Nokia 6131 Review

Well my house can be somewhat of a fringe area inside, my 6230 and my SE always held 3 to 5 bars downstairs, full signal upstairs Whereas the 6131 always struggled to maintain 2 bars downstairs but did well upstairs.

 

IIRC, 6230 has a seven-bar indicator, while 6131's has only 4, so a direct number od bars comparison may not be indicative.

 

I am aware of that, and may I add it is nice to see a familiar face on WA welcome.

 

Thanks for the welcome, Joe, nice to see you, too! I figured I'd keep the new mod (Fire14) on his toes (Just kidding).

 

It's hard to display 50% signal on 6230, isn't it?

I've read many times that 6230 is the best Nokia phone RF-wise, so it sets a pretty high standard. The European version of 6230 seems to have an even better RF and 6131 falls short of that, that's for sure

 

I have no complaints about the RF on my 6131 compared to my 6230 (I still have both). I think they are pretty darn close.

But, really, comparing bars is a bit silly at the level of precision your looking at, and I think you guys all know that. Even comparing bars within the same brand, other than roughly , is a difficult call.

The only thing to compare is dBm, decibels referenced to 1 milliwatt of RF power received. Unfortunately, I can't get to that number, not since my GAITphone. And even that is hard to compare,unless the phones are side by side, at the same time of the measurement.

Otherwise, my criteria is, can I maintain a clear call in the areas I've used before? Afterall, no one has a RF meter on their FM radio. You just want to get a good stereo signal, not how much dBm you have.. I used to have a very fine Tmobile Moto phone (actually VoiceStream) that had a clear bell signal with no bars. I only had to worry if I could see the VoiceStream logo, which meant I had some service.

 

Thank you for everyone's analogy here on RF.:lmao: Here is one for you my V180 always held one or 2 bars in my house and never dropped a call and also was very clear. My V3 was awful everyone complained I was garbled even though I could hear them.
But I will stand my fround with the 6230, that was by far the best GSM phone around for reception,call clarity, and reliabilty.

 

LOL:lmao: You never know what your dealing when doing comparisons.

A few years ago, I had 3 GAIT 6340i phones. They worked fine. After about 4-6 months my 6340i was pulling 2 or 3 bars less signal than it had before, in the same areas. I thought it was Cingular's tower problems.

After a bit, I looked at my wife's phone and it had more bars. I placed the phones in a mode where I could verify that, on average, my phone was receiving 6 dB less RF.

It seemed to me that a problem developed in the RF receiver section of that phone. I shipped it off to Nokia, had it repaired, and things were back to normal.

If I had nothing to compare it to, I would have 1)blamed Cingular, or 2) thought that the 6304i's were no good. Instead, it was just that one phone.

 

When I was pitting my 6131 against the Euro 6230 both phones were lying side by side on a table and both had the SIM cards from the same provider in them. Mine wouldn't muster enough bars to send an SMS and the 6230 had 3 bars and could maintain a conversation. If I moved mine to a window sill it became a happy camper... 6230 was happy anywhere in the room.

 

Interesting test! I read your post, and just tried the same thing on my couch.

Didn't get the same result, however. I placed the 6131 and 6230 side by side, with about 3 inches between them. the 6131 on the left, 6230 on the right. Same provider SIM too.

- First result was the 6131 had 4 of 4 bars, and the 6230 had 2 out of 7 bars.

- I then switched the phones: 6230 now on the left of 6131. The 6131 went down to 3 out of 4; the 6230 went up to 6 out of 7.

I repeated this 12 times...results were the same each time.

Then I move to the opposite end of my house, in the living room. Did the same test with the phones in my two hands. The 6131 was steady at 3/4 or 4/4; the 6230 was around 2/7 or 3/7. This time I rotated my body 180 degrees to switch phones position. This time switch the position of the phones did not change the result, as it did on the couch.

So either I have a bum 6230 or a great 6131; whatever the case both phones have very great quality in making a call, so it really doesn't manner. The RF steadiness of the 6131 was interesting and surprising to me.

What it shows is one test is not enough to make a conclusion about an entire product line. And it is not an easy test to perform either. Not even two. I considered the 6230 the best RF phone I've had, until I got the 6131, which I think is equal in practice. I like the audio on the 6131 better however.

vf

P.S. In my kitchen, the phones seemed about equal: 3/4 vs 5/7

 

Your test was much more thorough than mine, although considering in that environment the 6131 had no bars regardless of whether it was alone or not it probably wouldn't have mattered. Another thing is that it's quite likely that different variants of the same model (my 6131 is a 0534295 Asian variant, the 6230 was a Russian issue) have different RF sensitivity. Like I said before, my 6131 held it's own much better against the US version of 6230, plus your point about the few comparisons between a few select items being statistically insignificant are very true.

I guess that as long as we're all happy with our phones, that's all that matters

 

Hey Bobolito. I thought to go back to this question again. Like I said before, I don't have the Operator Selection or Automatic/Manual menus on my 6131.


Well today I got a new 3G SIM card. I popped it in the 6131, and what do you know, now I have those Menus!!!

I selected manual and I get two Cingular choices.

Now I feel like everyone else. I never would have guessed that, except that I had a two year old 64K SIM, and everyone else that this menu...but they had the newer SIMS. It was the first thing I checked out after putting the 3G SIM in the phone

 

That's awesome. I wonder if the Cingular 3G SIMs don't block Network Selection. I have no way of knowing since I've never used a Cingular branded phone.

 

They do on Cingular-branded phones. Actually the previous post was the first time I realized that my 6131 was not ignoring this setting completely, apparently it only ignores it on a 3G SIM.

 

I was refering to the viewfly's post. Apparently the network selection menu was not available with an older SIM card on 6131. Cingular-branded phones I've tried do not show the network selection with the new 3G SIM either. When I put the 3G SIM in 6131, I noticed that the menu didn't become hidden like with other phones, so I thought that 6131 ignores that restriction completely. Apparently I was wrong as there are SIMs that will enforce the restriction, just not 3G SIMs.

Did I manage to explain myself or just created more mess?

 

I wonder if that means that they can selectively enable and disable this feature with new SIMs.

 

The only way to really prove that the 3G SIM blocks network selection menus would be to try it on a non-modified Motorola phone to see if the Network Selection menus are gone, or to try a T-mobile SIM in a Cingular branded phone to see if the Network Selection menus are there.

Just placing a Cingular 3G SIM in a Cingular branded phone doesn't prove it because it is possible that Cingular branded phones already have Network Selection menus removed regardless of the SIM.

I am going to restore my Motorola V635 to its original setting to see if the Network Selection menus become hidden with my 3G SIM.

 

For the heck of it, I placed my new 3G SIM in my cingular branded 6230 phone (but unlocked). I did not get any network selection settings.

Perhaps the fact that the 3G SIM allows network selection on unbranded phones (but older SIMS did not) means that Cingular has some future plans for this feature, when and if they remove the network selection blocking from some of their branded phones.

 

I have a Cingular-branded Nokia 3120 which shows the network selection menus with a non-Cingular SIM and hides them with a Cingular 3G SIM. It may not hold true for all makes and models, but I can try with my girlfriend's Samsung D807 when I get my hands on it. BTW, Samsung doesn't hide the menus, rather just disables them with a Cingular SIM.

 

Make it "some unbranded phones". I know that with Motorola phones there's a seem setting that tells the phone whether to obey the setting or ignore it and it can be tweaked on Cingular branded phones as well. Some unbranded Motorolas have that setting set to ignore by default. We really need to test more unbranded phones

 

LOL, yes, I'm not trying to generalize here. Ok , 'some'.

I view a seem edited phone, no longer 'branded'. But, your right, I have only 2 nokia phones to examine.

I'm just happy that I now have network selection on my 6131, and it had nothing to due with the hardware or where I bought the phone.

 

I tried on these phones and this is what I found:

Motorola V600 (AT&T)
+ Cingular 32K SIM: Network Selection Available
+ Cingular old 64K SIM: Network Selection Available
+ Cingular 3G 64K SIM (Gemplus): Network Selection Available
+ Cingular 3G 64K SIM (Oberthur): Network Selection Available
+ AT&T SIM: Network Selection Available

Nokia 6340i (Cingular)
+ Cingular 32K SIM: Network Selection Blocked
+ Cingular old 64K SIM: Network Selection Blocked
+ Cingular 3G 64K SIM (Gemplus): Network Selection Blocked
+ Cingular 3G 64K SIM (Oberthur): Network Selection Blocked
+ AT&T SIM: Network Selection Available
+ Orange SIM: Network Selection Available

Nokia 6131 (unbranded)
+ Cingular 32K SIM: Network Selection Available
+ Cingular old 64K SIM: Network Selection Available
+ Cingular 3G 64K SIM (Gemplus): Network Selection Available
+ Cingular 3G 64K SIM (Oberthur): Network Selection Available
+ AT&T SIM: Network Selection Available
+ Orange SIM: Network Selection Available

So there has to be something different between my 6131 and Viewfly's because mine doesn't care which SIM is in it, it will always allow network selection. Only the good'ol 6340i blocked Network Selection when using Cingular SIMs. Also, the V600 I used is NOT modified to allow manual selection. It is at its factory default setting.

 

On an irrelevant note, I have to add that I have gotten so used to that push button to open the flip on the 6131 that I can't live without it! Now I find other phones to be so awkward to have to open the flip by hand! LOL!

 

I don't know for a fact that that setting (bit in the seem) is the same for AT&T Wireless and Cingular flexes. It may very well be that the Cingular flex changes it from factory default. If you have enough time on your hands, can you check the value of the bit 1 at the offset 02 in the seem 0032? (If it's set to 0, then it is allowing manual selection).

 

LOL, I know exactly what you're talking about! I was flashing a friend's Nokia 6125 and I had to fumble with it for a while before I could open it!

 

LOL - I was thinking the same thing. I use it ALL the time too (I drive a lot). I definitely want my next phone to have this!