Once again, Nokia has taken beauty before bones with the 6600 Fold; a low-specced clamshell handset. But how does it weigh up?

Nokia seems to have taken a stand against the feature-frenzied smartphones we’ve all come to love. Sure, the N96 features the top end spec you’d expect from the Finnish manufacturer, but recently the mid-range selection of handsets has seen a boom. Swiftly following on from the announcement and release of three new fashion-biased Supernova handsets, comes the launch of the Nokia 6600 Fold.

The Fold is a handset at a modest price, with modest features, but is still a device likely to be a huge hit with the army of Nokia fanboys out there. The 6600 Fold falls nothing short of fashionable with a sleek, streamlined casing available in either black or pink, with a hyper-shiny exterior that’ll have no trouble attracting pesky fingerprints.

Through the mirrored frontage, an invisible screen appears when you tap it, displaying vital stats including date and time plus track and artist name if you’re playing a music track. If you have a missed call or text messages waiting, you can check on these by barely lifting a finger.

If you simply don’t have the energy to prise the two magnetically sealed halves apart, you can tap a button on the side and as if by magic the handset will open, revealing a severely beauty-impaired keypad.

Ok, so we didn’t expect anything half as stunning as the exterior inside the Nokia 6600 Fold, but here it seems as though the manufacturer has completely overlooked anything but retro ugliness. However, keys are hugely responsive and the layout allows even those with oversized fingers to press the keys without much effort.

The internal screen is nothing short of impressive from a handset that’s free on almost every monthly contract out there. The vitals stats read QVGA resolution, 16.7 million colours and 2.13-inches.

You may be thinking that this whole review seems to be based on how the Nokia 6600 Fold looks, and there’s a reason for that. There simply aren’t any bells and whistles to brag about with the 6600 Fold apart from its design.

Applications are basic Nokia fare, with a few quirky extras preloaded, including Flickr for directly uploading your snaps to the web, Opera Mini for improved web browsing and a presenter app that allows you to use the Nokia 6600 Fold as a remote control for PowerPoint presentations. This is an odd addition, considering the handset is very unlikely to be on the top of the list for businessmen.

Even on a budget handset, a 2-megapixel camera is not something to brag about. There is a flash, but it’s hardly going to light up anything more than the 5 inches in front of you.

The Nokia 6600 Fold certainly takes style over specs. It’s a hefty device, weight wise, but fits nicely in the hand at 87.7 x 44 x 15.9mm. The minimalist design on the outside is somewhat ruined by the cluttered, distasteful interior, but quite clearly reflects the feature set: refined, back to basics, and simple.