Posts Tagged ‘Nokia’
Well this is an interesting video and I think its worth seeing, its only 2:33 min but it gives insights as to what design concepts went into making the Homescreen on the N97
Well the Nokia 13520 divided by 2 which equals the Nokia 6760, yes that’s right, after having it unveiled these past few days as the ATT Surge, Nokia unbranded the device and numbered it the 6760. This tiny messaging machine is packed full of goodies and will make a lot of people happy. I like it myself.
Here we have Trent Smith comparing the Nokia N97 to the HTC Touch Pro 2. Trent dives deep into an analysis that is totally worth reading.
So far, I am thoroughly impressed with the build quality of this model and the improved stability of Windows Mobile. HTC certainly gave this qwerty slider a more upscale appearance in comparison to past HTC models I had previously owned, for the glossy and reflective surfaces seem to be paramount throughout the entire body of this phone. The plastics do not feel cheap and have been polished to the point where I feel as if I’m holding a jewel. The bulk has only increased from the N97 in terms of width, and the length seems to be shorter by a tiny margin. Weight has definitely been increased with this HTC, and it is immediately noticeable upon first picking it up in my hand. The slider feels like it has a bit more resistance than the N97, and the tilting mechanism requires a good amount of force to initiate…but there is a presence of solid craftsmanship nonetheless.
At this point, switching from the N97 to the Touch Pro 2 is like going from an accessible Volkswagen to a more refined Audi.
Scalado is one of my favorites Symbian software houses. They are the “mobile imaging experts” and tech like CAPS prove it. When Ovi Store was launched, one of the first surprises was to see a new Scalado product there. It’s called Autorama and it will help you to capture panoramic images with your Nokia phone. Read more
Just now our resident theme developer Tehk7 wrote his first impressions on the Nokia 5800. Its a great piece and everyone should read it. Its good to know that Tehk now has the hardware to work so that all his themes will sooner than later be running in all its glory on s60 5th edition.
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Nokia just unified all their blogs into one, which makes it so much easier now to follow all the latest official news, you can head over to http://blogs.nokia.com/ 
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Nokia is getting ready to launch their mega online store with 20,000 application, holy cow that’s amazing, like Matt Damon said in Good Will Hunting, “how do you like them apples” Cupertino and Waterloo, way to go Nokia. Also its been reported that the Ovi Store will debut on the N97 and future devices as well, so I guess we’ll have to wait and see what happens to all the other devices.
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Hey there ladies and gents. It has been seven days since I first got my grubby paws on the Alpha pre-release of Nokia’s much awaited Messaging app for S60v5. Before that, my mailing needs were served by a combination of the built in mail app (which was inadequate, but was my only choice at the time for reliable Gmail retrieval) and Mail for Exchange (for fast push Email). I also tried Seven push mail (which was okay, but not without its problems) before settling into this combo.
This short list will dramatically increase the usage of your s60 smartphone. So rock on and download some these puppies, don’t blame me if you get Nokia-itis.
Even though it’s branded with Carl Zeiss optics, the camera module equipped on the 5800 is slightly above average at best. It takes great pictures in adequate sunlight but fails miserably in low light conditions. The lack of a proper xenon flash makes things worse (the dual LED light included isn’t much help, really). Pictures are washed out and extremely noisy on the default automatic settings in low light (blame the tiny sensor), and the auto White Balance is a little off most of the time even with sufficient light.
As Nokia’s first mainstream, mid-tier fully Touchscreen mobile, Nokia has a lot riding on the 5800. And taking it as it is (a mid-tier mobile rather than the iPhone killer it was billed to be), the 5800 succeeds brilliantly, cramming as much features into its tubby – yet extremely handy – body as it could.
True, taken one at a time and broken down objectively, the separate functions of the 5800 is not really that awe-inspiring, to say the least. But taken as a entire, intergrated package, the 5800 is a thing of beauty.
True, the 5800 is not without its quirks, but for its price I would easily say that it is the first truly “complete” (in terms of features) fully touch mobile for the masses. As such, I personally hope that they would continue on to support and make the 5800 better, as I feel the phone that started the Mid-Tier Touch Revolution deserves at least that.
So, ladies and gents, sound off in the comments section and share with us what you think about the 5800!
First, I would like to confess the fact that I’m utterly in love with the screen. The resolution of the 3.2 inch TFT screen is a gobsmacking 340×640, which is great for a mobile of this price bracket (all the other near/better than VGA resolution screens are found in mobiles that are vastly more expansive). The colours are great and are comparable to the PSP that I own, and viewing angles are great for a mobile screen of this size.
Granted, the screen on the iPhone has more vivid colour and is more responsive, but that’ll be comparing apples (pardon the pun) to oranges now, wouldn’t it? The Resistive TFT found on the 5800 is generally inferior to the iPhone’s Capacitive screen, although - as a bonus – the 5800’s screen is not limited to finger input only (like every other Resistive screen, you can tap on it with ANYTHING).
Compared to other Resistive screens, the 5800’s screen fairs well, with sufficient sensitivity. Although the fact its Resistive nature of the screen means that you will have to physically push in slightly for any finger input to register. Even then, I haven’t had much in terms of problems using my fingers. The screen gets extremely fingerprint ridden after a day of use though, and the fact that the screen is only encased in thick plastic (rather the mineral glass found on some pricier alternatives) makes one worry about its durability.
In terms of Navigation, it’s mostly standard S60 fair, although everything has been slightly reworked to more effectively support contextual touch-based navigation. This is primarily noticeable on the home screen, where a tap to the clock would lead you to the Clock application, a tap on the date/time opening up a list of profiles/link to the calendar, a tap on the space that houses the connection/activity indicators opening up a small window that lists down the indicated activity with a link to the Connectivity app.
Also, conveniently enough, a tap on the Media Bar button next to the XpressMusic branding will bring up the ever useful Media Bar no matter where you are.
There is also an option to replace the standard S60 Shortcut Bar with the new Contacts Bar interface. This contacts-centric interface lists down all communicative activities with 4 contacts that you have chosen. I personally find this option irrelevant to how I use my 5800, so I prefer to stick to the traditional Shortcut Bar (mind the low quality contact Images. They COULD look much better, I just never bothered to replace them with better ones).
The recent S60 voice recognition navigation is also included, doing quite well in places with acceptable levels of ambient noise. The fact that it is non-speaker dependent (works well with anybody’s voice) is also great.
Other than that, S60 main menu is still typical S60, with optimization in size of fonts and icons to facilitate finger navigation; arguably at the cost of efficiency as the icons are far too big. This results in more wasted space then I would have liked within the Symbian menu. The default, from the box arrangement of the menu makes no apparent sense as well, as could be seen from how I’ve re-arranged everything for more efficient navigation.
There is also a slightly exasperating inconsistency with single- and double-taps found throughout the interface, with little or no rationality behind it. I finally gave up trying to make sense of this after a few days.
The lack of proper multi-selection in any form is also a maddening minus, thankfully enough third-party apps exist to alleviate this problem but why is such a core process such as multiple file selections so hard to implement within the core OS?
Another popular question that I’ve been asked is the smoothness and speed of the interface itself. As a Symbian based device, it impresses. The 5800 has one of the fastest and smoothest that I have come across – most of the time. Sometimes, though, particularly when the background apps start heaping up and/or available memory start dwindling; the entire system crawls to a halt until you close the offending apps (or restart).
But I do have to say that the amount of programs that has to run for this to happen is quite admirable for a Symbian system with a (relatively) puny 369MHz processor (with NO 3D hardware of any kind) and only 128MBs of RAM. Thus, generally, if one takes that into account (and run applications accordingly), the 5800 won’t disappoint.
On some rare occasions, there are also split-seconds of lag that happens for no apparent reason. These are hoped to be smoothened out by the firmware people at Nokia within the next couple of months.
As for the OS, while Symbian S60 is a relatively mature platform, Symbian 9.4/S60v5 is not quite there yet. The relative newness of this variant of S60 would mean that there will be some programs that will not run as well (or run at all) on the 5800. But this is a problem that we will see being addressed by developers progressively throughout the next few months leading up to the launch of the next, S60v5 powered Nokia Flagship, the N97.
THREE MONTHS LATER: Still in love with the screen, especially how it can be so huge on a mobile so compact. In terms of beauty though, the Omnia HD’s huge Capacitive AMOLED screen has already trumped even the iPhone 3G IMHO, more so the lowly 5800. Nonetheless, things are shaping up to be better than expected on other fronts. Ever since the V20 firmware rolled out, the 5800 is noticeably faster and more stable. More S60v5 compatible programs are also being released, much to my delight. The release of Gravity AND Nokia’s own Image Browser unleashed the potential of kinetic scrolling, which really needs to be utilized everywhere!
Next: The Camera and other Media Capabilities of the 5800.
