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• The Good: Supports EGPRS networks for speedy file transfers; direct print utility is very handy; comes with a PDF reader and MS Quickoffice installed (though with some features locked out); multimedia applications are surprisingly robust.
• The Bad: E-mail module is a bit clumsy; standard phone keypad makes typing lengthy text a chore; camera and video resolution is lower than that of competing handsets; bulky form factor.
• The Verdict: It's got some terrific multimedia, business, and messaging apps—and it's a pretty good phone to boot.
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When it comes to mobile phones, I've always been of the opinion that less is more. That said, if I absolutely had to have a handset that was bogged down with countless features, I might just choose the Nokia 6682 Smartphone.

Though it only arrived in June on Canadian store shelves, the 6682 has been available in the U.S. for about a year, so some of its hardware and software might not seem particularly cutting edge. For example, its camera maxes out at just 1.3 megapixels and it employs the popular though aging Symbian Series 60 OS.

Still, it's far from outdated. It has all of the standard modern mobile features users have come to expect in a their phones, including polyphonic ring tones, wireless Web, voice dialing, and comprehensive call management and contact list utilities.

Also, it functions on EGPRS networks, making large file transfers a fairly speedy affair—which is fortunate, since much of the appeal of the 6682 is its ability to let users work with a wide variety of file types that could potentially be quite big, including PDFs and Microsoft Office documents.

But we're getting too serious too quickly. Let's take a look at some of the phone's fun features before getting into its professional apps.

It's got an MP3 player. That doesn't make it a substitution for an iPod, but it'll do in a pinch. Just fill up your MultiMediaCard with songs, slide it into the side slot, and off you go. The main five-way scroll key acts as the primary interface for the MP3 player, which isn't as efficient as having dedicated music controls, but at least it leaves a small footprint.

The camera and video functions are more advanced than the music player. Its 4.5mm lens outputs photos with a maximum resolution of 1280x960, which is relatively low compared to many other handsets currently on the market, but I still found myself spending a fair bit of time snapping pictures just so that I could experiment with all of the phone's photo features.

In addition to an LED flash, night mode, rapid shot mode, and self-timer, the 6682 also has a surprisingly robust photo editing suite, which gives users the ability to do some basic tasks, such as autofix and cropping, as well as a few more advanced procedures, like adding text, inserting additional frames, and creating greeting cards.

The video functionality is even more powerful. Again, the image quality isn't great—indoor footage can be dark and grainy, and the resolution tops out at 176x144—but I was very impressed with the phone's post production features. Not only can users edit individual clips and splice footage together, they can also insert colour effects, ramp down the frame speed for a slow motion effect, and add custom soundtracks. Suddenly those amateur mobile phone film competitions make more sense…and seem a bit more alluring.

Once you've finished working with an image, there are several ways to share it. You can e-mail it, multimedia message it, share it with another device via Blutooth, copy it to a MultiMediaCard, or, in the case of a still picture, send it directly to a printer via PictBridge.

In fact you can print more than just pictures. With Nokia's XpressPrint technology you can send all sorts of things—including messages, calendar items, and note pad text—to a local printer via USB or Bluetooth once you've created a proper device profile.

And that's a good segue to get into more business-y features. The 6682 comes with a PDF reader and MS Quickoffice installed, allowing executives on the move to view PowerpPoint, Excel, and Word files. Editing capabilities exist as well, though it appears as though users have to pay extra to unlock this feature for each application. Personally, I'd never want to tackle writing or editing a business document using a standard mobile keypad, but the 6682 does support Bluetooth keyboards for execs who absolutely need to edit docs on the go and have an aversion to numb thumbs.

Two other features likely to get a workout by business users are e-mail and instant messaging. I didn't test the instant messaging, but I did spend a bit of time with the e-mail client, and found it to be about on par most other smartphones—better than some, worse than others (the Blackberry remains unmatched and unchallenged as mobile e-mail king). You can attach a variety of documents, and calling up contact e-mail addresses is fairly straightforward, but expect some finger cramps if you ever try authoring a long note.

It might appear as though I'm really down on the 6682's keypad, but I'm not—I just think it's not ideal for composing lengthy text.

Other than the fact that the lowest keys are a bit too close to the bottom of the handset's face and are therefore a strain to reach, I approve of the clear, backlit button design and configuration.

The alphanumeric keys are flanked by a long and skinny menu button on the left and edit and clear keys on the right. Between the thin call and end keys, which are just above the flanking buttons, sit the phone's three most used controls: a pair of context sensitive selection keys and a five-way directional pad. The selection buttons are bigger than any other key on the phone, which gave me confidence without looking that I always had the correct button under my thumb. The directional pad—a crater-shaped circle—perfectly fits the tip of my thumb and provides a comfortable level of resistance in all directions.

But while the keypad suits my taste, I find the handset itself a bit bulky. Its candy bar-shaped body is a couple of centimetres thick. Add that to its 11-cm length and 5.5-cm width, and you're looking at a substantial device likely to show a telltale bulge in whatever pocket you put it in.

A pity, too, since it's actually kind of pretty, albeit in a middle-management sort of way. Its bright, colourful 5-cm TFT screen is easy to look at, indoors and out, and is surrounded by light silver plastic. The back of the phone is devoid of features, save a sliding panel that reveals the camera lens, a logo, and a silver button that provides access to the mobile's innards, where you'll find a BL-5C battery that's rated to provide between three and six hours of talk time and up to 11 days on standby (I wasn't able to test my demo model long enough to verify these numbers).

The only other notable physical features are the 6682's jacks. For some strange reason Nokia annoyingly decided to use a proprietary connection for headphones, which will make losing the earbuds that come with the handset a costly mistake. However, it's worth mentioning that these earbuds are of better than average quality and sport an exceptionally thick and tangle-resistant wire.

Other ports include a charging connector on the bottom and a hidden MultiMediaCard slot on the right side.

In the final analysis, I think I'll still stick with a simpler phone for the time being. If I had a real need for any of the many features offered by the Nokia 6682—which goes for $249.99 with a two-year service agreement at Rogers Wireless—I might consider upgrading. It doesn't handle e-mail as elegantly as a Blackberry, and a full QWERTY keypad would have be nice (though I'm not sure where the engineers could have put it without increasing its already bulky form factor), but it's packed with practical and well implemented features that will likely satisfy most multi-app phone connoisseurs.