Will 5800 substitute Nokia N96?

Nokia N96 was the device that Nokia promoted in the last Christmas, all over the world we saw huge campaigns with this smartphone. Many were expecting to buy Nokia 5800 XpressMusic in 2008 but Nokia has announced that will start selling the device in Europe, first in UK, from 23rd January this year.

Does this means that Nokia N96 will lose market having the 5800 available? It’s cheaper, it’s touchscreen, it’s xpress music, has a great camera and GPS built-in. Well, probably Nokia will simply raise the sales.

In my point of view, N96 is focused for high-end users, like those who would buy HTC Touch HD, it’s  expensive and a great mobile phone and at the level of Nokia n96. While Nokia 5800 will be sold for medium-end users, the price is over 300 euros, but might probably drop as time goes by to …200, 199 (hehe) or even 149 euros, so then, we would be able to really consider 5800 a medium-end mobile phone.

Having two great handsets in the market, N96 (..and futurely the N97) competing against HTC Touch Diamond, Touch HD and Blackberry Storm/Bold and the Nokia 5800 Xpress Music, Nokia might get a big percentage of those 2 markets, high-end  and medium-end users.

And as you already know, nowadays what can makes a successful device isn’t the device itself but all the advertisement investment that is made. We are in a big crisis which analysts predict it will increase in 2009 and we must have in mind that companys will invest less money in marketing and advertising, blackberry and HTC must cut those costs and the same will happen to Nokia, but as Nokia is a giant they are able to always mantain the promotion of some of their best handsets.

Dr Jukka interviewed – Nokia and Symbian uncovered

Today I am interviewing Dr Jukka Silvennoinen, Senior Technology expert from Forum Nokia, a Certified Nokia Trainer, and a guest lecturer at a university in Thailand. Dr Jukka is known for his extensive contribution to the Symbian community and, of course to Forum Nokia. Dr Jukka is also admired by many Symbian programmers, and he was one of the founding members of Forum Nokia Champions reward program. It is my great honour to interview him, and I’m sure the world’s cell phone community is eager to read what this talented programmer has to say.

Dr Jukka, I thank you once again for accepting my invitation, and I thank the Nokia Press department as well for this opportunity. First of all, I would like to ask you some questions close to your heart, of a personal matter:

What was the first phone you ever had?

It was Ericsson GH 198, my first and last non-Nokia device.

When did you buy the above-mentioned phone, and what price did you pay for it?

I bought it in August 1994. It did cost around 7-800 Euros, I would have wanted to buy Nokia 2110 back then, but it was probably some 300 Euros more expensive.

Continue reading the interview at PhoneReport

 

Nokia N96 reviewed in english!

Eldar has had his mega-review of the upcoming jewel translated, of which in a previous post I chose my favourites shots.

 

I will present my views on the phone by the weekend, but I leave you with an excerpt of the interesting article:

“

Interestingly, over a year ago Nokia started to enhance its product portfolio not only by varying styles, but also hardware platform underpinning their solutions. The Nokia N95 and its follow-ups built upon the TI OMAP chip, while the N96 takes advantage of STMicroelectronics’s Nomadik. So when comparing these two phones, their similarities don’t go beyond physical aspects, since other things, like functionality and hardware, are quite different.

Is the N96 a mass-market solution? No. Then, is it heavily specialized, aiming at one particular niche? No. It is rather somewhere in between. This phone will see moderate sales, although the fuss around it will easily shadow its modest numbers.”

Source: Mobile-Review

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N96 live pics

Eldar from Mobile-Review managed to somehow get a Nokia N96 for a review, and he gladly posted it for us, unfortunately it’s still in Russian, but for now enjoy the pictures.

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Widsets 2.0 reviewed and released…

Many websites report that Widsets 2.0 have been released, but is still in beta. Widsets is loved by many of a us for its looks and usability.

The Widsets 2.0 beta site recently went live which means you can now download and test the latest version of the Widsets client. New features include better integration between Widsets and the rest of the device including the ability to initiate a phone call or open a browser window. Widsets is a way to get web content on your mobile via widgetisation. Read on for more.

Widsets has been around since the summer of 2006 (but only really took off last year). It has continued to evolve at an impressive pace and the new version holds a great deal more functionality that the original version. The basic idea is presenting digestible web content optimised for consumption of a mobile device through a ‘dashboard / desktop’ and ‘widget / application’ interface. Widgets are arranged on the dashboard and each widget can be opened to view the contents. The basic Widgets are RSS feeds wrapped in an attractive package, but there are also a number of small games and utility widgets. New to this beta is the Push E-mail widget.
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N96 will be here in August

Everyone’s ears starting ringing when The Carphone Warehouse announced that they will start selling the Nokia N96 by August.

All we knew from Nokia is that the phone would be released in Q3, and as usual, it would arrive in most parts of the world by Q4…

Source: N96“>The Carphone Warehouse

Apple iPhone vs Nokia N96

We’d love to say that we’re doing this comparison because Apple have announced a date to release the iPhone in Australia, but as you probably know, Apple is playing its cards very close to its chest. Thankfully, Nokia have been a little more forthcoming, and we’re still expecting a release of the N96 in Q3 of this year.

 (click in the image to see in real weight)

Source: CNet Australia

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S60 v3 Feature Pack 2 – Tons of photos

These photos have been everyone now, but let me select the ones which I believe bring innovation.

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Another Video of S60v3 Feature Pack 2

httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0w67NyaU-NI

Here’s an interesting video of the upcoming Symbian OS9.3 with S60 v3.1 Feature Pack 2, provided by S60.cz

Bery from Symbian Web Blog posted few interesting points that can be seen from the video:

• • Sensor Settings:

The video shows that Feature Pack 2 has not only the common accelerometer feature to auto rotate the screen, but also snoozing alarms and silencing calls. Has Nokia learned these innovative ideas by watching from applications developed by 3rd party programmers like Samir and Tong Reng with “ShutUp” and “FlipSilent”?

• Active Standby:

The new active standby mode including the new standby theme settings with the vertical sidebar in motion. Nice!

• New Menu Views:

Feature Pack 2 brings two new menu views, the “Horeshoe” and “V-shaped” modes which are looking very nice with their large application icons.

• Photo Menu:

The new “Photo Menu” which replaces the old “Images and Videos” view is shown as the last feature.

Source: S60.cz via Symbian Web Blog

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LandscapePro New version!

LandscapePro is an application for symbian OS 3rd edition devices, which allow you to change your phone screen from portrait to landscape mode.

• Rotate with hotkey: Press hotkey to switch between landscape and portrait modes.

• Rotate by launching: Launch the application to rotate the screen. (as on nokia E60)

• Auto-start: Auto-start and hide function

• Rotation 270 degrees

The new version as released yesterday, as the developer promised end of February, although I don’t if it already available to the general public. Clearly Samir’s RotateMe is better as it has more options, but it is always nice to check what other developers put effort in, and appreciate their work. If you find it useful, do buy it for 6,50 Euros, although Samir doesn’t put a clear minimum amount, which is better.

Developer’s site: LandscapePro

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