]

If only KiaOS supported larger touch screen devices. As If I could get a phone with a 4 or 5 inch touch screen for me it would be a viable alternative to getting an Android or iphone as I don't really use any apps, I just need a phone with a web browser, whatsapp and to do calls and text. I just would be reluctant to do web browsing on a small screen that the candy bar or flip phone have

[Len]

Ever looked into Sailfish OS? I run it on a Sony Xperia XA2 as my second phone and am quite happy with it.

[Anonymous Coward]

Just say NO to Android

I have SailfishOS as my main driver in an XperiaX Dual SIM. This is useful when travelling to countries where one risks being forced to install a tracking app. I remove the Android subsystem :)

Is kaiOS is similarly incapable?

[Ian Johnston]

Coo. Looks nice. If only they would do the Nokia 6220c, which was the best phone I ever had. Infinite battery life, cracking good camera with a xenon flash, easy to use. I still have its cold, dead corpse lying about somewhere.

[Lazlo Woodbine]

I had a 6020 as my work phone for a while, I much preferred the little joystick over the 4-way keypad

[Dabooka]

If I had to resurrect one

it would probably be the N95. Preferred it to the iPhone.

Better battery, lighter but with a small touch screen, I'd happily have one as my second handset. Much better than the work supplied bricks.

[Dave559]

Re: If I had to resurrect one

If we're all making wishes, I'd really like an updated E7, please. Touchscreen + decent keyboard, it was the best of both worlds.

[Dan 55]

Seems odd they haven't released new version of the 6310i yet.

[msknight]

I want the banana phone... with spring!

(body)

[werdsmith]

Re: I want the banana phone... with spring!

The 8110 re-run came out in 2018, and is still available for 50 quiddish.

Search Nokia 8110 4G

[Blackjack]

Nokia N8 remake when?

That's my second favorite ever Nokia phone.

[BrownishMonstr]

Re: Nokia N8 remake when?

I'm waiting for the n-gage

[AIBailey]

"why you’d want to text on a T9 keyboard is beyond us."

The one thing that I'd really love on my Android phone is a no-frills reliable T9 keyboard.

I used to find it possible to type quickly and accurately using predictive text, and the muscle memory is still there.

[Shadow Systems]

Re: "why you’d want to text on a T9 keyboard is beyond us."

Because as a totally blind person for whom a flat slab of featureless & haptic-feedback-devoid glass is the absolute *worst* method of entering text, at least the Tap9 gives us buttons to feel, clicky noises to let us know we've pressed something, & we can do the muscle memory to reach for the next letter in the entry without faffing around trying to find it first.

Just you wait until you get old, arthritic, fat fingered, myopic, & your vaunted pseudo-smart phone turns your attempts to type into useless gibberish.

And before you dismiss feature phones as niche, consider that the Chinese buy them by the *millions* because they get the job done, do it inexpensively, & tend to last longer per charge than your average Tsetse fly during mating season at the fish pond.

[Dan 55]

Re: "why you’d want to text on a T9 keyboard is beyond us."

I was far more accurate with an on-screen T9 keyboard than a QWERTY keyboard. On a Nokia N8 both were available. On Android I haven't found one one with predictive text yet (which is kind of the point of a T9 keyboard).

[BrownishMonstr]

Re: "why you’d want to text on a T9 keyboard is beyond us."

The keyboard on the Lumias were great for swiping, some issues but was mostly good. Second best is SwiftKey. Despite being Microsoft still not as good as the lumia ones.

[Blackjack]

Re: "why you’d want to text on a T9 keyboard is beyond us."

One thing those phones had was fast typing, I can't deny that.

[Duncan Macdonald]

A bit overpriced

A quick look on eBay shows a DOOGEE Y6C Android phone with 4G, 2GB/16GB/microSD card storage, a 5.5" screen and a 3400mAh battery for £38.99 .

Except for blind people there is very little to recommend this phone.

[Alumoi]

Re: A bit overpriced

What part of 'a real keyboard' did you miss?

[Quentin North]

Still using my 6300

The battery lasts for a week, it has a fancy blue flashing LED when a text has been received and the neatest trick is when you use it as an alarm clock it fades in the sound, so it doesn't shock you awake but just gently brings you out of your slumber with the tune of your choice. It would be nice if these features were in the new version of the 6300, but when I tried the new 3310 I was disappointed.

[-tim]

Re: Still using my 6300

My old 6300 is my bedside alarm clock. It is the second best alarm clock I've ever used due to its features like pressing the 4 does a 4 minute snooze, yet non-numeric use the default value which can be set arbitrarily. Too bad I can't put a sim in it to reset its time anymore.

[jonfr]

2G and 3G are going offline for good

Everyone using 2G and 3G phone today is soon going to find them without any signal. Plans are different between countries but 2G and 3G are going to be gone by 2030. The upgrade of simple mobile phones to 4G and 5G is going to happen because the mobile networks are getting permanent upgrade.

Around 2030 the new standard of 6G is going to be released to the market and then it is going to be 4G and 5G that is going to be turned off.