Nokia's S40 1GHz Speed Demons Snapped

We reported last month about Nokia prepping some 1GHz smartphones based on the S40 platform and today we finally get a glimpse of one of the phones. Called the C3-01.5, this unusually named mobile seems like a carbon copy of the existing C3-01 touch-and-type mobile but with beefed up internals. There are many other phones listed as well on Nokia’s site like the C2-01.5, X2-01/X2-03, X3-02.5, X2-01. Proof that this naming scheme could make it to retail A couple of Chinese websites have managed to snap a picture of the upcoming C3-01.5 and along with the 1GHz CPU it will also be packing 512MB of RAM. While the naming scheme is a bit un-conventional, it marks a clear distinction from existing products. Looks exactly like the C3-01 The display also receives an upgrade to a ClearBlack capacitive screen so videos and images should look better. Now I’m guessing there’s a good reason for packing all this horse power in these budget phones and that is HD video playback. I’m hoping they’ll be able to playback at least 720p files smoothly, else it’ll be a wasted potential.

Nokia Ovi Maps Available for iOS and Android Users Now

Although Nokia’s market share might not be doing as well as it used to, that’s not stopping the Finnish company from rolling out new devices and sharing their technology with others. By the latter statement I’m talking about the very recent discovery that Nokia’s own mapping software i.e. Ovi Maps is soon going to be available for other smartphone OS'. That means Apple and Android mobile users without any navigation software loaded onto their devices can avail of Nokia’s generosity. It was already quite obvious that Nokia WP7 devices would not be losing out on this system either so I guess Nokia decided, why should anyone lose out. However, here’s the catch, if you can even call it that – although there doesn’t seem to be an application in the works just yet, according to thehandheldblog, the Finnish company has announced an HTML5 powered, mobile optimized Nokia Maps website. The site can be accessed from your iOS or Android powered device, activate your GPS settings and you’re good to go. iOS offers multi-touch zooming but Android will have suffice with Zoom-In and Zoom-Out buttons. Ovi Maps on Android and iOS You can access the maps via your device's browser here – m.maps.ovi.com, and you’ll be able to find your way around your location with ease with a-GPS services aiding you. Switch on your GPS module for accurate readings though. I’m sure most of you are wondering why bother with Ovi when Google Maps comes preloaded with iOS and Android? The answer is for those using smartphones with these operating systems in countries where the search giant has not yet managed to dole out navigation for their maps. This is where this online service will be most handy. So far Nokia has made no official announcement about this latest update in the Ovi Maps segment, but it won’t be too long a wait I’m sure. And I have to agree with the mobile community, it’s only just rolling out so if you find bugs, chances are that they’ll be weeded out with a few updates that shouldn’t be too far behind. Right now, it’s extremely basic and very simplistic so don’t expect too much, but with a few updates over time, Google could be looking at some serious competition, especially if Nokia also decides to take it to the “streets”, if you know what I mean. You can take a quick look at how Ovi Maps runs on Android (LG Optimus Black used for test) and the iPhone 4 -

Nokia’s Ovi Suite Gets an Upgrade

Those of you who're loyal to your Nokia handsets definitely know about Ovi Suite – the software that lets you sync all your data from your device to your PC. Nokia has finally released an update for it, bringing it to version 3.1.1.75. This actually was in a Beta stage version 3.1.1.40, and had quite a few features. With some added features and bug fixes... Users with Symbian-based mobile phones can download and install apps, games and more directly from the Ovi Store. The Ovi Maps has got a simplified view and Nokia had also worked on quite a few crash errors being fixed. You can download the updated version of Ovi Suite directly from this link, and if you do find it to be better (or worse) than the previous sync suite, you can always mention it in our comments section. Thanks to Nokia Blog for the heads up.

What’s New with Symbian Anna?

Nokia brought Symbian Anna to India along with their launch of the X7 and E6. Not that you haven’t heard of Anna before, but in case you’re wondering what the latest Symbian version is all about, Nokia had conducted an event titled “Get to Know Symbian Anna” and ZOMG gave a quick lowdown on what the new OS had to offer. One pretty apparent change is that the icons throughout the interface are rounded. Add to that, there’s real time scrolling so as you scroll, transitional animations will follow your touch. You can also scroll between the main homescreen panes. Rounded Icons look cool A much needed update this, Symbian Anna’s browser is updated giving the application support for HTML5, hardware acceleration for fluid CSS animations and the overall look of the browser looks quite clean without any unnecessary icons. Nokia has still managed to keep the more commonly used functions like a Back button and an address bar constantly available. Browser version 7.3 also has support for Flash Lite and multi touch. Obviously all this wouldn’t make a lot of sense without any improvement in performance, which has also been promised. Browser's got an update as well There’s a new virtual QWERTY keypad that has been incorporated and the older T9 keypad has been ditched. Also, unlike virtual QWERTY keypads found on most phones that have the digits on the first line only, Nokia has placed them over a few rows. The Ovi Maps have been improved, although it’s the same app available on Nokia Betalabs, where you can download full maps over the air. The email application has got an update albeit a small one. There’s more space to check mails and the UI has been improved and is a tad quicker than the earlier versions. There’s some change to the calendar app, with a Dual Pane layout in monthly view. So that’s about what the Symbian Anna has to offer. It cannot be termed as a major revamp to the user interface but even then, it seems to be a lot better than the current iterations of Symbian. The interesting bit however, is that Symbian Belle which will be the next update is going to be a different platform altogether. Nokia says, “If you like Android, you’ll love Symbian Belle.” Check out a video overview of Symbian Anna by Nokia India’s Product Manager below

Nokia Announces Updates to Symbian 5 and Symbian 3.2 Mobile Phones

We started our morning yet again with some Nokia news. Earlier they were launching smartphones like N9 and some of their handsets were also being leaked. Now, Nokia has turned their attention to the older generation mobile phones. What can definitely be called as a good move by the Finnish company is the fact that they’ve announced firmware updates for their Symbian 3.2 and Symbian 5 platforms. There are also quite a few refreshing changes being brought to a slew of handsets.

You are not forgotten!

The changes include Nokia browser v7.3, which is the same browser available for the latest Symbian Anna running smartphones. In their blog, Nokia claims that this will translate to a better, faster browsing experience, along with support for International Domain Names (IDN). Ovi Maps will also be updated and, while Symbian 3.2 handsets will have Ovi Maps 3 SR4, Symbian 5 mobile phones will get an update to Ovi Maps 3 SR6. For the former, there’s indoor positioning through Wi-Fi, as well as travel and recommendation services. SR6 will add public transport lines and check-in services to social networking sites. Last but not the least, Nokia’s also bringing some fun to MMSes by adding a set of emoticons.

The updates will be available for the Nokia C6-00 and Nokia 5230 for now, and will be rolled out in progression for the rest of the handsets slowly and steadily. Here’s a list of the handsets that can be upgraded:

Symbian 3.2

• Nokia E72
• Nokia E52
• Nokia E5
• Nokia C5-00
• Nokia 6700 slide

Symbian 5

• Nokia C6-00
• Nokia C5-03
• Nokia 5230
• Nokia 5235
• Nokia 5250
• Nokia X6
• Nokia N97 mini
• Nokia 5800 XpressMusic
• Nokia 5530 XpressMusic

So, if you own any of these handsets and have upgraded your firmware, do let us know about your experience through the comments.

Nokia and Vodafone Join to Offer Life Tools

Nokia and Vodafone have tied up to offer Nokia Life Tools services. Life Tools aims at providing Indian consumers with access to content on agriculture, education, healthcare and entertainment. As part of the offer, content will be available for Rs.30 a month. Vodafone subscribers will be able to access Nokia Life Tool services in an icon based, 'graphically rich' user interface. Life Tools brought to you by Nokia and Vodafone Designed with information gathered from target users, Nokia has collaborated with partners including IGNOU, State Agriculture Marketing Boards, Syngenta, Pearson, EnableM, NDTV among others to deliver the services. This service is available on a range of entry-level Nokia handsets and is available in 11 Indian languages including Hindi, Gujarati, Tamil, Telugu, Bengali, Oriya, Assamese, Marathi, Malayalam, Kannada and Punjabi, in addition to English. The Nokia Life Tools service has been customised for Vodafone to deliver to Vodafone’s entertainment services along with Life Tools suite of services.

Nokia Launches Mobile Money Service for all their Phones

With Netbanking making it so much easier to manage your financial accounts, the next logical step is porting those services onto your mobile phone. With phone banking services already in existence, the quality of service varies in different banks. Now, Nokia has taken it upon themselves to provide a common platform irrespective of your bank.

Manage your finances from anywhere

It’s called Mobile Money Client, and it will be available for all Nokia phones including S40 and S30 devices, pretty much any Nokia phone with a keyboard or touch screen. Currently this service is available for Union Bank of India, Yes Bank, Obopay and a wide range of retailers and merchants.

Mobile Money Client offers the user the following functions:

• Manage your account by receiving detailed balance info, track all your transactions and status of each transaction.
• Bill Payment
• Money Transfer
• Cash withdrawal from Business Correspondents cash-out outlets and ATMs.
• Top-up you prepaid SIM

If you already own a Nokia phone and wish to avail of these services, simply visit this link and proceed from there.

Nokia's First Windows Phone 7 Device, 'Sea Ray' Leaked

Finally. The much-awaited WP7-toting Nokia device has been caught online. Codenamed Sea Ray, the smartphone runs on Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7. As you already might know, many of us were eagerly anticipating the Nokia-Microsoft partnership to yield some results and what is being seen in the pictures looks quite promising. We want the Sea Ray to fly! The best part is that Sea Ray was shown off by none other than Nokia’s CEO, Stephen Elop himself. And the funny bit is that he pleaded that nobody take pictures of the smartphone! (Yes Stephen, we won’t reveal the device that we’ve been waiting for with bated breath) Anyway, if you look a little closer, Sea Ray looks pretty identical to the recently announced N9. Not that it’s a problem in any way, but we’d probably expect Nokia to have a different design rather than go with an already used one. Unlike the N9 however, Sea Ray has a dedicated camera key and the LED has been placed in a different position. The handset will be running on the latest Mango update of Windows Phone 7. In terms of specifications, that’s about it. But GSMArena also has a small video of Sea Ray which you can check out below. Also, let us know whether you think that Nokia’s first Windows Phone 7 is hot or not in our comments section.

Nokia N5 Possibly Running Symbian Anna Spotted

All of a sudden Nokia is making an appearance almost everyday in our mobile news section. Of course, most of it primarily belongs to the N9, to be precise, but the Finnish company has been busy with other devices, as well. The latest that we’re seeing is touted to be the Nokia N5. Yeah, another one in the N-series with specifications that won’t impress you too much, but nevertheless are pretty okay.

A younger cousin of the N9?!?

Specifications of the handset have not been revealed by the sources, as such. But they definitely feel that the handset is running on Symbian Anna, although from the looks of it, MeeGo will be the first term that’ll come to mind. But leaving that aside, the smartphone also has a 5 megapixel camera, and on the front there are two physical buttons for making/ending calls and a menu button in the middle. The size of the screen is said to be around 3.2-inches and will be a touchscreen.

5 Megapixel camera, with colour options

Apart from the specs, the sources also say that the N5 will be followed by the N6 and N7, which will boast of better specifications. So, will the N5 take over the mid-range smartphone market or for that matter the lower-range segment? Let us know what you feel about the N5 in our comments section below.

Nokia N9 to be the Last MeeGo Device

The Nokia N9 has been in the limelight ever since it was announced. As new a revelation as this might be for Nokia fans, it might only spell doom for Nokia’s MeeGo platform. From what Finnish newspaper Helsingin Sanomat has to say, Nokia’s latest MeeGo smartphone, the N9, will also be their last device ever to run on their somewhat ill-fated endeavour of an operating system. It comes as a bit of a surprise because most of the Nokia loyalists around the world were probably expecting more improvements in the OS at later dates. These fans will now be left wondering if Nokia will ever be issuing bug fixes and updates for an OS that could become obsolete the day it gets launched. However, Stephen Elop Nokia’s CEO says that there won’t be any more MeeGo, no matter how well the N9 does.ns The smartphone that could not be?!? Earlier this year when Stephen Elop was talking about why he chose Windows Phone 7 over Android, he did not mention much about the OS which was being developed in partnership with Intel. The latter might not be too surprised as they themselves felt that Nokia was the wrong partner. Since Nokia won’t be working on any development towards the platform, we wonder whether it will affect the sales of the N9 adversely.

Nokia launches N9 Smartphone

Mobile phone-maker Nokia today announced the "beginning of a new era" for the company with the launch of four new mobile phones, including a full-screen touch-based smartphone. "Earlier this year, we outlined a comprehensive strategy to change our course," said Stephen Elop, the president and CEO of Nokia. "Innovation is at the heart of our strategy and today we took important steps to demonstrate a new pace of innovation at Nokia. It''s the beginning of a new era for Nokia," he added. 

Nokia's new flagship N9 gets mixed reviews

SINGAPORE — Nokia's latest attempt to win back market share with its N9 phone received mixed reviews Wednesday but analysts said the real test will come when it releases new models using the Windows Phone 7 operating system.

Fans lauded the N9's ease of use without any "home" button -- a feature of the iPhone and other rivals -- while detractors mocked what they saw as its outdated Meego operating system.
Unveiled by Nokia chief executive Stephen Elop at the CommunicAsia telecoms fair in Singapore this week, fans crowded around the company's booth to try out the device.
The N9 has a 99-millimetre (less than four inches), 854 x 480 pixel display and weighs 135 grams (less than five ounces), putting it clearly in iPhone territory.
Its most distinctive feature is an "all-screen" display, with users swiping the screen to switch between applications.
The device also has a function that allows users to link it to dedicated accessories such as a headset or speakers by simply touching the phone against them.
"Being a user of Apple, an iPhone, this is light years ahead of what iPhone 3G does," declared Paul Krzystoszek, operations and marketing manager for Australian Satellite Communications.
"The ease of use... the intuitive nature of swiping across the screen instead of using a button, there's no button on it, the plastic casing, I think they're all things that make it a lot better than what we have already," he told AFP after trying the phone at the Nokia booth.
"Awesome" was how Shahiran Jaafar, chief executive officer of Malaysian firm Microtel Systems and user of an iPhone 3G, described the N9.
"The fact that you can just swipe it and it goes back to whatever screen that you need it to go back to, the fact that it can show all the open tasks that's available, that's fantastic," he said.
"It just dwarfs the iPhone, the iPhone is nothing now."
However, some were unimpressed by the fact that the N9 was still operating on Nokia's MeeGo platform despite the company's impending adoption of the Windows Phone 7 platform later this year.
"I have a problem with... the operating system," said Phoosith Ratpiyasoontorn, a Thai systems integration engineer, lamenting that MeeGo lacked user volume and compatibility with many applications.
Technological consultancy firm Ovum's consumer information technology analyst Tim Renowden said the true test of whether Nokia can reverse its sagging fortunes will be when its new handsets using Windows Phone 7 are rolled out.
"The N9 is an interesting demonstration that Nokia can still build excellent hardware, and it shows the progress made on the MeeGo OS," he said.
"But it doesn?t change the fact that most Nokia fans will be waiting for the first Windows Phone 7 handsets to arrive later this year," he told AFP.
"With Nokia?s focus shifting to Windows Phone 7 it?s hard to get excited about MeeGo on Nokia hardware, despite the apparent merits of the N9 itself."
Ratpiyasoontorn added that the choice for him would be clear if the N9 was stacked up against the iPhone.
"iPhone for sure because the ecosystem, they have a lot more content, more applications," he said.
In Finland, Nokia touted the virtues of Meego as the N9 was unveiled in Asia.
"It reflects a change in philosophy, hardware and software coming together at Nokia in a very specific way to create a device," said Peter Skillman, Nokia Vice President of Services and Meego Design.
"This impacts everything from smartphones to low-end phones right across the board."

Nokia launches Nokia C2-06 and Nokia C2-02 handsets

Nokia has recently unveiled its two new Symbian phones, Nokia C2-06 and Nokia C2-02 at a price of EUR 75 (USD 105) and EUR 80 (USD 112)

Nokia has added two new decent handsets to its product portfolio with the release of new slider phone Nokia C2-06 and Nokia C2-02.

"These phones offer web, maps and messaging experience second to none in the market. And with the choice of a touchscreen or a keypad, we really have made everything available and easy to use in an affordable phone that comes in both dual or single SIM options," stated Mary McDowell, the head of Nokia mobile phones business unit.

These latest Nokia handset are embedded with improved Internet browsing capabilities, due to the Nokia Browser. This Nokia Browser offers data compression technology, which reduces the costs of surfing and elevating the browsing speed.

In addition to this, the browser of these devices has been designed to load with a localized start page that provides you with instant access to relevant content. The devices also provide tabbed browsing to the users.

The new Nokia C2-02 offers some exciting features like push messaging options and the handset also support to a number of IM providers. Besides, the device comes with stereo FM radio, media player and Bluetooth. This Nokia phone is a single SIM version comes with both touch and type features.

It sports a beautiful 2.6 inch touchscreen with 240 x 320 pixels resolution. There is a 2-megapixel camera and it comes with 10MB of internal memory. Users have the option to increase its memory space up to 32GB.

Nokia C2-06 Touch and Type dual SIM phone offers a wide array of colors and finishes. This handset is beautifully designed and appears more attractive in comparision to its other variants. The Nokia phone supports Nokia Maps for Series 40 and allows memory enhancement up to 32GB.

The Nokia C2-02 and Nokia C2-06 are price at EUR 75 (USD 105) and EUR 80 (USD 112). It remains to be seen how these new handsets perform in the global market. We hope it will still take time to enter the Indian market.

Nokia Prepping a Feature Phone With 1 GHz Processor

While a 1 GHz certainly looks good, the rest of the specifications might take you by surprise. This “smartphone”, apparently, will be running on Symbian S40! This is a bit surprising and will prompt you to wonder why Nokia is actually manufacturing a feature phone with a fast processor that won’t even be running the latest Symbian OS.

Really? A smart dumbphone?!?

Not only will it have a 1 GHz processor, the handset will also have 512 MB of RAM. Plus it’s going to sport a ClearBlack capacitive touchscreen display. Also, the handset will be Wi-Fi and 3G enabled and will also have a QWERTY keyboard. All this was revealed on Twitter through none other than the Finland-based company’s Manager of Marketing in Argentina.

Quite possibly, the device might be shown off at the Nokia Connection 2011 event that will be held in Singapore. We definitely want to know more about this handset and it will be interesting to know how Nokia will price this handset that has a processor faster than that of the Nokia N8.

Do you think it’s a little weird that all the processing power will go to waste with an outdated OS? Or maybe if the handset is priced aggressively, this mysterious device might just be apt for the VFM category. Tell us more in the comments section below.

via Cellularis

Anna Update Incoming for the Nokia N8

Probably all you Nokia N8 users have been waiting with bated breath for this one. The N8 will be getting the latest Symbian update – Anna - pretty soon. The most important of all is that the excellently performing 12 megapixel camera will get better with a few more features added to it.

Anna's coming!

Anna should have been released for the N8 quite a while back. However, it seems that the Finnish company was working on an update that was specific to this smartphone and that’s why the delay. Damien Dinning, the camera expert for Nokia has tweeted saying:
“There will be an N8 specific update coming which will. You need the code from Anna though.”

The new features to the N8’s camera will be able to record videos at 30 frames per second which means smoother videos. The camera will also be able to capture videos in a continuous autofocus manner. So the focus of the camera can shift quickly and continuously while capturing objects in varying distances while shooting videos. Now that it all sounds good, lets hope the N8 gets love from Anna, sooner than expected.

via MyNokiaBlog