NiniaPimp Magazine

When we first looked at the Motorola Brute i686, we wondered if there was a mistake. It seemed practically identical to the Motorola Brute i680, its predecessor. Even the overall features are similar–the 2-megapixel camera, GPS, Bluetooth, and of course support for Nextel’s iDEN network.

The main difference seems to be that the Motorola Brute i686 is a touch more durable. It now can be immersed in 1 meter of water for up to 30 minutes. Aside from that, it retains the ruggedized exterior of its predecessor, keeping its “Brute” moniker alive. If you already have the Brute i680, we wouldn’t encourage you to run out and buy the i686, but if you’ve been looking for a tough phone that’ll survive a diving trip or two, then this might be for you. The Motorola Brute i686 is available for $119.99 with a two-year contract from Sprint Nextel.

Design
As we mentioned in the introduction, the Motorola Brute i686 hardly differs from its predecessor. At 3.92 inches long by 2.09 inches wide by 1 inch thick, the Brute i686 is just as bulky, and at 5.63 ounces, it’s just as heavy. It’s clad in hard plastic and a thick rubber exterior that protects it from all manner of scrapes and bruises. Indeed, we dropped it onto concrete and dunked it in a sink of water for a solid 20 minutes without ill effects. The Brute i686 is said to be military-certified under specification 810G for resistance to dust, shock, vibration, extreme temperatures, low pressure, salt fog, humidity, and more.

On the front is a color external display that supports 65,000 colors and 160×120-pixel resolution. We’re glad to see that it supports photo caller ID and recent call history, and it’ll also work as a self-portrait viewfinder when the camera is activated. As for the camera, that sits right on top of the display, next to the LED flash.

The left spine is home to the volume rocker and push-to-talk button, both of which are large and easy to find by feel. On the right is the Micro-USB charger jack hidden securely beneath a rubber flap. On the top of the Brute i686 are the speakerphone control and the usual Nextel button for accessing your recent calls list. Also on the top is a 2.5-millimeter headset jack protected by a rubber flap. We would’ve liked to see a 3.5mm headset jack, however. We also would have preferred a camera shutter control on the sides.

To keep the phone nice and dry on the inside, the battery cover is secured by a round locking mechanism that you can unlock with either a fingernail or a penny. Behind the battery cover is the microSD card slot.

Flip the phone open and you’ll find a simple but legible 2.2-inch color display. It only supports 65,000 colors and 220×176-pixel resolution, but as you aren’t likely to use this phone for multimedia purposes too often, we didn’t mind the average resolution. Colors are bright enough, and we like that we can change the text size and the backlight timer. Along the bottom row of the display is a series of shortcuts to frequently accessed applications or functions that you can toggle through. The main menu itself is displayed in either a grid or list view.

The navigation array consists of the usual two soft keys, a round toggle with a middle select key, a main menu key, a camera key, and the Send and End/Power keys. The overall keypad is spacious, with enough separation between each key. We found it easy to text and dial with the raised keys as well.

Features
The features on the Brute i686 are similar to the Brute i680, so forgive us if there’s a little bit of deja vu here. To start, the Brute i686 has a 600-contact phone book with room in each entry for seven phone numbers, an e-mail address, and notes. You can categorize those contacts into groups, and also into push-to-talk groups if you’re on Nextel’s Direct Connect service. You can also pair the contacts with a photo and one of 20 polyphonic ringtones for caller identification. The Brute i686′s Direct Connect features include International Direct Connect, Group Connect, and Direct Talk.

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On paper, the Motorola i886 seems like a pretty run-of-the-mill Nextel phone. It has push-to-talk with Nextel Direct Connect, stereo Bluetooth, a 2-megapixel camera, a microSD card slot, GPS, and as it is not a smartphone, it has no Wi-Fi. Like most Nextel phones, it is billed as a durable handset, with thick rubberized casing that is military-certified to take a beating. The i886 also looks like a regular messaging handset, with its slide-out QWERTY keyboard.

Yet, it has a trick up its sleeve–its user interface looks almost identical to that of Android. Indeed, the multiple home screens, the pull-up menu, and the app icons look uncannily like Android. But it is not–the OS is a proprietary BREW operating system. While we initially thought the use of a fake Android interface was odd, we actually think it’s a great idea, as it is far better than the usual Nextel one. The inclusion of Opera Mini is welcome, and we appreciate having a dedicated GetJar app store as well.

We do worry that some people might get fooled into thinking it’s a smartphone when it’s decidedly not. At the end of the day, the Motorola i886 is just a well-made Nextel messaging phone, which is not a bad thing. Just don’t expect anything more than that. The Motorola i886 is $79.99 after a two-year service agreement.

Design
As far as rugged handsets go, the Motorola i886 is positively petite. At 4.6 inches long by 2.0 inches wide by 0.7 inch thick, it’s not exactly wafer thin, but compared to other Nextel phones like the Brute i680, it’s quite slim. Clad in hard plastic and thick padding, the i886 is military-certified to withstand dust, shock, vibration, extreme temperatures, low pressure, solar radiation, and humidity. We couldn’t subject the phone to such a battery of tests, but it did survive a drop in a bucket of water. While the black-and-gray color scheme is a bore, we do like its compact form factor, and at 4.98 ounces, it feels very solid in the hand.

The 2.2-inch QVGA display is quite bright and colorful, with 262,000 color support. We like the bold graphic icons, and the text is clear and legible, too. We did think the text was a little on the small side, and unfortunately, you can’t adjust the font size. You can adjust the brightness and backlight timer, however. You can also toggle window animations from the display settings.

As we mentioned in the introduction, the i886′s user interface is almost note-for-note the same as Android’s. However, unlike most Android phones, you have to control everything using the navigation toggle since the display is not a touch screen. We had to resist the urge to swipe the screen at times, but we soon got used to it. Everything from the home screen to the pull-up main menu is identical to the Android user interface, right down to the app icons.

You get up to three home screens, and all of them are customizable with shortcuts, widgets, and wallpaper. Simply press the menu key, select Manage Home Screen, and go from there. You can display widgets for the analog clock, the calendar, the music player, Nascar updates, one-touch Direct Connect, the picture frame app, power control, and Sprint Football Live. Do note that there aren’t any Google widgets, because, remember, it’s not really an Android phone.

Underneath the display is the navigation array, which is, again, very similar to most Android phones. You have the menu key (which doubles as a screen lock key), the Home key, and the Back key. Instead of the usual Search key, you get a Notifications key, which brings up the notifications screen. In the middle of the array is a round navigation toggle with a center select key. We almost wished the center toggle was an optical touchpad of some kind just to make it feel more like an Android phone, but no, it’s just a regular physical key. There are also raised Send and End/Power keys on either side of the toggle.

Beneath the array is the number keypad, which consists of rubbery raised keys. They’re well-separated and we found it easy to dial by feel. If you want you can also text with the number keypad using XT9. However, we would recommend using the full QWERTY keyboard instead.

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