Flip phones haven’t exactly been en vogue lately, but the Nokia 7205 Intrigue, a glossy, lightweight handset, makes a strong first impression. Aside from its good looks, it supports Verizon Wireless’ V CAST with Rhapsody music service, and offers fast 3G performance and reliable voice quality. At $129 after a $50 mail-in rebate and two-year contract, it’s more expensive than other feature phones and its video streaming performance is mediocre, but the head-turning design and strong call quality may be worth the premium.
Design
In a market filled with touchscreens and slide-out keyboards, the Intrigue’s design is refreshingly simple. This clamshell is a light 3.2 ounces, and it feels compact and thin in the hand. The silver hinge and accents lend it a classy look. However, the glossy finish picked up fingerprints very quickly.
The phone gets more interesting once you turn it on: the understated black lid reveals itself to be a 1.9-inch PMOLED display, whose blue text offers the time, incoming text notifications, and battery life and Wi-Fi signal indicators. Users can also play music and snooze the alarm clock from this screen.
When you flip open the phone, you’ll find a spare layout: a matching piano black interior with gray characters and thin metal grooves separating the buttons. The Answer, End, speakerphone and camera launch buttons, and two soft keys are all flush; only the grooves are raised. The keys felt a bit stiff as we typed text messages, but we were able to peck out notes quickly and accurately nonetheless.
The four-way navigational pad looks like a plus sign. All of the buttons are on the lower half; the underside of the lid is completely taken up by the 2.2-inch display. Although the screen is bright and colorful, the 320 x 240-pixel resolution strained our eyes while we were viewing text on Web pages.
User Interface
Navigating the menus using the four-way pad was pretty self-explanatory. The four points double as shortcuts for Mobile Web, the Verizon Dashboard (a straightforward, comprehensive menu), Habitat mode, and the shortcuts settings. To access the various menus, just press the center of the pad.
When you reenter the Dashboard after exiting it, the program last-used will still be highlighted; the Intrigue makes it easy to return to the things you do most often. The one thing that took some getting used to was using the CLR button on the keypad to backpedal; a soft key would be more intuitive.
The Intrigue has volume keys and a USB port on one side and a 2.5mm headphone slot on the other. The back panel of the phone houses the 2-megapixel camera (with flash).
