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Tag: nokia

  • Nokia dispels rumors that it might be manufacturing smartphones again

    Nokia dispels rumors that it might be manufacturing smartphones again

    Nokia-Logo

    A report published on Gizmodo stated that Nokia might be getting back into the manufacturing of consumer handsets at the end of the year (Dec 31st, 2015) – that is immediately after its non-compete agreement expires. However, a statement released yesterday by Nokia dispels the rumors as inaccurate and false.

    The statement reads, “Nokia notes recent news reports claiming the company communicated an intention to manufacture consumer handsets out of a R&D facility in China. These reports are false, and include comments incorrectly attributed to a Nokia Networks executive. 

    Nokia reiterates it currently has no plans to manufacture or sell consumer handsets.”

    The return of Nokia into the manufacture and selling of consumer handsets started at Re/code where an article at their site stated that Nokia was plotting a 2016 return. The article speculated that Nokia was looking into designing exciting devices and then licensing the designs and its name to a Chinese manufacturer.

    Nonetheless, the recent press release by Nokia pours cold water over the rumor and this somehow makes a Nokia revival pretty damn unlikely, at least for now.

     

     

  • MWC 2014: The Red Herring Price Goes For – Triple Draw Between Samsung, LG and Sony

    It's split between three big players this year.

    Samsung:

    The core feature Samsung has been touting all MWC long has been the ability of its tablets to run 4 application windows at once. Useful, of course, but… Nothing else?

    LG:

    How long have you been dreaming of a curved mobile phone? Me neither, but the engineers at LG are very happy with its curved battery and screens. The phone doesn't feel specially awesome either.

    Sony:

    Speaking of dreams, we've been always waiting for a waterproof tablet, don't we? No? Yeah. Sony thinks otherwise. In any case, after seeing the impressive feats of the HZO guys I'd rather purchase a water-proofer from them and use the tablet I like.

  • MWC 2014: Nokia Doesn't Put All Eggs in One Basket – Android Handheld Launched


    Nokia astonished the mobile world (well, more or less since news of this had already been leaked) with its Nokia X1, an Android phone that makes Nokia probably the first mobile manufacturer to have 3 operating systems under control. X1 is a relatively heavy UI change on Android, but as a phone it felt relatively vulgar, indistinguishable from any other Android phone. Below you'll see a few pictures and a video.

    We also took some time to check the Nokia Asha, its low end mobile for kind-of developing markets, using the S40 operating system. It's not a full-fledged "smartphone," but it looks like a decent device. See a short video below:

    Finally, we played for a few minutes with a Nokia Windows tablet. The Metro UI actually looks very good in high definition screens, as you can see below. 

  • Nokia Lumia 925 Goes Live at AT&T Starting September 13th for $99.99, Pre-Orders Now Open

    Nokia Lumia 925 made its appearance at T-Mobile last month and now it is set to land at AT&T on September 13th. This is the first Lumia smartphone that features a metal design detail and it will be available for a monthly cost of $21 on AT$T Next plan or for $99.99 in a two-year agreement.

    AT&T Next is a new program that the company launched to allow its customers get a new device every year. Available only to upgrade eligible AT&T customers, AT&T Next lets you purchase a smartphone or tablet devoid of down payments, upgrade fees, and activation fees, and after paying 12 monthly installments you are allowed to trade it in and get a new device.

    Lumia 925, a Windows Phone that is slim, lightweight, and dominated by a 4.5-inch PureMotion HD + Gorilla Glass display, runs on AT&T's 4G LTE network. It sports an 8.7 megapixel camera that packs the usual high-performance optics and camera features Nokia is known for. At launch, the exclusive black version of the Lumia will be available to only AT$T customers.

    A couple of days obviously stand between the 4.5-inch aluminum-clad smartphone and its lovers but pre-orders already began.

  • Nokia Asha 210, the first mobile with a WhatsApp button

    Nokia is introducing Asha 210, a brand new social smartphone that is proud to be the first smartphone that has its own WhatsApp button. According to Nokia, it is described as the phone that allows you to "have your social life at your fingertips."

    Nokia Asha 210 is considered a budget smartphone and it targets people that enjoy using social networks, but don't want to spend a fortune for a phone. Asha 210 has 2.4-inch display, a QWERTY keyboard, it supports Wi-Fi and 2G connections, while it also has a 2MP camera. It is available in yellow, cyan and magenta and it has been significantly advertised for its unique button for the famous WhatsApp application. WhatsApp is an app that allows you to chat with your friends easily and without any cost, either with calls, or messages. It is available for iOS, Android, Windows phone and Blackberry, which increases the possibilities of chatting with your friends for free. Nokia has already announced that WhatsApp will be free for its users, despite other platforms selling it at a minimum cost.

    "The Nokia Asha 210 really stands out giving super-social consumers new ways to express their personalities through design, color and innovations like the world's first WhatsApp button," explains Timo Toikkanen, executive vice president, Mobile Phones, Nokia. "It has been designed to allow people to easily update their social networks, stay in touch with friends and share user created content."

    What is even more important is that the Asha 210 is going to have a starting price of $72, while it is expected during the second quarter of 2013. As it seems, Nokia is trying to focus at a young age audience, trying to persuade them with the social integration, the beautiful colors and the low price. Asha 210 has already been discussed a lot and this might be the start of a successful phone. 

  • Mobile World Congress 2013: Nokia launches a $20 phone – Nokia 105

    Nokia has decided to create a lower cost phone, Nokia 105, aiming at those that still purchase a phone for calls and texts.

    While we are all discussing the latest smartphones by Apple and Samsung and whether we should prefer iOS, Android, BB10 or WP8, Nokia is approaching a different type of customers, the ones that are unwilling to pay a fortune for a phone. Thus, they created a $20 device, which was presented at this year's Mobile World Congress and has already been discussed a lot..

    Nokia 105 does not impress you with its specs, but you can use it for calls, texts, alarm, FM radio and flashlight. What's more, its battery life lasts for 35 days, which is really impressive on its own, and it has a resistant keypad to endure in scratches and dust. Nokia 105 is expected during the following months in many countries, starting from China, Egypt, India, Indonesia, Nigeria, Russia, Vietnam and other markets in Africa, Middle East, Asia-Pacific and Europe.

    As you may notice, their target audience is not the U.S., they are not even including them for now, but the emerging markets that are still not under the hype of the latest trending smartphones. Hence, they are trying to win a new territory, hoping that they will remain loyal to Nokia for their future purchases, too. After all, there are still so many people out there, even in Europe, that do not use their phones extensively and would find the price of the Nokia 105 tempting.

    According to Stephen Elop, the CEO of Nokia:

    "There's a very large number of inexpensive and largely undifferentiated devices. We believe we have to offer differentiation at each price point."

    It seems like smart move for Nokia and it could be the chance for them to rebound on the smartphone market.

  • Mobile World Congress 2013: Nokia presents Lumia 520 and Lumia 720

    Nokia has presented two new smartphones at the Mobile World Congress, the Lumia 520 and Lumia 720, aiming at customers with lower budget.

    Lumia 520 is the cheapest Windows Phone 8 for Nokia, starting at $184, with a 1GHz dual-core processor, 512MB of RAM, 8GB of storage, a 4-inch WVGA screen and a 5MP camera. It weighs 124g, it has a 2D hardened glass and it is also ideal for touch while wearing gloves. It will be released in five colours (cyan, yellow, red, black and white) and it is expected during the next quarter. It seems like a pretty decent phone for its money, with Nokia's experience and Micorosft's ambitious Windows Phone 8 being a great combination.

    As for Lumia 720, it is a bit more sophisticated, with a 6.7MP camera, a 4.3-inch screen, a 1GHz CPU, 512 MB of RAM, 8GB of storage and it will be priced at $329. Lumia 720 will also have a Carl Zeiss lens and f/1.9 aperture, also focusing on the front camera with an f/2.4 aperture, which makes it an ideal choice for everyone that loves taking decent pictures with a smartphone.  It supports NFC and it also allows wireless charging with a snap-on cover. Lumia 720 will also be released in 5 colors and it is expected mostly in Asia and some countries in Europe. There are already some users from the U.S. that found Lumia 720 attractive, although it seems that it won't be available for them.

    Nokia is trying to recover on the smartphone market, targeting for now the low and mid budget users who used to purchase affordable Android devices. It's up to them to persuade them to trust them.

  • Nokia Lumia 620 – Attractive Entry Level Smartphone with Windows Phone 8

    Taking the analysts by surprise, Nokia has launched a new model of its Lumia range – Lumia 620 – Nokia’s third phone that runs Microsoft’s latest version of Windows Phone, .

    Priced at $249, excluding taxes and subsidies from operators, the smartphone is a more attractive model in terms of price in the Lumia series. The new smartphone, launched during the salon Le Web 2012 in Paris, will enter the Asian market in January and will shortly be launched in Europe and the Middle East.

    Lumia 620 aims at younger customers, according to Nokia, and will be available in seven different housing colors.

    The 3.8-inch screen with 800 x 480 WVGA resolutions is more compact than the other two Lumia handsets, 920 and 820, which were harshly criticized for being too heavy and too thick.

    The screen comes with ClearBlack technology and Nokia boasts that it will be as visible in daylight as Lumia 920 and Lumia 820. The chipset is more than decent and allows HD video camera. Dual band wireless card is a plus, and the 1300 mAh battery should provide a decent range, but it will not be able to be charged wirelessly. However, the smartphone supports NFC connectivity.

    Like most advanced models, Nokia Lumia 620 comes with Nokia Maps, Nokia Drive and Nokia City Lens. Operating system offers mobile browser Internet Explorer 10, support Windows Live, Microsoft Office Mobile applications and 7 GB SkyDrive storage.

    Lumia 620 has a 1 GHz Snapdragon S4 Plus processor, with 500 MB RAM, 8 GB internal storage (expandable up to 64 GB) and a battery of 1.300mAh, according to Engadget.

    Separately, Nokia has announced on Wednesday the launch of a new smartphone, Lumia 920T, in partnership with China Mobile, the largest mobile operator in China.

    Overall, we could say that Nokia Lumia 620 is a step in the right direction. The smartphone looks good, has good facilities and has an attractive price.

  • New Rumors About The Upcoming Samsung Galaxy S4

    Galaxy S3 is still one of the most impressive smartphones released this year, so it is not surprising at all that rumors about the next step to be taken by the South Koreans have already appeared.

    The fourth iteration of the Galaxy S terminal would have a screen 4.99-inch screen and a resolution of 1080 x 1920 pixels, which already seems to be the default standard for the top models scheduled for 2013. According to some Korean sources, Samsung is expected to show at CES 2013 the first HD Super AMOLED panel with this resolution.

    As the company did not release any panel with RGB matrix yet, we can assume that we will still be talking about a PenTile screen, but given the new arrangement of subpixels used to make the screen of Galaxy Note 2, with a density of 441 ppi, probably this inconvenience will not bother too much.

    The speculated hardware platform is Exynos 5 Quad, the quad-core version of the already-launched dual-core model Exynos 5250, which was implemented in the portable Samsung Chromebook and the tablet Google Nexus 10. Also known as the Exynos 5450, this chip will not seem to see the light of the day as simple quad-core version of the current model, but as an improved version that will also implement an ARM T658 GPU, better than the current version T604.

    The third rumor says that the next Samsung Galaxy S4 will offer a 13-megapixel camera, a rumor also heard before the launch of Galaxy Note 2, but which did not come true.

    As we all know, the new Galaxy S will be launched somewhere in late spring 2013, during which much can happen in the world of smartphones. But anyway, hopefully we will have a rich year in real flagship releases from both Samsung and the easily-left-behind competition: LG, HTC, Nokia and others.

  • Nokia to Launch Windows Phone 8 Smartphone

    Nokia used to be dominant in the smartphone market share, but the arrival of iPhone has dropped their sales significantly. The company seems to insist in releasing Windows Phone handsets and that is why they are about to release Windows Phone 8 smartphone.

    Nokia realized that Symbian cannot compete with iOS and Android, so they decided to cooperate with Microsoft and launch Windows Phone handsets. Lumia 900 was quite a success, selling 4 million units during the Q2. Many customers turned to Nokia one more time, finding an alternative to iPhone, at a much lower price. However, the upcoming release of Windows 8 and Windows Phone 8 from Microsoft has become a problem for Nokia. They decided to drop the price of Lumia 900 by 50$, but the fact that those who bought it were informed that they wouldn't be able to upgrade to Windows Phone 8, was rather disappointing. Hence, they seem to be preparing for the release of new smartphones, coming along with Windows Phone 8 and trying to save the game.

    Windows Phone 7, which became Windows Phone 7.5, has received good reviews and although it is still a new operating system, it has the potential to be competitive the next few years. Nokia believes that they can boost their sales with the support of Microsoft and they stick to Windows Phone handsets. During September we are expecting the announcement of the new smartphones and by the end of the year they will be available in the market.

    However, with the release of the highly anticipated new iPhone, is this a good time for a new smartphone? Actually, it might be. Not everyone can afford an iPhone and if Nokia can provide them with another good smartphone, why not buy it?