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Review Siemens C60

Siemens C60, live pictures

Standard kit:

Phone
Battery
Charger
Manual

We’ve made an exception for Siemens and stopped testing pre-release phones for our reviews, since they had too much bugs, which are promised to be fixed, but actually still remain. That’s why there is still no SX1 review, and don’t wait for it’s appearance before January, all SX1’s that were sent to us had serious troubles. As to middle class model, Siemens C60, it would have seemed rather silly to expect any troubles, since it’s built on the same platform as it’s older “brothers”, Siemens S55, M55 and recently released MC60. At first it seemed impossible to find anything new in this phone, due to it’s cut features and competitive price for the low-end phone market. Actually, it turned out to be interesting after all.

This phone has classical style used by Siemens for this type of phones. It has average size (110õ47õ23 mm) although it may seem a little too plump. This is the feeling you get when you’re looking on the phone. Its weight is 85 grams, and it is just enough for this kind of model. You can carry it wherever you like, in your shirt’s pocket or in jeans.

A display is capable of showing up to 4096 colors and has 101x80 pixels screen resolution. Up to five text lines can be shown on the screen, plus one used for service needs. Screen remains readable even when it’s facing direct sunlight, although it does become a little pale. Images, especially pictures look weak, you can even see artifacts, which turn out to be big dots. Sharp color overlay is seen as well.

The keyboard is made of plastic, just like in A55. And if A55 was famous due to it’s crunchy keyboard, then you can call C60 a rattle. Just shake the phone and you’ll hear the keyboard shaking. As to keyboard’s convenience, it’s average, keys are just a little bit smaller then they could have been. Keypad’s back light is orange. Backlight can be seen fully only in complete darkness. While you are outdoor or indoors, font used for keypads becomes hard to read. You can’t actually see neither digits nor letters clearly. The only thing that saves the phone is it's standard position, there is nothing to get used to.

You can see a standard system connector on the bottom of the phone and a strap hole on the top of it.

Panels can be changed; it’s typical for this series. Although you will have to deal with the fact that the new cover will start crackling after a while. This will not affect the performance, but at the same time it can be a little annoying.

C60 has Li-On 700 mAh battery. Siemens claims that C60 can work up to 250 hours in stand by mode, and around 6 hours while talking. We tested it in Moscow, it worked for 2 days with 30 minutes of talking and 45 minutes of using other phone’s features (games). If you talk less (up to 20 minutes a day) and use phone’s features only for a while, it will work for 3 days. A bit less than 2 hours is required for full charging.

The main Menu is presented with 9 icons; one of them is used for Camera which is not shipping with the phone. Most of C60 users will likely not buy the camera, so bringing this feature to the main menu seems like a bit foolish idea. You can navigate using shorcut number navigation, which saves your time.

Phonebook. Phone’s memory allows to store up to 100 contacts. You can add only one phone number and e-mail for each entry. Besides, every name can be assigned to an image, a photo or a simple picture. All names can be sorted to five groups. Special ring tones can be defined for each of the groups.

Messages. Up to 100 messages can be stored, and once again the memory spreads dynamically. Messages from phone’s memory and SIM-card are shown in one list. SIM Card’s sms are marked with special icon. You can create templates and folders if you like. Phone has MMS messages support. Of course it’s better to choose sending data over GPRS, this will save your money.

I wasn’t delighted with an interface while creating messages. You can’t move quickly between pages, and you should call a context menu to know, how many pages you have in your message. A message size reminder, which is displayed before sending a message, is very pleasant. You need also to input a time period (one hour – as long as you want), during which the message will be delivered. If you pay for the messages size (depends on operator) it’s a rather important function. You can receive MMS manually or automatically. Besides, you can decide would you like to receive message in roaming. It’s interesting that sometimes, when you are in automatic mode, the phone gives a notice that this way can be expensive.

Records. Phone can store up to 10 last dialed, 10 received and 10 missed calls. Date and time are shown for every entry.

Ring tones. Choice of melodies, type of the ring, that’s what’ve been cut from the Settings to Main Menu.

More. This menu offers you to use either timer, stopwatch, or alarm clock (can be programmed for 1 time only, the only positive change is that it shows current time). .

Personal. Pictures and melodies are stored here.

Surf&Fun. Wap browser 1.2.1 and two games – StackAttack 2, Puzzle are located in this menu.

Settings. You can setup phone’s functions here. There is no need in describing all sub-menus, since they’re already known if you have used a Siemens phone once. By the way, I recommend disabling GPRS, if you do not use it. It will save you some battery power.

Impressions

Ring tone volume is average (you can miss the call quite often), vibrating alert is typical for Siemens phones, it’s average. No problems with reception quality were encountered during testing period. Inspite of the fact that this phone uses the same platform, as M55, it has much more modest phonebook, but the same amount of memory (1.86 Ìá).

On the whole, this is a typical Siemens phone. It seems to be one of the most interesting phones presented by Siemens recently. Other phones are too weak for their classes. Although, there is one problem which can become phone’s flop, it’s price. It costs 150 dollars, which seem to be really overrated. For example, the most popular phone in this segment (We will not name it due Siemens’s negative reaction when another brand is mentioned in the review) has been released about a year ago and has same functions, as Siemens C60, but it costs less. What we can see here, is that the phone’s price becomes overrated, and it scares away potential buyers.

This model will become popular real soon, but it will never repeat the sucess of its predecessor - C55. This phone has too much lacks. For the first time in C class, a handset doesn’t have Java, it can be activated only with the help of special unofficial firmware, just like e-mail client. To cut the long story short, another phone from Siemens made for those who love to tweak their toys is released.

Eldar Murtazin ([email protected])
Translated by Alexander "Lexx" Zavoloka([email protected])

Published — 03 December 2003

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