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Tag: ovi-store

  • Nokia N9, Love at Second Sight

    Nokia N9, the charismatic smartphone with MeeGo OS is one of those gadgets that after an initial period of time conquers you irremediably thanks to its outstanding design and its fresh and different operating system.

    You cannot feel a certain sadness at the thought that the N9 will get a limited release and the promising MeeGo will be placed somewhere on a shelf where it will be getting dusty.

    Slim and stylish
    Nokia N9 has a minimalistic casing, with a thickness of only 12 mm and a curved AMOLED ClearBlack screen of 3.9 inches, having a resolution of 854 x 480 pixels. Its colorful menu icons, displayed by the splendid screen, perfectly contrast with the black matte case.

    Nokia had the kindness to include in package a case designed to protect the casing from scratches. Its casing impresses primarily by impairing the phone’s design, going almost unnoticed, which unfortunately cannot be said for many smartphones.

    Fresh air
    Nokia N9 uses MeeGo 1.2 Harmattan, the most refined version of the operating system developed by Nokia in collaboration with Intel. For those familiar with Android’s key layout or with the iPhone’s Home key, the no-button interaction used by N9 will definitely be an interesting experience.

    After using intensively the Android OS and the iOS, MeeGo seems a breeze of freshness. Vivid icons, fluid animations and a very modern look dominate the N9 operating system's interface. An example is the clock – in order to set the alarm you have to turn the two disks associated with hours and minutes.

    The menu and the applications are working excellent, despite the fact that the hardware used by Nokia N9 is not very impressive. The phone has a Cortex A8 processor at 1GHz, but is helped by 1GB RAM and a GPU PowerVR SGX530. The internal memory is 16 or 64 GB.

    Camera
    Upon hearing the news that Nokia will launch the N9, many fans were expecting the smartphone to have an even better camera than the one on N8. Things are not quite so, the Finnish giant preferring a different approach for the N9. The phone has an 8-megapixel camera with a smaller sensor than in N8 but with the same excellent Carl Zeiss optics.

    N9 also offers 720p video shooting, something not very impressive considering that we already have plenty of smartphones with 1080p. Videos are also decent, but nothing remarkable.

    Camera interface is complex, providing access to a multitude of options, from setting the ISO exposure, geo-tagging, formatting or selecting one of the six different scenes.

    Applications
    The ecosystem of applications should be the Achilles heel for Nokia N9, taking into account the somewhat limited offer from Ovi Store, but things are not so. You will not have access to the hundreds of thousands of applications in the App Store, but you will find applications mainly covering the needs list and also some top games. You have access to dedicated applications for Facebook, Twitter, multimedia playback applications or games like Angry Birds or NFS Shift.

    Nokia N9 supports a wide range of files, both office and multimedia. With the Documents application you can open text files or PDFs, while the video player supports MKVs. No shortage of navigation applications Maps and Drive or the Ovi Music service.

    Nokia N9 shows those who criticized the lack of innovation of the Finnish giant that the flame has not yet been extinguished and that Nokia can still be a milestone in the mobile world. The problem is that Nokia N9 arrived a year too late, has a pretty high price and is not enjoying the deserved attention.

    We will probably see phones with hardware and design similar with N9’s during the Nokia World event, but that will run Windows Phone Mango.

    You may also want to read:
    Samsung and Google Launch Galaxy Nexus
    HTC Sensation XL with Audio Beats
    HTC Explorer: Smartphone For Masses

  • Nokia’s Ovi Label Metamorphoses into Nokia Services Soon

    Nokia is planning to start services on some of the latest Nokia devices by July and August of this year. Also, the company is planning some more transition in the form Ovi label into Nokia services by the end of 2012. This is indicating that the current services under the Ovi umbrella will be soon branded as Nokia without affecting present service and the roadmap.

    Jerri DeVard, Nokia’s EVP and Chief marketing Officer said in this context: “We have made the decision to change our service branding from Ovi to Nokia. By centralizing our services identity under one brand, not two, we will reinforce the powerful master brand of Nokia and unify our brand architecture-while continuing to deliver compelling opportunities and experiences for partners and consumers alike”.

    The planned metamorphoses will be started from July this year and intended to complete all over the world including all services by the closing of year 2012. There is a possibility that the every latest Nokia smartphone purchased by the user will see the new branding procedure over it. Perhaps, future software updates might perform this new branding procedure for the old Nokia smartphones.

    Jerri also added that “the reasons for this decision includes the fact that nokia is a well-known and highly-loved brand the world over. Our mobile experiences are tightly integrated with our devices-there is no longer a differentiation. For example, if consumers want the best mobile navigation experience, they know it’s a Nokia that they can rely on. These last few years, and moving forward, our mission remains unchanged. We will continue our work to deliver compelling, unified mobile service offerings and next-generation, disruptive technologies”.

    The Finnish company’s sudden decision for the transition got many behind the screen reasons. Earlier this year, Nokia got hooked up with Microsoft. The vital parts of that agreement comprise for Nokia software, and Nokia maps are to be made available for all Windows Phone devices and over Microsoft’s range of services. Definitely, the latest decision from Nokia is making a lot of sense and serious about keeping its own name on all its wares. There will be no other structural changes or transformations from Nokia in this aspect, except the change of new name plate atop. Let us wait and see how much more benefit this act is going to gain for Nokia, but many existing users of Ovi Store are finding it wrong at the first place.

  • Nokia N8 Offcially for Sale at the end of September

    Nokia finally announced that Nokia N8, the company’s long-awaited, flagship handset, will be on-sale in the last week of September for £429 SIM free or on contract from £35 per month.

    The Nokia N8 introduces a 12 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics and Xenon flash, HD-quality (720p) video recording, film editing software and Dolby Digital Plus surround sound.

    Among the features of this Symbian^3 smartphone are:

    • On-demand Web TV (CNN, E! Entertainment, Paramount and National Geographic and others)
    • HDMI connection
    • Navigation with Ovi Maps
    • Up to three personalised home screens
    • Integrated social networking: all social networks in a single app
    • Flick scrolling and pinch-to-zoom
    • Ovi apps
    • 3.5 inch widescreen (640 x 360 pixels) capacitive touch
    • 6GB mass memory + micro SD card slot, 135MB internal memory, support up to 32GB memory cards
    • 1200mAh BL-4D battery

    "The Nokia N8 is perfect for creating and sharing great content in high-definition, using HDMI out to connect to your TV as well as hot-USB swap. We’re making it fun and easy to capture and share memorable moments on the go," said Mark Loughran, General Manager, Nokia UK.

    Related news
    Nokia and Intel Build Joint Research Center
    Nokia Siemens to Acquire Motorola’s Wireless Network
    Nokia Announces Skype for Symbian

  • Truphone Expands Services to 11 More Nokias


    Truphone has extened its VoIP and call-through services to an additional 11 Nokia handsets.

    The move is to capitalise on the improved the distribution channel now being offered by Nokia’s Ovi Store.

    It has had great success in both the iPhone App Store and Android Marketplace – something it hopes to repeat on the S60 platform.

    The company offers both VoIP (Truphone WiFi calling) and call-though (Truphone Anywhere) technologies.

    Smartphone.biz-news reports that with the addition of the 11 new handsets, Truphone is now compatible on 26 Nokia devices.

  • Truphone Expands Services to Range of Nokia Devices


    Truphone has announced that its VoIP and call-through services now support an additional 11 Nokia handsets.

    The mobile VoIP operator first offered its VoIP-only services on Nokia devices but went on to include the iPhone and Android platforms.

    With Nokia’s Ovi Store having improved the distribution channel Truphone now sees the opportunity to update its Nokia offerings.

    It has had great success in both the iPhone App Store and Android Marketplace – something it hopes to repeat on the S60 platform.

    The company offers both VoIP (Truphone WiFi calling) and call-though (Truphone Anywhere) technologies.

    With the addition of the 11 new handsets, Truphone is now compatible on 26 Nokia devices.

    Of those, software for 14 of the Truphone-compatible devices can now be downloaded from Nokia’s new Ovi store, with the software for 11 of the remaining 12 new devices to be added to the Ovi store soon.

    The new Truphone-enabled Nokia devices are:

    * N96
    * N78
    * N85 (also VoIP enabled)
    * N79 (also VoIP enabled)
    * 5630 (also VoIP enabled)
    * 5800
    * 5320
    * 6210
    * 6220
    * 6650
    * E63

    All the new handsets are Truphone Anywhere-capable and, in addition, three of the handsets – the N85, N79 and 5630 – are also compatible with the original Truphone Wi-Fi calling service.

    The full list of Nokia devices that are Truphone-compatible is:

    * E51
    * E60
    * E61
    * E61i
    * E63
    * E65
    * E66
    * E70
    * E71
    * E90
    * N80ie
    * N81
    * N81 8GB
    * N82
    * N95
    * N95 8GB
    * N96
    * N78
    * N85
    * N79
    * 5630
    * 5800
    * 5320
    * 6210
    * 6220
    * 6650

  • Teething Troubles Disrupt Nokia's Ovi Store Launch


    Nokia has officially opened the doors to the Ovi Store application site – but its answer to Apple’s app store immediately ran into problems.

    High traffic "spikes" – which would surely have been expected, right? – meant users experienced slow downloading and page upload times.

    Effort were immediately made to rectify this by adding additional servers, according to Eric John, head up product marketing for the Ovi Store.

    But it meant Nokia didn’t get the smooth launch it would have hoped for.

    The Ovi Store is the fourth major mobile app software store to open, and the third since Apple launched iTunes in July 2008, following the Android Market and BlackBerry App World.

    Some analysts suggest the market can only sustain five such ventures.

    Nokia said the applications and services storefront will target an estimated 50 million Nokia device owners, across more than 50 Nokia devices, including the forthcoming flagship phone the Nokia N97.

    Users will have the ability to download mobile applications – starting with an initial offerering of over 20,000 – including games, videos and podcasts.

    The mobile client is available in English, German, Italian, Russian and Spanish and supports operator billing in Australia, Germany, Ireland, Italy, Russia, Singapore, Spain and the United Kingdom.

    Globally, credit card billing is available through the mobile application and the mobile website.

    AT&T plans to make Ovi Store available to its customers in the United States later this year. Additional countries, languages, devices and features will be added throughout the year.

    We’d be interested in hearing your experience with Ovi – good or bad?

  • Nokia, Vodafone and Adobe Help Kick-off Mobile World Congress 2009

    Nokia, Vodafone and Adobe Help Kick-off Mobile World Congress 2009


    This year’s Mobile World Congress is now underway and already there has been a flurry of announcements and launches from some of the big names lining up in Barcelona.

    Vodafone has unveiled a raft of new mobiles, including its first own-branded consumer GPS phone – the Vodafone 835.

    The 3G candybar handset is to be available across Europe from spring on contract.

    Other newcomers to the 3G range include the Vodafone 735 and Vodafone 736 – a candybar and slider version respectively of the phone.

    Hot on Vodafone’s heels comes Nokia, with the news that it is launching its own online app and media portal – the Ovi Store.

    The Finnish telecoms giant has made its N97 smartphone the first device to be "pre-integrated" with Ovi Store, but existing S40 and S60 customers will be able to download the service from May.

    Not surprisingly, a developer site has been launched offering a 70 per cent revenue share.

    Adobe announced this morning that Flash Player 10 – the full version of Flash that runs on PCs – is to be available on smartphones running Windows Mobile, Google’s Android, Nokia S60/Symbian, and the new Palm operating systems.

    Devices with Flash Player 10 are expected to hit the market starting in early 2010.

    Obviously, the glaring exception to the list of applicable devices is the iPhone – though Adobe executives do promise that it’s coming.

    Earlier, Carl-Henric Svanberg, CEO and president of Ericsson, told delegates at MWC that 2008 had been a year of establishing mobile broadband.

    He talked about the impact investment in telecom infrastructure can have on societies and their prosperity – even in the current economic climate.

    "Mobile phones have had a profound impact on peoples’ lives all over the world," he said.

    "The mobile industry is now on the verge of another significant wave of investment, which will bring affordable mobile broadband services to all."

    Svanberg finished by stressing that the fundamentals of the telecoms industry were sound, as was demand.

    "The operators are generally in good shape and the networks are fairly loaded," he said.

    "As we move further into a financially turbulent 2009 our focus will be to manage our company for value creation. In this market environment there will be opportunities to strengthen our position and I am convinced that we are uniquely positioned to capture them."