Nokia 8310 Vintage Mobile Phone

Launched at CEBIT in 2001, the Nokia 8310 was one of its flagship products which became a classic vintage mobile phone which is sought after even today.

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The Nokia 8310 phone is now one of the many classics produced by Nokia in their heyday. This vintage phone is one of their 8000 series phones and it is often described as having a candy barshape.

The 8310 was also one of the smaller phones on the market, and was used by many who wanted a phone that could be carried around easily in any pocket, bag, or whatever.

Front view of Nokia 8310 vintage classic mobile phone

Side view of Nokia 8310 vintage classic mobile phone

Back view of Nokia 8310 vintage classic mobile phone

Internal view of Nokia 8310 vintage classic mobile phone

The Nokia 8310 used the company's classic menu system and it proved to be very easy to use like other phones from the same company.

Other features supported by the phone included, white backlight for the screen, infra red short range connectivity, a calendar and it also supported GPRS to give some data capability to the device.

In line with Nokia's ethos to provide the user with what they wanted in terms of looks of the phone, it came in a huge variety of different colours.

Technical capabilities

The Nokia 88310 provided an excellent level of capability for most users of the day. Technically the 8301 was a dual band phone covering the 900 and 1800 MHz bands used in Europe. It did not cover the 1900 MHz band used in the USA and this limited its use in terms of roaming.

Nokia produced a different variant of the phone for use on the 1900 MHz band in the USA. This was designated the 8390 phone. It had the same capabilities except for the different frequency band.

The display was relatively limited by today's standards as it was a monochrome graphic display with width and height of 84 x 48 pixels. Messages, phone numbers, etc were displayed in the middle and bars on either side indicated the battery level and signal strength.

The fact that the display was only monochrome was a disadvantage when it was compared to some competitor phones such as the Ericsson T68 which had a 256 colour display.

Connectivity included GSM and GPRS for the mobile communications systems supported and there was also an infra-red port, although few people probably used this capability.

Nokia 8310 review

When it was launched, the expectations within Nokia were high for the 8310. It had to follow the 8210 which had been very successful, and it needed to keep up the momentum of the Nokia name.

At this time, phones were upgraded and released on a tight timeframe. They had to support the market demand for new phones every few months and as a result this meant new releases were happening all the time.

The 8310 is very similar to the 8210: it kept the small outline, intuitive operating system, and of course the very popular Snake game. This old mobile phone came in a variety of different coloured covers and it had a huge a big battery life.

These features along with an updated outline and a few improvements including a backlight colour that went to an ice-blue colour and the Nokia name ensured that the phone was a success.

Nokia 8310 specifications

The table below provides a basic summary of the key Nokia 8310 specifications, showing the performance it gave and accordingly how it compared with other old mobile phones of the time.

Nokia 8310 Mobile Phone Specifications & Details
Parameter	Details
Launch	21 March 2001 at CEBIT
Network technologies	GSM, GPRS
Bands	900 & 1800 MHz
Dimensions	97 x 43 x 19 mm (3.82 x 1.69 x 0.75 in)
Weight	84 g (2.96 oz)
SIM card type	Mini SIM
Display	Monochrome capable of graphics
Memory card	None
Phonebook	500 names each with three numbers
Call records	20 dialed, 10 received, 10 missed calls
Camera	None
Loudspeaker	None
Alert types	Inbuilt or user downloadable monophonic ringtones, vibration
Wi-Fi	None
Bluetooth	None
GPS	None
Infra-red port	Yes
USB	None
Radio	FM radio
Messaging	SMS
Browser	WAP
Clock	Yes
Alarm	Yes
Battery	Removable 830 mAh Type: BLB-2
Talk time	2 - 4 hrs continuous
Standby	100 - 400 hrs
Colours	9 Xpress-on Nokia covers - other sources gave a vast range.

The Nokia 8310 was a very handy phone. As it was launched in 2001 before 3G had been deployed, its capabilities were totally in line with phones of the day - even a little ahead in some areas.

The 8310 was used by many people because it was so convenient, robust and provided what was needed for the time without taking up too much space in pockets, handbags and the like.