Something Big Due From Nokia???

Over on the Nokia events site it states something big is due from Nokia and has a countdown timer.  Friend of the site and Symbian Guru, Ricky Cadden has been invited along to Nokia World and will be posting all the action.

Taken from his site Ricky Dotsisx says:

The sentence “It looks like Nokia is planning something big” is also there.

Something big?! With a countdown timer that is even advertised on Nokia’s worldwide official site? It sounds like something serious. If you do the math, you’ll see that the timer will expire this Tuesday at 09:15 CET. This is the first day of Nokia World, which our own Guru will be attending, and 09:15, according to the Nokia World agenda, is when Nokia’s CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo and Nokia’s Executive Vice President Anssi Vanjoki will be giving a keynote speech entitled “Transforming the way we connect”.

I smell a new device announcement. There usually aren’t any groundbreaking releases in Nokia World, but this year might be different. Apart from the E63, there isn’t any announced S60 device that hasn’t hit the market yet, so it might be a good time for Nokia to refresh their portfolio for the coming months. Notable candidates for release might be the new Nokia Internet Tablet, the recently leaked E75 or a few other devices or services that are still mysterious. What do you think? What do you expect?

You can track the news over at www.symbian-guru.com live from the event and get our impressions right here at World Of Nokia

Nokia Pull out of Japanese market

Nokia announced yesterday that they are to pull out of the sophisticated Japanese market. With Brands like Sharp and Panasonic (brands which are pretty much unheard of in the EU and US) dominating the market, Nokia have now thrown in the towel for Japan. The are continuing to sell their ultra “Luxury” Vertu phones, but have stopped supplying mainstream handsets to the most technological country in the world. 

Here is an extract from the BBC website:

Finnish mobile phone giant Nokia has said it will stop selling its handsets in Japan after struggling to grow its market share in the country.

Nokia said it would continue selling its luxury Vertu brand in Japan, and would dedicate its Japanese business to research purposes.

Its quite a strange thought that handsets that are so advance over in the US and EU, arent selling in Japan because they aren’t advance enough. Japans networks are purely 3G (I believe they phased out the majority of their GSM network a few years ago now?) and with things like electronic payments, PTT (Push to talk) and DVB-H (like the BBC Article says) its hard for Nokia to compete.

Still, they are a huge success in the EU and US, its just a shame the couldn’t compete with the big boys in the Japanese market. This also comes as a bit of a shock here after Dans post about Nokia starting their own network in Japan! (here)

Read the rest of the BBC article here.

Nokia 5800 Ships (Not UK Yet Though)

Nokia announced today that the highly anticipated Nokia 5800 XpressMusic is now, or soon will be, available in select markets globally, including Russia, Spain, India, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Finland, among others. The latest in Nokia’s XpressMusic range, the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic delivers an affordable music device with a touch screen interface to the mass market.

Welcome To World of Nokia v2.0

First of all I would like to welcome you to World of Nokia V2.0 (in the mobile term).  The site has grown a massive amount since it’s launch 4 months ago and the transition over from the site formally known as Today On 3G went very smooth and as quick as possible.

So what’s new i hear you ask?,  Well actually the site itself still has the same content thanks to Wordpress’s database system so all the links still work and all the content is the same.  What you will notice is the site has more impact due to better look and design and hopefully over the next few weeks you should see the speed improve too with some behind the scenes improvements.

I suprised Christian with the new design just last night and his feedback was he is very impressed and we hope you are too.  The main benefit of the change was the site looking much more professional and as we have seen hits increase on a daily basis we want to offer the best site possible.

If you used the old RSS feed please can you delete the link and use the new one just incase there are any changes to the feed.

As always feedback is very much welcome so if you have anything to say please comment below.

Nokia 6260 Announced Today

Nokia To Be MVNO In Japan

Nokia Corp plans to launch a mobile phone service in Japan next spring, a move expected to intensify competition among Japanese cell phone carriers, Japanese daily Yomiuri Shimbun reported on Saturday.

Finnish cell phone manufacturer Nokia is expected to use lines owned by Japan’s biggest mobile phone carrier, NTT Docomo Inc, under an arrangement called mobile virtual network operator, the paper said.

Nokia will first offer the service with high-end models to establish a strong brand, Yomiuri said.

Nokia is the world’s biggest handset maker but holds less than a 1 percent market share in Japan. Major Japanese cell phone makers, such as Sharp Corp, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co Ltd and NEC Corp, dominate the world’s most advanced handset market.

American site ‘BoyGeniousReport’ have said

Finnish mobile manufacturer Nokia, in a pretty bold move, will make its way to Japan to start its own MVNO. We’re not quite sure what Nokia is thinking, given the lack of success of MVNOs in the past, but they will be piggy-backing off of NTT DoCoMo’s network next year. Unlike other MVNOs, however, Nokia will be offering up high-end devices in order to compete in Japan’s tough mobile market. The only device we’ve ever really liked to come from an MVNO is Helio’s Ocean by Pantech. Nokia may be the world’s largest handset manufacturer, but they hold only 1% of the market share in Japan. It’s going to be interesting to see how this one shapes up as Nokia faces some serious competition with the likes of Sharp and Matsushita dominating that market.

Nokia Download Needs SERIOUS Updating!

Having been a phone tester for around 4-5 years now I have come across many different manufacturers and software applications to help make your handset more personal and best for your needs as everyone wants something different.

Since giving up reviewing other manufacturers and concentrating 100% on Nokia handsets I have still come into contact with a few non Nokia phones and 3 of them stand out when it comes to adding on extra applications.

First of all there is the brand spanking new BlackBerry Storm on Vodafone.  Blackberry are trying to reach the everyday user of the mobile phone now because they have been known before as being just for business people to get emails on the move.  Something they have added into their Storm is an App Store button.

Pressing this button loads up a range of applications such as Flickr, Facebook, Vodafone Live which all can be installed at a touch of a button over the air right to your Storm.  I tried this when I had my hands on one a few days back and it was so easy to do anyone can do it!.

Then onto the T-Mobile G1 which has the Android Market again with the same idea where you load up one application and you get a whole range of 3rd party software to installat a touch of a button.  These apps range from Shazam to a Barcode Scanner to check recent prices.

Apple have the iPhone and the well known App Store which is both on the iPhone and iTunes so you can always find the software you want and install how and when you want.  Facebook is again a huge player with the iPhone and users around the world.

So lets look at what Nokia have to offer!.  Each Download! store has separate content depending on what type of handset you have but the theory is the same.  It has to be said though the list of applications on there are very poor with only a few really interesting ones like Messenger and Widsets.

When you look at the thousands of great 3rd party applications such as:

• JoikuSpot (Shares your 3G/HSDPA connection over WiFi)
• Jaiku (Great for sharing comments and thoughts with othes)
• Nokia Chat (Made by Nokia like PIN Messaging for BlackBerry)
• Friend Finder (Uses GPS to share your location with friends and comments)
• Screenshot (Lets you take screenshots from your S60 phone)
• Opera Mobile (The most popular 3rd party browser for Nokia)
• Twitter (Share your thoughts with the world like Jaiku)
• BBC iPlayer (Only officially N96 for now but would work with others)

These are just a few examples of what I use on the E71 and out of 8 listed apps I had to go looking around the Internet to find the files, bluetooth them to my E71 and install that way.  How easy would it have been to select Download from the main menu and have a big list of applications come up like App Store on iPhone and install OTA?. MUCH easier!!!.

My question to readers is do you use Download and if so what do you think of the current poor lineup when you compare to iPhone, G1 and Storm?

Nokia E63 Review Pt1: Hardware

The Nokia E63 was announced recently and the team over at WOM World were kind enough to supply me with a handset on the launch day so I can share my thoughts with everyone

This is a massive plus for World Of Nokia because only a few people were given these on launch and with all the well known sites out there for World Of Nokia to be given the chance is great for the site and shows how up and coming World Of Nokia is getting so a big big thanks to WOM World for this chance.

So what exactly is the E63?, well if you see the pictures your first thought would be ‘is that just not a red E71?’.  The answer to that is a 100% NO!.  The E63 may look the same because of the layout the the features inside are what makes all the difference.

So this 3 part review on the E61 will cover Hardware, Software and E63 vs E71 to compare side by side which many people have asked me to do, because as luck has it, I also have a E71 in to review too!.

This is Part 1 and covers the main hardware such as the screen, keypad, specs and battery life with Part 2 coming in a few days time.

Here is a quick overview of the main specs of the phone before I start:

• S60 3.1 Edition, Eseries
• Symbian Os 9.2
• Dimensions: 113 x 59 x 13 mm
• Weight: 126 g
• 2.0 megapixel camera (1600 x 1200 pixels)
• 320 x 240 (QVGA) at 15 fps (Video Capture)
• 110 MB internal dynamic memory
• microSD memory card slot, hot swappable, max. 8 GB
• BP-4L 1500 mAh Li-Po standard battery
• Talk time (maximum): GSM up to 11 hours; WCDMA up to 4h 40 min
• Standby time (maximum): GSM up to 18 days; WCDMA up to 20 days;WLAN idle up to 170 hours
• Quad-band EGSM 850/900/1800/1900, WCDMA 900/2100
• GPRS class A, multislot class 32, maximum speed 100/60 kbps (DL/UL)
• EDGE class A, multislot class 32, maximum speed 296/177.6 kbps (DL/UL)
• WCDMA 900/2100 or 850/1900 or 850/2100, maximum speed 384/384 kbps (DL/UL)
• WLAN IEEE 802.11b/g

The Screen

When using a smart phone having a decent screen in both quality and size makes all the difference especially when you are emailing or web browsing.  The E63 packs in a 2.36″ wide-screen with a resolution of 320 x 240 pixels so pretty good quality and the size makes general use very easy.

There are many themes available either on the phone or online so you can personalise the phone to your taste so every phone is different and using your own wallpaper with the big screen is really nice because of the high resolution you get the best out of your photos.

The Buttons & Keypad

The keys on the E63 are quite small but you get a QWERTY keyboard which allows fast text entry, perfect for Email or if your a heavy texter such as myself who sends near on 1500-1750 a month!.  Before I get onto the keypad il cover the row of buttons under the screen first as these are for navigating your way around.  Starting from the left you have a shortcut key which works with what ever option you have on the left side of the main screen i.e. Contacts/Camera etc…, you also have the green call key for making phone calls and to pick up an incoming call.

Next you have a home key which loads your main menu to get the grid of icons, a calendar button so you can get to your appointments with 1 press, perfect for someone who uses their phone as a diary too.  You then have the 5 button navigation pad which is made up of a Up, Down, Left, Right silver square and a big select button in the middle.  After this you have a button to load your contacts quickly no matter what screen you are in which is great as it can allow you to use a on screen shortcut for something else.  Then you have a envelope which loads up your email account again from any screen so you have 1 touch email access.

To finish it off you have the right shortcut key and the red call button to end or reject phone calls.

The actual keypad is made up of letters with the numbers in grey in the middle.  These can be accessed by just typing in as you would expect to make a call.  When in text entry mode just hit the grey arrow in the bottom left and then the number for it to show up.  Sounds complicated but its a breeze really.

Looking around the phone on the left hand side you have a mini usb port for connecting to a computer and a MicroSD card slot for expandable memory.  The right hand side is totally blank.  The top of the phone has the speaker phone and what will be a joy to a lot of people… a 3.5mm headset jack so you can use the headset provided or  your own from say an iPod if you have one of them too.  A great addition and more phone’s should have this.

The bottom of the phone is simple with a charging port and a hole for a lanyard if you wanted to wear around your neck or want to hang a charm off it.

Now onto the back.  At the top you have a 2.0 megapixel camera, a LED light which also acts as a flashlight when you hold onto the space bar key on the front (what a great idea!), and a mirror for taking your own photo if you should want too.  The bottom  of the back there is a little latch which locks or unlocks the cover if you want to remove the SIM or battery.

Build Quality

The E63 is quite a well built phone with more of a rubberised feel to it which helps when your holding the phone so it wont slip out.  The plastic and rubber help keep the cost down again cheaper than the premium version the E71 and if your looking for a hard wearing business phone the E63 could be just what your looking for with the power of E-Series applications, the battery life being in days and not hours and the well built feel of the materials.

I have been very lucky to have both the E63 and the E71 in to review at the same time so comparing side by side is easier (and will be covered in Part 3 of the review).  The E71 needs that extra bit of care with the metal finish, the extra weight and just being more valuable where as the E63 just looks and feels like  a phone you can throw in your bag/pocket ant take anywhere (don’t worry WOM, I have not thrown this phone anywhere) it just has that look that you know its a sturdy phone and will work when you need it most.  Sort of like mixing a E51 with a 5500 (back in the days of 2006) you get the idea im sure.

Inside The E63

The E63 does have a lot of features hidden inside but it is easier to cover what is NOT included when compared to the E71

• No GPS Built In
• No HSDPA
• 2.0 Megapixel Camera (The E71 has a 3.2 megapixel camera)

These are all unfortunately things I use a lot so personally I would have to choose the E71 but there are many people out there who don’t want GPS, don’t want a high res camera and are not fussed about data speeds, they just want the phone because its great to enter data because of the large screen and large keypad and because of this you can snap up the E63 for quite a bit cheaper than the older brother the E71.

Battery Life

Battery life on the E63 is on par with the N71 because it has the 1500mAh battery included which is one of the biggest batteries Nokia have in their phones.  After getting the phone on launch day I put it on the full 16 hour charge just to make sure the battery was conditioned ready for use and of course with any new device when I first get it use is always over the top what with getting email setup, installing 3rd party software and getting to grips with how to use the phone.

So after a week of using the phone normally battery life sits on about 2-3 days of use with the following conditions:

• 4-5 short calls in 1 day
• About 50 texts in the day
• WiFi & Bluetooth OFF!
• Auto checking for Emails every 30 minutes

Pretty good if I say so myself as I consider myself quite a heavy user on phones and enjoy my email and web browsing

Well that is the review on the hardware, next step is the software where the phone really gets interesting with quick access to calling your contacts, sending a text and many more handy tips.

Look out for Part 2 in a few days here on World Of Nokia

Nokia 5800 Hitting Vodafone In February

On browsing the new Vodafone online store  today I noticed that the Nokia 5800 is now the only phone on the ‘Coming Soon’ section which is great news for the Vodafone customers and those of us who want this amazing device.

Dated ‘February’ which is indeed in Q1 2009 as we were told back at the Smartphone Show in October and as of yet no other network has played an interest in getting the 5800

What is interesting is this phone is a ‘Comes With Music’ capable device so are Vodafone about to jump on the CWM bandwagon or are they going to stick with their own service?

We shall soon see in the next 3 months.

3UK now offering the N95 8GB Comes with music!

3UK started supplying Nokia N95 8GBs with the ‘Comes with Music” bundle a couple of days ago. They are the first network officially selling the new “Comes with Music” bundles direct from the Network. Previously, you would have to go through Carphone Warehouse who could supply it through various networks but not officially. This is the first high end phone to be sold with the comes with music package, and lower spec’d 5310 is available on PAYG also from The Carphone Warehouse.

Interestingly, 3UK picked up on this deal much quicker then I, and a lot of other people, anticipated. Pretty much all of the major UK networks have their own store, offering a subscription based service where you either pay per track, or pay per month. 3UK offer their own music store with Dual download where you can download to your PC and phone, similar to what Nokia have done with their comes with music service, but 3UK want a Whooping £1.49 per track (Around $2)! Its come as a surprise to me that 3UK have taken up the Comes with Music service and devices, because obviously it seems in direct competition to what surely is a huge profit maker for 3UK. It comes as even more as a surprise that only a couple of months ago 3UK rejected taking the Nokia N81 on because Nokia was insisting that their own music software was to stay on the device rather the installing their own (infact, this happened with several networks!).

It seems 3UK have caught onto the bandwagon that they will never be able to contend with Nokia Comes with music service, and instead of trying to fight it, have embraced it.

The Nokia N95 8GB is available through 3UK for Free on £35 and upwards, and also available on other networks through The Carphone Warehouse. Its just a matter of time before more Comes with Music handsets are released and the Networks start to realise, like 3 have, that they cant fight it, so they will have to embrace it.

Nokia E63 Announced (And We Have One!)

Nokia today announced the low-mid range version of the E71 called the E63.  Offering the same form factor as the E71 there are a few things missing this time but it will be made available for a cheaper price and get interest from a whole new range of customers.

The E63 has a QWERTY keypad, massive screen which is great for internet browsing, HSDPA, a 2.0 megapixel camera and WiFi plus access to the OVI services.

The E63 also has a 3.5mm headset jack so you can listen to your music with a standard headset (i could have done with that yesterday morning walking to work)

All in all the E63 should be popular for those people who love to text and email but dont want to pay a premium for the E71

Here is the press release in full

Nokia E63 joins the successful Nokia E71 to form a compelling QWERTY messaging device range

Espoo, Finland – Nokia today announced the latest addition to its Eseries range, the Nokia E63, designed for people who need to manage their business and personal lives equally well. Building on the success of the Nokia E71, the company’s flagship messaging device, the Nokia E63 brings the QWERTY keyboard form factor to a broader audience at a great price. The Nokia E63 is expected to begin shipping in the coming weeks for an estimated retail price of EUR 199, before taxes and subsidies.

“Our research shows that people want a device that deals with both their personal and professional lives, but helps them to separate the two. When someone sits down at lunch, they want to update their social network or browse their personal email account and they don’t want work getting in the way of that. It’s another great case of technology adapting to the people that use it,” says Soren Petersen, Senior Vice President, Nokia. “The Nokia E63 is a new proposition for Eseries – a messaging device where people will be just as involved in their social network as they are in their business network.”

Whilst appealing to a new group of consumers with a design that feels great in the hand and has two new colors, the Nokia E63 is still very much a member of the Eseries family. Petersen continues, “People use Eseries to access their corporate mail, review their calendar and work in their business network, so the Nokia E63 still includes Wi-Fi connectivity, easy access to Mail for Exchange and dedicated key access to contacts, calendar and email.”

The Nokia E63 also has the ability to switch modes with a single key press, switching from a view of corporate mail, appointments and intranet data, to a personal mode with a picture of friends, personal email and shortcuts to favorite hobby blogs or websites. Petersen adds, “The amazing response we have seen to the Nokia E71, which has very quickly become the best selling model in its category, let us know that we are heading in the right direction. People want a rich experience when using messaging, social networks and the Internet. With the Nokia E63 you can enjoy the web, update your status and work meaningfully with multiple email accounts.”

The Nokia E63 also includes Files on Ovi, a service where people can get remote access to their PC files even when their computer is offline. Anyone buying the handset will have access to 1GB of online file storage for free.

The Nokia E63 will be available in ruby red or ultramarine blue with a range of multimedia features.  Record and view images and videos with the digital camera and bright landscape display, listen to music downloaded from the Nokia Music Store, or a number of other sources, via the standard 3,5 mm audio jack or customize the device through the thousands of applications available for download.

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