Nokia Blogged, Nokia news, reviews information and more

In what is probably a tech industry faux-pass, Nokia has indirectly placed the Symbian^3 OS on the side and is putting more focus on the upcoming MeeGo OS as well as the possibility of the eventual launch of the Symbian^4.

With that said, Nokia has already confirmed that the N8 smart phone will be the only Symbian^3 handset to be used in their N-series lineup. In the meanwhile, their new MeeGo OS will be the main focus of their high end N-series lineup. With two strong operating systems already available (the Symbian Foundation’s S-series and the Intel-Nokia MeeGo) Nokia is not looking at other operating systems.

This means that die-hard Nokia users will not be seeing any Android smart phones from the Finnish phone manufacturer any time soon –or even in the distant future. Nokia’s support for the Symbian Foundation is a pre-established given in the industry, and even with the development of a proprietary Nokia OS, the Symbian still remains as a primary OS for Nokia’s other phone lineups (such as the X, C and E series of handsets).

As for the Symbian^4 operating system, there is still no news as to when the OS will finally be made. With the Symbian^3 still not yet out, it is unlikely that version 4 will be released this year, though it is rumored that development on the new OS is already underway.

The Symbian OS has been suffering from performance issues –particularly with the major bugs that plagued the Nokia N97. Even established Symbian supporters such as the Guru have acknowledged the situation and are starting to slowly withdraw their support from the OS. The Symbian^3 OS needs to bring back the confidence and trust of users in the platform, and according to Anssi Vanjoki there is plenty to look forward to with the upcoming N8 –for Symbian’s sake, he better be right.

Nokia Google-Android, Intel, MeeGo, Nokia, Nokia-N8, Nokia-N97, Symbian-3, Symbian-4

According to rumors, there is a new Nokia Symbian^3 device coming this September. From the looks of it, video buffs will certainly enjoy this impressive smart phone.

People have been eagerly awaiting the release of the very first Symbian^3 handset ever since the OS developer announced that they will be shifting to open source. Initial images of the new mobile platform have also been quite intriguing –sporting a new look that seems to have a lot more dynamic elements that it’s previous iterations. News about new applications for the OS is still on the down low, but we expect to see plenty of support for the device in the coming months.

The new handset featuring Symbian^3 is being called the N8-00 or the Nokia N98. Images of the device feature a large touch screen form factor with a single button on the bottom of the screen.

An HDMI port has been spied on the edge of the device hinting at HD quality video output to TVs and monitors. It has also been said that the new phone will have a 12 mega pixel camera (with Xenon flash and Carl Zeiss lens) and video recording at 720p HD quality. We are hoping they would also add LED video recording light since the phone already has a good flash.

Nokia however, has yet to actually confirm that they are working on the device. The 98 will be one of the things many of us will be looking out for when the Finnish manufacturer makes their scheduled announcement this April.

The Symbian^3 is making a remarkable comeback this year after its recent troubles last 2009. The OS was bumped off by Maemo on the N series and several Symbian devices suffered from major software issues (such as the SE Satio and the N97).

Find out more about the rumor N98 smart phone at Know Your Mobile.

N-series Nokia-N8-00, Nokia-N97, Nokia-N98

Rarely has a phone’s title (especially one from the notoriously bland-naming Nokia) done such a good job of summing up a phone that it actually leaves us slightly lost for words. Us! Lost for words! Amazing, isn’t it.

But what the fudge are we supposed to do with the Nokia N97 Mini. Because… well… that’s it. It’s an n97, but smaller. More mini. Less maxi.

It does all the things the n97 does, but in a more miniature way. Just as the normal n97 does all the things the n97 mini does, but in a more maximum zoom kind of way. Not that that makes any sense.

Well, they’re not completely identical, we hear some pedants at the back arguing. The mini Nokia N97 comes with only 8GB of internal storage, whereas the big boned original had a whopping 32GB. But then you can buy a 16GB microSD card for about £25 if you shop around, so that’s not really an issue. And there’s all sort of hoo-haa about how the mini is more connected, and allows people to update their status on Facebook even quicker than ever. However, try as we might, we can’t find a £25 solution to this travesty.

There’s a bunch more actual opinion in this Nokia N97 mini review, but we’ve simply, honestly, got nothing to say. Apart from: go look at these Nokia N97 Mini deals, and ooohhh, shiny, look at that (in relation to perhaps the only good video Nokia have made about one of their products in the last five years that you can find below):

Nokia, X-series mobile, mobile-contract, mobile-contracts, mobile-phone, mobile-phone-contract, mobile-phone-contracts, mobile-phone-deal, mobile-phone-deals, mobile-phones, mobilephone, mobilephones, mobiles, N97, N97-contract, N97-contracts, N97-deal, N97-deals, n97-mini, n97-mini-contract, n97-mini-contracts, n97-mini-deal, n97-mini-deals, n97-mini-offer, n97-mini-offers, N97-offer, N97-offers, Nokia, Nokia-mobile, nokia-mobile-phones, Nokia-N97, Nokia-N97-Contract, Nokia-N97-deals, Nokia-n97-mini, Nokia-n97-mini-deals, NokiaN97, phone, phones

August in the mobile phone world is like the calm before the storm. OK I’ll let the secret out, the biggest handsets are normally released in October and November but as yet we have had no word on any big releases (apart from Samsung and Sony Ericsson, but more on them in another post). Her we have decided to pick out our favourite mobile phones and the best deals around. We are also being a little controversial and including not just Nokia handsets, please forward your complaints to the comments section.
1) Nokia N97 deals – The mother of all Nokia phones, we think that it’s great (even if we are a little biased. It is available on Vodafone for £40.00 per month with 600 minutes and unlimited texts, not half bad.
2) Nokia N86 deals – the gaming phone of choice. This simple yet effective phone is built on N-gage technology. 400 minutes and 3000 texts on Orange for £25.00 per month seems like a pretty good deal.
3) Nokia 5530 deals – The slimmer version of the Nokia 5800 is still a winner and at half the monthly cost of the N97 is great for those on a budget. Did we mention that you get the same amount of minutes and texts as well?
4) HTC Hero deals – Android has to be a concern for Nokia, can Symbian compete? Time will tell. In the meantime the HTC Hero is the best Android offering out there and 400 minutes and 3000 texts for £28.53 is pretty good in our opinion.
5) Samsung Jet deals – Another Android phone and a seriously underrated one at that. We love it (not as much as the N97 though) and you can get it for £26.11 on Vodafone with 300 minutes and unlimited texts, a great offer if we may say so ourselves.
6) Blackberry Curve 8520 deals – An updated version of an already popular brand of handset. This is the phone for the email generation. That is of course if you don’t opt for the Nokia E75. You can get this on O2 with £170 auto cashback which makes this seriously affordable.
7) Sony Ericsson W995 deals – Because we are Nokia lovers, we bumped this one down the list a bit, but for £21.00 per month you can get this great handset which has arguably the best music features of any phone out there.
LG Crystal deals – This novel handset looks the part, but you pay for looks. O2 offer the best deal here, with 400 minutes and 500 texts for £30.00 per month. Not bad, but not great either.
Do you know of any other handsets we should have mentioned? If so let us know. And before you say the iPhone, we didn’t want to give it any more publicity. We know it’s great and we also know it will set you back the best part of £1500 over the duration of your contract. In our opinion there are cheaper alternatives out there.

Blackberry, HTC, LG, N-series, Nokia, Samsung, Sony Ericsson Blackberry, blackberry-8520, HTC, htc-hero, htc-touch-diamond-2, Nokia, Nokia-5530, Nokia-N97, Samsung, samsung-jet, samsung-pixon-12, Sony Ericsson, sony-ericsson-w995

Courtesy of our friends over at Symbian world, we are able to bring you some hi res images of the all new Nokia E75.

This is just one of the images that we borrowed (cheers guys). To see the rest, check out their post here. The slide out Qwerty kyboard is becoming quite a feature on Nokia mobile phones, with the Nokia E55 and the Nokia N97 all having slide out QWERTY keyboards of some nature. It certainly suits the business users, who are looking to send longer emails, rather than just text messages. We will let you know about release dates for the E75 as soon as we know more!

E-Series, N-series, Nokia E55, E75, mobile, mobile-contract, mobile-contracts, mobile-phone, mobile-phone-contract, mobile-phone-contracts, mobile-phone-deal, mobile-phone-deals, mobile-phones, mobilephone, mobilephones, mobiles, N97, N97-contract, N97-contracts, N97-deal, N97-deals, N97-offer, N97-offers, Nokia, Nokia-E55, Nokia-E75, Nokia-mobile, nokia-mobile-phones, Nokia-N97, Nokia-N97-Contract, Nokia-N97-deals, NokiaE55, NokiaE75, NokiaN97, phone, phones

The Nokia N97 was released for all to see in Barcelona last week and has already been touted as an Iphone beater. What makes this device so special, besides its massive 32GB of internal memory, is the fact that it has both a touch screen and a qwerty keyboard. This makes the device much more palatable for th e average business user. Of course you will also get a lot of the other goodies that you expect from Nokia, including USB connection and for the first time Nokia has started using desktop widgets, pulling in data to your desktop in real time. You will be able to get the Nokia N97 on contract from as early May 2009, but we will let you know as soon as we have definite information.

N-series, Nokia mobile, mobile-contract, mobile-contracts, mobile-phone, mobile-phone-contract, mobile-phone-contracts, mobile-phone-deal, mobile-phone-deals, mobile-phones, mobilephone, mobilephones, mobiles, N97, N97-contract, N97-contracts, N97-deal, N97-deals, N97-offer, N97-offers, Nokia, Nokia-mobile, nokia-mobile-phones, Nokia-N97, Nokia-N97-Contract, Nokia-N97-deals, NokiaN97, phone, phones