The Nokia 1110 is the second highest sold mobile device of all time, selling about 250 million units. If you want to enter mobile, home and work numbers for a single contact you have to make three separate entries – you are only allowed one phone number per contact. Usability matters with any phone, but arguably is a lot more important in a phone aimed at those looking for something straightforward to work with. It doesn’t mention that you can set up profiles to activate at set times, nor what it is you can actually personalise. As you can’t see all the options within a menu on screen at once you are forced to hop backwards and forwards to find what you want.

Rather than think about how a modern phone could have an easy to grasp menu system that makes options clearly visible, Nokia has backtracked to a variant on the nested menu system it used to use several years ago. Games suffer from the lack of a colour screen, and the variation of Snake looks rather tame compared with versions on more sophisticated phones.Its layout and screen appear to have been passed down through a family of no-nonsense budget and business phones that millions of us have owned or used sometime during our lives.

The Nokia 1110 lineup includes several variants like the Nokia 111i and the RM 1110, each tailored to meet specific user needs. As far as features are concerned the list of what is available is basic, though of course that’s the point. Instead I just fully charged the battery and then left the phone on to see how long it would last on standby.Compatibility with a range of GSM networks ensures that these devices remain a practical choice for communication across different regions. There are five on-screen dice games to choose from; of these the old playground favourite Liar Dice would be a great way of killing time with one, two, or three other people.

In time-honoured Nokia tradition, the 1110i also provides a high degree of customisation, through a range of clip-on front and rear covers. Between January and May 2007, the 1110 model was sold by Nokia as their basic, monochrome, low-end phone.With this capacity, you may find that if you use your phone heavily, you may need to recharge your phone during the day.