Phonimus Beta

It started life as the Nokia 6790 Mako, then morphed into the Nokia Surge on its release in the US last week.  A QWERTY-equipped slider with a style which looks far better in landscape orientation than it does in portrait, Nokia have now announced the Surge for Europe, with a name change to the 6760 Slide.

Running Symbian S60, the phone is aimed at messaging and social network fans, including as it does, easy access to Twitter and Facebook, your Exchange server and other email systems, plus IM clients such as Google Talk and Windows Live.  Much abuse has been hurled in the Surge's direction concerning its questionable looks, however to us it looks quirky and functional.

The Euro Surge will, according to Nokia Conversations, be getting a camera upgrade from 2 megapixels to 3.2, a wise move we feel.  The phone measures 15mm in thickness and comes with a 2.4» QVGA screen, Assisted GPS built-in, a MicroSD card slot and of course, the slide-out QWERTY keyboard.  No mention has been made concerning connectivity at this point, but surely Nokia won't leave out 3G or Wi-Fi, will they?

Cost is €199 before any deductions and the 6760 Slide is expected to be on sale during autumn this year.