Nokia 6790 Surge User Reviews

dontneedaname posted on 31 Jul 2011, 19:30

Poor 4

I'd Stay Away

dontneedaname has owned it for more then one year before publishing this review

I was drawn to this phone because of it's keyboard. I have massive thumbs and couldn't afford a large touchscreen phone, so I got this one because it was the only phone I could comfortably use. I also got it thinking that I couldn't break it.

How wrong I was.

My first one lasted a month until I closed the phone and the screen broke in half. I couldn't believe it. Considering I had an LG (fragile brand) and I had not had a single build quality problem in the 2 years I had it, I think I take decent care of my phones. I kept it in a case and had never dropped it.

I sent it back, and received a new one. About 9 months later, I noticed that it would keep freezing while doing mundane things - typing text messages, starting up the camera app, even changing the phone from silent to vibrate, and I would have to do battery pulls almost hourly. It could also not handle more than 10 minutes of using 3.5G before overheating and shutting off. At this point I thought this was slightly ridiculous - surely a phone that is advertised as an internet capable phone should be able to - you know, go on the internet without destroying itself.

After a few weeks, the charge level went from about a week to about 6 hours, rendering it unusable. All within less than a year. Mind you I do not overuse my phone at all - send about 75 texts a day and make 2-3 calls. I, as I said before, never dropped my phone. I have an option to get another one, but 3 times will not be the charm with Nokia's Surge.

Build quality 2/10
With light usage, this phone managed to find 2 different ways to break within a year with no misuse at all. The slide mechanism caused the screen to break the first time, which is ridiculous, and the battery fizzled out on the second one.

Reception 8/10
Reception was decent. I could hold on to 3G bars almost whenever I went, but whenever I was in a fringe area, calls would drop.

Call quality 5/10
I had to adapt the way I talk on the phone so people could hear me. The mic is not powerful enough for how far away it is from your mouth.

Internet 4/10
Besides the internet browser being anemic, the internet capabilities also cripple the phone and make it lock up.

Multimedia 2/10
Surge comes with a decent amount of storage space, but the music player is terribly unintuitive, and a 2.5mm jack doesn't really help matters. Watching videos is even worse as it struggles to run basic 320x240 videos.

Camera 7/10
The camera is a basic point and shoot - no fanciness, but it does take good pictures. Video recording is a laggy mess though.

UI speed 2/10
Surge freezes while doing mundane tasks such as texting and calling. Menus load slowly and lists of items take minutes to populate.

Everyday usage 4/10
As stated before, the Surge freezes while doing the simple tasks that one would expect a phone to do.

Text input 8/10
The keyboard is awesome - spacious and easy to type on. The keys are a bit mushy, but that's the nature of the beast for large keys.

Display 6/10
The display is decent enough - could be bigger, but I knew the size of the screen before buying, so I can't complain.

Battery 1/10
Man oh man. Where do I start. The battery life is amazing on one hand. However, the battery is the whole reason I hate this phone. It suffered a complete breakdown and now refuses to charge. Before that it would overheat while doing anything other than idling to the point where I couldn't hold the phone. People I spoke to told me that this is a fairly common issue.

Pros

• Decent Keyboard
• Does SMS and MMS well
• Great Battery Life
• Reception
• Unique Design

Cons

• Fragile
• Laggy/Slow
• Mic Placement
• Batteries are fincky
• Freezes Often
• Keys Stop Working
• Terrible at Multimedia
• No WiFi

andfrew posted on 25 Aug 2010, 12:02

Good 8.3

not a bad phone

the key sounds can be disabled. and i tether with mine all the time. i've had this phone for 11 months and it barely has a scratch on it. i've dropped it many times so i was surprised to read that one review. the only problem i have with it is the 2.5 headphone jack.

manda.starr posted on 06 Jun 2010, 12:51

Good 7.7

loved it...while it lasted.

i'm very picky when it comes to phones. this one, i truely loved and thought i would have it for a while. sadly, i dropped it at work while texting, and it broke. it was ridiculous considering it landed on a rubber mat yet suffered such damage. the entire top left corner where the keyboard connects to the base of the phone was broken and when i took the back off to retrieve my sim card a big chunk fell off. i have the option of getting another one with my insurance, but honestly, i don't know if it'd be worth it seeing how easily the first one was broken.

so, if you want a phone that will hold up, look elsewhere.

Pros

• spacious qwerty keyboard
• nice features
• downloadable custom themes
• radio
• decent camera/video

Cons

• damages too easily

Anonymous posted on 08 Feb 2010, 09:14

Terrible 1

DO NOT BUY!!!

Do not buy this phone. I had it for 3 months and parts kept falling off. !st the directional pad and then the contacts. Nokia did not want to fix or replace it. this phone is made of cheap plastic parts. It does not tether which is a major downer. If your a texter like I am this phone will not last.

Uday Singh posted on 03 Nov 2009, 14:20

Good 8

Nokia Surge : Surges ahead!!!

I bought this phone yesterday only !!Pros:3G phonegreat battery lifephone supface is finger print- freegreat screen !! crystal clear photosgood luking phonegreat loudspeakerauto FM radiocons:no touchscreenno camera FLASHarrow keys make tapping sound  owing to cheapnessrely on side sliding keyboard to dial a number :(

Swedish Boy in USA posted on 29 Sep 2009, 21:59

Average 5.7

Euro my . o v for International Users

Review is made in regards to price range & abilities.

GSM/GPRS/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 MHz; UMTS/HSDPA 850/1900 MHz
No Wi Fi
No Tethering (Might be a work around but as advertised via ATT answer is no) 

It wouldn't have broke the bank to add 2100 MHz & yes the phone will still work in Europe (and Asia too I think).

Problem I ran into was often Data will  time out and/or get confused when it tries to access the 2100 mode and gets bounced... as other phones in same area with similar capabilities like the W760A was having no problems. For this Surge model at least had this downgrade. Also I have average hand size and it wasn't the most comfortable to talk on.


***Off subject Razr V3XX speeds ROCK on tethering, if you don't have a data plan with a RAZR V3XX please don't tether unless you want to spend alot of money on bandwidth charges. Reason I bring up Razr, even though they are fragile the tether speed is constant and reliable compared to ALOT of phones I've experimented with.***

Nokia is made in Finland, I wonder why they wouldn't add 2100Mhz
Sony Ericsson is made in Sweden, most of their phones if not all have 2100Mhz

My pick is Sony Ericsson W760a for international users, without alot of onboard memory it isn't a con for me it's a Pro as I like my data easily movable.  Still no WiFi but Tetherable, better camera, same price but no QWERTY. Like that I can close the mobile when tethered to save power.

Almost...  

Review is made in regards to price range & abilities.

GSM/GPRS/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 MHz; UMTS/HSDPA 850/1900 MHz
No Wi Fi
No Tethering (Might be a work around but as advertised via ATT answer is no) 

It wouldn't have broke the bank to add 2100 MHz & yes the phone will still work in Europe (and Asia too I think).

Problem I ran into was often Data will  time out and/or get confused when it tries to access the 2100 mode and gets bounced... as other phones in same area with similar capabilities like the W760A was having no problems. For this Surge model at least had this downgrade. Also I have average hand size and it wasn't the most comfortable to talk on.


***Off subject Razr V3XX speeds ROCK on tethering, if you don't have a data plan with a RAZR V3XX please don't tether unless you want to spend alot of money on bandwidth charges. Reason I bring up Razr, even though they are fragile the tether speed is constant and reliable compared to ALOT of phones I've experimented with.***

Nokia is made in Finland, I wonder why they wouldn't add 2100Mhz
Sony Ericsson is made in Sweden, most of their phones if not all have 2100Mhz

My pick is Sony Ericsson W760a for international users, without alot of onboard memory it isn't a con for me it's a Pro as I like my data easily movable.  Still no WiFi but Tetherable, better camera, same price but no QWERTY. Like that I can close the mobile when tethered to save power.

Almost good but too many other phones in the same price range.  If you dont need WiFi, don't tether and want a bad iPhone wanna be it's an okay phone but as it's a compatible "World Phone" they could have added the 2100Mhz

Pros

• Symbian S60 3.2 OS
• GPRS/EDGE; 3G HSDPA Gives you many happy data options, more the better.
• Full HTML browser including Flash support
• QWERTY Keyboard
• Internal Memory Size: 120MB MicroSD expandable memory up to 8GB
• GPS Enabled: Yes
• FM Radio: Yes

Cons

• No WiFi,
• No Tethering
• No 2100 Mhz *For best data speeds this is needed in Europe for optimum flexibility.
• Uncomfortable to hold, especially for long periods of time.
• Not a big deal but the uncomfortable design with there being so many other phones available.
• USA/NAM uses 1900Mhz data & has no access on 2100Mhz on towers to the public sector currently.