The ‘indestructible’ handset returns, full with one-month standby time, color display screen and baggage of nostalgia
The rumours are true – the Nokia 3310 is again, and it even has Snake. The up to date model of the early noughties icon, famed for its seemingly indestructible qualities, was unveiled on the Cellular World Congress in Barcelona on Sunday.
Anticipation of the machine, a cellphone that doesn’t even have 3G, has been excessive ever since information of its launch leaked earlier this yr. The relaunched 3310 is produced by new cell agency HMD International, which licensed the Nokia model final yr. HMD is stuffed with key ex-Nokia individuals, and the cellphone seems to have misplaced not one of the allure and identification of the 17-year-old authentic.
“This is what consumers have been asking us for, and so we decided that we’d just do it and have some fun with it, said Florian Seiche, president of HMD. “That’s the unique opportunity we have here at HMD with the Nokia brand.”
The cellphone has a barely greater display screen than its namesake, and in color this time. It additionally has a digital camera on the again, which the unique didn’t. It does have a detachable again cowl and battery, and runs an up to date model of the unique’s S30 software program. The software program behaves a lot like the unique and followups you may assume you have been caught inside some kind of time loop. The cellphone will price about €50 (£42) when launched within the second quarter of 2017. The unique price in 2000 was £129.99 on pay as you go.
HMD guarantees that the brand new Nokia 3310 might be as sturdy because the previous one, usually seen as virtually indestructible by the teenagers of the 2000s. The brand new 3310 is about half the thickness of the unique and has 10 instances the discuss time, with 22 hours, and twice the standby time: one month – a length nearly unheard-of in 2017.
| Function | Outdated Nokia 3310 | New Nokia 3310 |
|---|---|---|
| **Weight** | 133g | 79.6g |
| **Digicam** | none | 2MP |
| **Battery life** | As much as two weeks should you’re fortunate | A month on standby |
| **Snake?** | Sure | Sure – nevertheless it’s not the identical |
| **Value** | £129.99 | €49 (£41) |
| **Launched** | This autumn 2000 | Q2 2017 |
It’s charged through microUSB, so there’s no want to hold the pin Nokia charger of previous, and there’s even a headphones socket within the backside. Cynics may see the brand new 3310 as merely a advertising and marketing train however some analysts are extra optimistic. CCS Perception’s Ben Wooden says that out out of the roughly 20m telephones bought within the UK annually, 1m of them are nonetheless function telephones such because the 3310.
Wooden stated: “There is a segment of the population that just wants a basic phone. From the stereotype of builder that just wants to call and text and if it gets broken it doesn’t matter, to the festival phone and the backup phone.”
The again comes off, the battery comes out and there’s even a microSD card slot.
Whether or not nostalgia, the need for a much less linked, however nonetheless contactable life or just a funds cellphone is sufficient to drive significant gross sales of the brand new 3310 stays to be seen. The Nokia model run by HMD was the quantity two international producer of function telephones in 2016, with 35.3m handsets shipped for a 9% share of the market, in accordance with information from Technique Analytics.
Neil Mawston, govt director at Technique Analytics stated: “Nokia has struggled in smartphones, but it maintains a very good reputation for delivering user-friendly feature phones at competitive prices, such as the Nokia 230 dual sim.”
Maybe essentially the most fascinating factor the Nokia 3310 tells us is just not about function telephones, however fairly the state of the smartphone market dominated by Apple and Samsung.
Wooden stated: “It’s a completely damning indictment of the state of the smartphone market that the world is so excited and obsessive about a retro function cellphone that shipped 17 years in the past.
“The 3310 is poised to be the largest story of Cellular World Congress this yr, the place we’re surrounded by essentially the most innovative expertise out there on the planet. The place telephones have synthetic intelligence in them, 4K screens that most individuals don’t even have on their TV at residence, cameras which can be extra highly effective than we’ve seen. And we’re all getting excited a few 17-year-old function cellphone.”
Play classic Snake
- Use the arrow keys to direct the snake around the screen and eat the dots.
- The more dots the snake eats, the longer it grows and the higher your score.
- Avoid causing the snake to eat itself, and use the arrow keys to start the game again.
For its half, the 3310 isn’t the one cellphone HMD is unveiling at MWC this yr. Three Android-based smartphones, the competitively priced, mid-tier units the Nokia 6, 5 and three – there is no such thing as a Nokia four now nor has there ever been because the quantity is taken into account unfortunate in China – every with aluminium unibody designs, a bloat-free Pixel-like Android expertise and assured updates for 2 years from launch.
HMD hopes to realize its purpose of democratising smartphones and bringing high-end options and high quality to mid-tier costs. Chinese language rivals reminiscent of Huawei are already saturating the market at scale with high quality units.
For Wooden, as good as HMD’s new Nokia Android telephones are, it’s all concerning the model. He stated: “If someone walks into a shop and they want a mid-tier phone, do they buy a Huawei, or a OnePlus, a Xiaomi or a Vivo or Wileyfox or something else they’ve never heard of, or a do they buy the Nokia, the brand they know?”