Tag: Price

Angry Bird, Spiderman, Quick Office showing free on Ovi Store? Operator billing coming to India?

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Update: It seems that Nokia has removed all the paid apps from Ovi Store for a while, but still the damage is done and is counting more as even the genuine buyers not able to buy any app from Ovi Store since a day now. Definitely, Nokia gonna have a hard time explaining this to developers.

I and many other users have asked from @NokiaIndia and @ovibyNokia, but still no answer from them and their twitter account is silent over all this.

I was about to go for the evening tea break and all of sudden a tweet of @freak4mobiles hit me. He told that all of the big game titles are showing as free items in Ovi Store of his Nokia N8 at least. It was a news that was too good to be true but still I touched the Ovi Store icon on my home screen and whoooaa… this was true. Not even games but everything was there for free like Nokia has gone into Santa mode post Christmas.

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I was like what’s this? Even if Nokia might have gone this much generous for a while, the various App developers wont allow this and if something such was going to be happen then we blogger would have known the same earlier via developers, but nothing such was in air.

Continue reading “Angry Bird, Spiderman, Quick Office showing free on Ovi Store? Operator billing coming to India?” →

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Layman take on Nokia N8 – Part 1 – The detailed unboxing

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Sorry guys I am late to come up with the post, while had my Nokia N8 since few days now. lots has already been said, lots of videos you seen, lots of pics and many of you even had your Nokia N8-00 in your hands by now. But still will try to make that up here.

Nokia N8-00: The box

It is the same eco-friendly blue box, like I had seen in case of Nokia Booklet 3G, plain and simple.

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And while the picture above doesn’t give the exact idea, it was the slimmest box of any Nokia I seen recently. Check out the pics given below …

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Hardly taking much of the space, the box also speaks in same minimalistic language as the design language of Nokia N8-00 is. (I missed my Nokia N82 box at the moment, I was taking snaps). Though if I remember right, then only Nokia N97 mini’s packaging was somewhat similar thickness, but that was much bigger than this.

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One more noticeable thing is, they are not stressing over the camera part only by covers, like it was the prime focus in Nokia N82 or like some of the recent handsets focused on Ovi Maps neither on Ovi Music Unlimited that comes with it. They just say “It’s amazing technology, what will you do with it?”

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Nokia N8-00: The content inside the package

When you open the box for the first time, then for the first time, it reckons about its camera by the engraved image on the last fold ..

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The glass side facing your face, probably this was the first Nokia device I seen without any plastic/ paper wrapper on it. May be to symbolize the robustness of materials, Nokia N8-00 is made of. And yes! Black/ Dark grey is my color. There are four more colors also available, if you prefer anything else. Like one person on the shop asked me, there is no option like changing cases, due to integrated one piece build.

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Inside the box, the pleasing part is to have the proper long USB cable back instead of the one, they shipping that 6” in most of other packages now days.  It shows that Nokia didn’t wanted to give any chance of complaint with this one.

Its a capacitive, so there is no stylus packed with. Though we seen a stylus in videos, but probably India is not among the regions, where it gonna shipped with stylus.

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You get the following inside the box:

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1. Nokia N8-00 Handset
2. Nokia AC-15N Battery Charger
3. Nokia CA-179 USB Data Cable
4. Nokia CA-157 USB OTG Adapter
5. Nokia CA-156 HDMI Adapter
6. Nokia WH-701 Stereo Handset
7. 3 Pairs of ear buds
8. 1 Nokia Ovi Suit/ Player mini DVD
9.  A quick start guide, a getting started with Ovi Services guide and one Ovi Music guide
10. A slimmer Nokia N8-00 Manual

 
 
I thought that manual would be thicker (remembering the earlier PDF Manual), but was slim just like the quick start guide. No battery outside as Nokia N8-00 comes with no user replaceable battery.
 
The device also come with Ovi Music Unlimited subscription, which people in India understand very late due to non-availability of free wi-fi spots out here. Downloading the pirated MP3 is so common here that it will take time to make people understand that how big thing Nokia is offering to Indian people.
 
This device also comes with life time navigation support with Ovi Maps 3.04 installed and life time Nokia Messaging on subscription on board.
 
Nokia N8-00: Detailed description of content

At first glance, you feel that you got the regular package with added USB OTG and HDMI Adapter, but there is much more improvements behind the prints..

Nokia AC-15N Battery Charger Known as Nokia Fast Charger, this charger come up with user retractable third pin. With less than 50 gm weight and standby power consumption: ≤30 mW, this 5-star rate charger stands for all reason that you wont be wishing to charge with your older 2mm Nokia Chargers. Obviously, the same series chargers will be part of all other coming high end devices as well.

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Nokia CA-179 USB Data Cable While I do not remember that this particular cable has ever been used in any of the past Nokia handset, it seems to be part of many new coming Symbian^3 handset like Nokia E7-00 and Nokia C6-01 (except C7 that has CA-101D). Though I am unable to find any info on it yet as they seems not selling it outside the package, but best thing people will find about it will be the length. Nokia seems to finally acknowledging the fact that still there are many, who don’t have laptops or netbooks.

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Nokia CA-157 USB OTG Adapter I found some idiots saying that what’s new in USB OTG, some PDAs been doing it since years. Let me tell you, this part alone really changes the way, we were using the smart phones till now. People who keep on complaining if they have to tap on one more menu, should think that how much of their efforts are being reduced, when they are able to connect their other phones or flash drive directly to Nokia N8.

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You might be surprised to know that Nokia C7-00 might be shipping without this cable even if that has USB OTG.

Nokia CA-156 HDMI Adapter While many saying it a HDMI cable in common, technically its a HDMI-C to HDMI-A adapter, with 19 pins and bandwidth to support all SDTV, EDTV, and HDTV modes. As per wiki, type A is electrically compatible with single-link DVI-D. It provides you the female connector for your type A HDMI cable coming from the LCD. And don’t go by the size only, if you lost this, then you might end up paying around 2000 INR for this adapter (and you were saying that N8 is over priced).

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Nokia WH-701 Stereo Handset With 1350 mm long cord and all required buttons to control music and call, Nokia continues their legacy of shipping high quality of headset with their smart phones. This is the same headset, they shipped with Nokia N97 Mini and Nokia X6 in my knowledge, so you are already very much aware about its quality output. Like usual, it also include three pairs of ear buds, to choose from suiting your ears.

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Nokia Ovi Suit/ Player mini DVD  Most of us might not going to even open it, but its a surprise in the package otherwise, many of the devices were being shipped with Ovi Suit kept on the MicroSD card.

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DVD version

Presence of five available language in installer might be due to regional presence, we get Ovi Suit Installer version 3.1.452 here and Ovi Player version 2.1.10304. With size of 462 mb, this DVD comes up with Ovi Suit version 2.2.0.241while the current version is 2.2.1.23.

Oviplayer

Ovi Player inside has its own set of requirements, of course bundled with. While I doubt that many might be using this one, but it has excellent options like iTune import, common music format support and a cool UI.

Ovi Player

Worth checking out.

Nokia N8-00: Price and only bad experience on Nokia N8

While escalated prices, no trials to hold back the esteem, it was a wild goose chase to find the Nokia N8-00 in right price, when Nokia dealers were inclined to sell it in MRP itself. Definitely, I didn’t enjoyed the situation even when I was a pre-order customer (though that’s being dumb ass, if you talk about India). After holding for 4 days, finally I given up and ended up buying the same from Nokia Priority Dealer.

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Was this really a right decision to buy something from Nokia Priority Dealer ever? I must say this became the worse part of Nokia N8-00 purchase. Same dealer S.D. Enterprises, Gita Colony, New Delhi was stuck on 26k price since October 13, 2010 and when I finally got time to check other priority dealers from Rohini area and got to know that other selling it easily on 24k, only then he somehow agreed on 24k.

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Within two days, one mate from my office informed about his Nokia N8 purchase in 22k… I was like WTF. Same city price and I was a pre-order customer … JACK ASS if you are a Nokia pre-order customer in India. And you know what, the same dealer still quoting that 26k price to new customers.

My friend of twitter suggested me to ask the dealer for extra amount returned, but I don’t expect Nokia to be like DELL, who returned extra amount of Rs. 2174/-after months, when I had no idea on my side that I was over charged on some tax regulations. Nokia has a good repute country wide, might be its a local issue, but sure it hurts faith.

I had purchased  more than a dozen Nokia Handsets and headset .. all from retail market. This was my first from any Nokia Priority Dealer, just to get this awesome device early and I got my lesson.

Never buy a device from a Nokia Priority Dealer, no one is retail market going to charge you more than them.

Definitely, its not like the device doesn’t worth 24k INR that I paid, but knowing that its already out in lesser and I would have saved at least 2000 INR (for some good bluetooth headset or 16 Gb MicroSD Card) … I feel like why I pre-ordered.

I am sorry for not including the unboxing video as the settings were not all right now days and probably, I need to learn some of many things about un-boxing yet, so skipped that part.

Keep tuned in.. I have many things to share on Nokia N8-00 … the game has just begin.

photo of Nitish KumarNitish Kumar

 
 
 

Nokia C7 coming to India by End of October 2010

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We have seen a lot of touch phones from Nokia till now and even the best of Symbian till date that came along with Nokia N8. But do you know what was the point, Nokia Touch phones always missed? It was the form factor. Nokia phones always packed these many features that it wasn’t easy to get a slim figure like 10mm (like Zero figure for Smartphones).

Guess what? The myth is about to be broken… as already announced 10.5mm thinner show stopper Nokia C7 bringing most of the features of Nokia N8 with tag of being slimmest Nokia touch phone. And biggest reason to get excited about it .. its hitting Indian market by end of October 2010.. no long wait like we did for Nokia N8.

It was started with a SMS that I received from LM-Nokia at 15:40 Hrs saying “Ready to move on from your Nokia N82? Check out the sleek and stylish new touch screen phone Nokia C7 with 8MP camera visit http://ct.nokia.com?OT0010-12537 ” and I just got confirmation by Nokia India

Nokia C7

Though still no words over the Indian launch price, but will keep you updated on it, once I get to know about the same.

Nokia C7 Price

By the way, the rumored price is Rs. 16000 and if it goes true then you know it… hurrray

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Nokia C5-03 touch screen arrives @ Rs. 10500

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While some of us spotted the all new C5-01 in the wild last day, today was the day to let Nokia announce it officially, Nokia C5-03, yeah they caught us by surprise by  an inexpensive 3.2” touch screen with WiFi support, A-GPS, Compass, 5MP camera (without flash thoguh) and Symbian^1 as operating system is ready to be shipped at a price around Rs. 10, 500/- without taxes.

Nokia C5 again? you will say, when you read their post.. but its Nokia C5-03 actually. May God help their naming system. At least they should have written the full name in their official post.

Definitely specs aren’t overwhelming for geeks, but the price tag and looks are set to change the game for the mid market that was being threatened by Galaxy 3 or Galaxy 57 like cheaper alternatives.  Though it also missing the front camera (if I am right), but having 3G, WiFi and A-GPS gonna be a huge plus and definitely its like pushing Nokia 5235, 5233 like best sellers out of the way.

Seems to be available in four colors initially including the above three and dark gray one, it measures 105.8 mm x 51.0 mm x 13.8 mm (L x W x H) and weighs 93g – that makes it a similar size to the (imminently) forthcoming C6-01 and sure its a much better looking phone than the current cheaper touch phones from Nokia were (read Nokia 5233, Nokia 5235, Nokia 5800).

Blogger community might get irritated a little on presence of Symbian^1 and just 40 MB user storage, but mind it has some other audience and targets in mind and believe me at this price tag and in this looks, it rocks. As per their post, it will start shipping by End of this quarter means End of December 2010. You may hope that next best selling has arrived.

I will be back, when I get more on it. Well done Nokia, after announcement of C7 shipment now this… fight back really seems to be started up. Nokia 5800 killer has arrived from Nokia itself.

Update:

As promised, hereby bringing the full specs of Nokia C5-03. It seems to have all from Nokia 5800, but in much compact outlook. We got better processor here and also better HSPA (on the contrary of what some tech sites claimed that there is no HSPA). Though there is no USB OTG in it, but remember its S60 5th Edition, probably not meant for supporting that. Addition of WMV 9 video playback suggest that the video playback should support larger range than earlier devices.

There are some shortcomings as well, when you compare with Nokia 5800, like no secondary camera means no video call. Though it has a 5MP Camera, but we have no Carl Zeiss like 5800, neither do we have a Flash. Even Video recording stands on 15 fps like it was on E72, unlike 5800 where it was 30 fps.

But its in comparison with Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, which still selling on higher price, if you compare with cheaper Nokia 5233 or Nokia 5235, then its a hands down victory. Take a look over complete specs.

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Laymans Take on Nokia 5233 – The short review

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Since I wrote of Nokia C5, the leading shot of non-touch smartphones crop, some of the readers enquired me about the cheapest options about touch phones as well. The answer wasn’t that simple, but as their concern was price, so I suggested them of Nokia 5233 and Nokia 5235 and specially with a price tag of Rs. 6300/-, Nokia 5233 is sure a great deal for one kind of market.

Today I got my hands on Nokia 5233 finally via one of my colleague and I took the same chance to bring my first impressions about the device for readers.

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Why should one buy Nokia 5233?

We are not talking about the geeks here, who could argue on the specs sheet for hours. We are talking about the guys, who are much mean, when it comes to shed a few bucks from their pockets. I have seen people, who will buy some Chinese model in 5K saying it got all and will come behind you that yaar!! its not opening the sites very well or how to transfer all my contacts on this phone… bla bla.. Com’on .. who suggested you to go for a non-nokia? Even if its priced at 5k, do you really wanted to throw some phone in one year coz there will be no care center for that kind of phone?

People get a life.. Nokia is listening of you people too. Not just for sake of price, but for sake of engaging people in a better experience because only that can bring them in for the bigger things in next.

Have you lustfully taken a look on other people’s Nokia 5800 because of their bigger touch screens and the style with which their slide their fingers on that shiny thing? So what if you didn’t wished to spend Rs. 13, 000/-, you can get the same feel with Nokia 5233. This is a device made for people to have their hands on touch phones world in cheapest way without loosing an inch of the quality standards that Nokia maintains.

  1. ARM 434 MHz processor (Irony or proud! it has the same processor as ‘’lagship’ N97 had).
  2. 128 MB of RAM is more than enough for the target users in this price range.
  3. 70 MB user storage is not much but kind of super, if you remember 50 mb of C5 or E52
  4. A 3.2” resistive touch screen with a very good nice touch feedback.

  5. Proximity sensor, Accelerometer sensor and Handwriting recognition, while target users might not even know about worth of these features.

  6. Not only comes with Ovi Music service, but has 33 hours music playback with Li-Ion 1320 mAh (BL-5J).

  7. A stylus for precise touch input though you can do all kind of things with fingers as well.

Definitely, you can complaint a single line, when someone bring this much in just Rs. 6300/-.Though still I wish people a little more with Rs. 7500/- and buy Nokia 5235 with 3G and A-GPS added, but if you are too picky about the price, then sure Nokia 5233 fits the bill as I have seen with some people around me.

Some of my first impressions after taking it in my hands

If you have taken Nokia 5800 in your hands for some times, then it almost has the same feel like that one. Though you might start complaining only if you dig a little deeper, but that would be purely based on inner features, not the exterior, which is sure full plastic, but still its better than many I had seen. At least opening back battery cover didn’t scared me here.

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Well! as you can see, it wont be a great screen when come under sunlight, neither the build has features that could keep the dust particles away.

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Though it doesn’t support the hot swap SIM feature, but sure you can insert the SIM without even opening the battery cover and same with Memory card that is hot swappable. Though disappointments are, you can not take the SIM out without opening battery cover and the package doesn’t include the MicroSD card.

But who cares, if you are looking for a cheap solution only, then in 1K you could get an 8GB card, while it supports up to 16GB and who takes out and in SIM daily, that could be managed for sure.

If you look more close in the first pics, then you could spot the mono speaker as well near my thumb. Well to say.. it wasn’t too loud, but not too low either. You can sure hear the calls on loudspeakers in normal scenarios, but don’t ask for the same in trains like noise.

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Well! I wont say that plastic buttons are all pretty, but still I would have loved more, if there was an always open miniUSB slot than the one covered with plastic on the top side.

What you love about Nokia is the fact, they still are the leaders when it comes to raise the level of common man. Here I am talking about the 3.5mm jack and 2mm charger that’s real democracy than some company running behind money only.

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I have got my hands on many of the devices, where the manufacturer decides that a dedicated camera key is kind of waste, like I seen in Nokia C5, but if you ask a user then nothing matches the feel of having a dedicated camera key on the side. Though the device doesn’t has a autofocus, so not like some half press to focus, but still you get a camera like feel.

With the volume rocker, you also got the lock button in the middle, quite handy and brings back the memories that how people were used to locking their phones by pressing Menu Key and * rather than waiting for the screen to get auto locked after a certain period.

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It got just 2MP camera full focus camera with focus range from 60 cm to infinity. It is very very ordinary and bigger disappointment is absence of even a single LED flash. I understand that it was a design decision to keep the cost at its lowest, but still it was better if they would not have compromised on this.

Probably for same reason that camera wasn’t the biggest attraction here, Nokia skipped the camera cover too.

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As I mentioned, due to a little easy slot there, it was not that hard to open the battery cover like others, where I always get scared that if opening battery cover may break it.

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Yup!! it got the stylus too though after using the phone for a while, I found that after sometime, you wont even need that. Having a resistive screen than a capacitive one, has some of profits too.

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Green, red and white; typical Nokia buttons, though reminds me of the Indian National flag as well in a way. Green one works as Call button, red as call End button and white one as Menu button. All these lights also serves as notification lights too in case of some incoming call or incoming message.

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Yes! there is no secondary camera, but that’s for a reason. It got no 3G support, so obviously no video calls, though you could spot the proximity sensors easily.

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Its the best thing Nokia does with such range of device, they don’t miss out the signal strength and battery, whatever low price might be. You are getting a 1320 mAh battery here and as no 3G, no A-GPS on board, nothing will stop this device from completing a day in normal usages.

In the same pics, you can also spot the mechanism to push the SIM out of it. The slider always go handy for that thing at least. And yes.. finally we see some metal here, the plates around the camera.

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If still some doubts, then sticker on back cover explains the basics.

So, while I will strongly recommend, a slightly higher priced Nokia 5235 over this, but sure if you gift this phone to your little sister or someone who is not much into tech, they sure gonna love it and you will be ensured that they wont bug you back that this is not working and that is not. Rs. 6300/- … what else you wish for?

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A Visit to Nokia Priority Dealer in Delhi-N8, C1, C6 and E5

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Finally after so much hue and cry about Nokia N8 and even talking to few of local dealers, I decided to visit the nearest Nokia Priority center to know the real situation in hands and visited the nearest Nokia Priority Center in New Delhi.

Let me summarize all the info that I got today …

Nokia N8 Pre-Order, Availability and Price in India:

Not in the whole world, but there are huge confusions about the availability of Nokia N8 in India as well. Some saying 15 October, some saying 8 October and some even calling that it will come by November.

Let me make it a full stop here.

1. Nokia N8 is expected to be available on all Nokia Priority dealers by October 15, 2010.
2. Pre-order customers will receive the device by October 8, 2010 or October 10, 2010 max.
3. It wont be available over other stores than NPD’s before November due to huge demands.
4. Pre-orders have began by September 29, some asking 1000 INR, some 2000 INR as deposit.
5. Final price is not clear as of now, but max is 26k or if believe @gauravh1 then 25k.
6. Pre-order customers will receive call about availability and could purchase within 2 months.

 

Take a look over Nokia N8 dummies at S.D. Enterprises, Gita Colony, New Delhi, which I seen…

Nokia N8 Black (my personal favorite)

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Nokia N8 Orange (second favorite of many, I guess its a little darker than the expectations)

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Nokia N8 Green (Not one of my favorite, but I seen many loving it as well)

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The NPD I visited had no dummies of Silver or Blue and though same might raise the doubt that if they are launching with all the five colors or not, but there are official words from @NokiaIndia that they are actually launching it with all five possible colors. Obviously, they don’t want to be like Apple.

As of now, there is no word over additional accessories or bundled offers. But following are on offer …

1. Free navigation is coming for all with latest version of Ovi Maps that will be 3.06
2. Nokia Push mail will be available for lifetime free that too with default HTML support.
3. Nokia Music Services as of now, not coming for free, though some will be preloaded there.
4. There will many great apps pre-installed like Joikuspot and Gravity trial (free versions)
5. As Vox has been closed, Nokia as of now has opted out from Share Online feature. Disappointing.
6. No big game coming with the package, not even free ones.
7. As of now, no news if they will bundle Bluetooth Headset for even pre-order customers.
8. Nokia isn’t giving the stylus with Nokia N8, makes you think which countries then?

Well!! take it my personal opinion or something, but I found Nokia N8 a little smaller in shape than I was expecting it to be. I mean, I have spend full 15 days with Nokia N900 and that screen always looked huge. May be it the compact exteriors or something but pics always looked big. Should say, its completely pocket-able and Sorry folks, to whom I always said that 4” or 5” devices would be insane. Yes! we wont mind a 4” or 5”, if that keeps the same level of compactness as SGS or iPhone or Nokia N8 have.

Nokia E5 Availability and Price in India

Yes!! very much anticipated Nokia E5 already on Nokia Priority stores on a price 11, 800 INR. Though its disappointing to see that prices on NPDs are always much higher than the market price, but at the same time, its obvious too. Market works that way. but still.. As per info from other dealers, you can make a deal on 11, 200 INR minimum for Nokia E5.

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There was no dummy of the same thing there, so I asked them for the box itself. Of course, I wasn’t allowed to open up the same. The green area on the front is highlighting the social integration here, like once Nokia was highlighting free lifetime navigation.

Definitely having a hard to hold my urge to buy one, though disappointing that like Nokia E72, this one also not coming with default HTML support.

Nokia E5 Availability and Price in India

While touch has gotten another name now days; Symbian^3, Nokia has also putting devices like Nokia C6-00 on offer. I wonder what effect this one would have caused, if would have arrived a little earlier. While there are still many reasons to discuss on paper about Nokia E5, for convincing someone to buy Nokia C6-00, you will be needed to focus on price point mostly.

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While @NokiaIndia mentioning the price as 15,600 INR, I found that its actually selling on 13, 800 INR from NPDs and even lower from the other dealers, probably 13, 400 INR minimum. Not a bad buy for newly smart phone users interested in touch and type.

The dummy I got to see was of the color white, though I would have liked to see Black one specially, but still what I see from the dummy only, at such a price point and build, its sure ready to take on over Nokia 5800.

Two more new handset spotted there were Nokia C3-00 and Nokia C1-00. Last time, I seen a light colored C3-00 and this time, it was my favorite black one here. Must say, that is the best thing you could gift someone, who don’t care about high end things like Maps or Internet and for later on..  it got wi-fi on it.

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Nokia C1-00 was the phone, the NPD guy was actually selling to someone right then, when I reached. I didn’t asked the price, though took the dummy of same in hands once to take a feel of it. Felt something like Nokia 2600 from past.

By the way, the journey to that Nokia Priority dealer was completely guided by Ovi Maps.

Ovi Maps

Though at a moment, I was completely frustrated by the fact that why Nokia India chosen to provide dealership to such an interiorly location shop than the earlier bigger shop that was located in Laxmi Nagar Main Market.

I must say, even if you are in around 50 meters away from the place, it might happen that stupid people out there will say that they never heard of the address I am talking about. You need maps in your phone, take your preference, go Nokia, go Ovi or go Android and go Google…. but have a GPS enabled phone for sure.

 

So, this was the story of my visit to a Nokia Priority dealer today. Hope it will solve many of the queries from you people and will save a visit on your behalf. Have a nice time waiting for Nokia N8. Keep tuned in.

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Nokia fights back with E7, C7, C6-01 and Much more – Part 2

Continuing from my post covering impressions of Nokia World 2010 …

Nokia’s best ever and the first touch screen E-Series Flagship E7-00 The design of this handset been out since a long while making rounds of rumors that it could be Nokia N9, I always said it can’t be and I had many reasons of my own. Reasons for confusion were the touch screen itself.

Nokia E-Series were always meant to be business people and business people were tend to have focus on crystal clear connectivity, pocketability, durability and ultra-long battery life. But it was becoming more and more impossible for even business people to be completely away from touch screens in the way, many business oriented features were becoming touch-only or more productive on touch.

After iPad started taking some of the sales in Business streets even after its bigger size against pocketibility, it was like a stone on heart that was to break down some day and should say probably BlackBerry was first to take the call by announcing Torch. Nokia came to say that why not the big daddy of family should have the biggest of the game rather than buying expensive phones for kids only?

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Just take a look over the pics above and you find it beyond a beauty that could be easily described, specially when you know its a Nokia means you are assured that it got no compromises under the hood and will be as powerful as are its looks. And if after Antennagate, people started tending to think that compact design means compromise with signal and Antenna then Nokia has just one three word answer “Its an E”

Let me try to go into details of Nokia E7-00 (RM-626) though it seems hard for me as the urge to get one is so troubling as I know I have not even received words about Nokia C6, Nokia N8 or Nokia C7 from @WomworldNokia neither E7 gonna release by this year 😦

 nokia-e7-540 nokia-e7_white3

Exteriors, pocketibility and durability Like I was talking in my post two days back, if Nokia really thinking that they are on a downward slope and wanna get a real come back in big way, then they don’t have to just make out some figures here and there or just to offer some mouth watering prices, they have to bang some real hard, need to accomplish something that no one else would have come closer or even could dare to come in next few months.

The design and build of Nokia E7 shown really such a commitment and aggression. Just think that Nokia N8 is just 0.7mm slimmer than this one, when there is no physical keypad. With closed slide, Nokia E7-00 just look like a bigger screen version of Nokia N8 without showing any un-necessary sign that it hides a best ever keypad of planet inside it. Once you open it, you find people bow down in respect.

Definitely, if a touch phone would have slipped in pockets of CEOs and CTOs, then it couldn’t have been something more slimmer, compact and super effective like Nokia E7-00. Would you mind, if a gorgeous 4” super responsive multi-touch screen serves as your all-in-one smartphone-cum-tablet-cum-tourguide-cum-handycam in this much compact form?

We have dimensions of 123.7 x 62.4 x 13.6 mm with 104.9cc and 176g weight (considerably higher than Nokia N8, 41g). My Nokia N82 has a weight of 114g with 17.3mm and Nokia N900 had 181g with 18mm, so even if we got a slimmer device here, don’t expect it to be lighter in any sense. You gonna have a solid piece of metal in your hand that will effectively working for hitting someone hard, if you find any trouble. LOL

If wanna more praises for the build then one should not only see the tilted screen like Nokia N97 mini, but also the redesigned and pronounced as super perfect keypad of Nokia E7-00.

N900-E7

You can see that the new keypad design of Nokia E7-00 makes very decent use of additional space provided due to a 4” screen, more evenly spaced big keys and a much bigger space bar. Can you still make a complaint?

The only thing that worries me is the thing that many even praise, the titled slide mechanism. I was worried about it with my Nokia N97 Mini trial as well and feel same here. What if someone drops his E7-00 badly with Slide open? I think horizontal slide of Nokia N900 was more robust with such use cases.

Update: As Brendan posted, look like I was worrying for no reasons. Nokia is always known for being solid. I remember when my old Nokia 3310 was hanging and hitting from a bicycle for half an hour and still I just got only battery cover, keypad out. It seems that even tilted slide is also same strong.

But on the other side, tilted sliding screen means easy to read while typing without bending your head over the device, if you put that on table and start typing. So, people have reasons to find more charm in tilted screens.

Display from here the confusions started, people think that why Nokia didn’t went with doing hand-to-hand with Apple offering a higher resolution or at least Nokia N900’s resolution, when they have such a big screen? Even if they convince themselves somehow then Nokia itself bring new question that why not at least CBD like they already given to rest of two devices announced on the same day?

Yes! there is no limit of what one will be wishing from a device and there is sure a compromise, whatever Nokia designer may give excuse for. I had seen Nokia N900 in 800×480 and I know that everything look smooth over it. Is it something related to Symbian itself that we never getting anything more than 640×360?

Nokia E7-00 sports 24 bit colors, 640×360 resolution, AMOED display and obviously big 4” size, which is entitled to do wonder with GPU available with 2D/3D Graphics HW Accelerator with OpenVG1.1 and OpenGL ES 2.0 support.

Processor, memory etc Though people are pushing higher for snapdragon, but Nokia still continues with 680 MHz. One should think that Symbian provides full multi-tasking at its best even on 600 MHz devices, which other ‘leading’ and ‘advanced’ OS not able to do even after having 1GHz processors. Not only MHz matters.

When we move over memory specifications, then it becomes more clear that Nokia E7-00 was never geared to take on Nokia N8, but came in just to cater needs of other genre.

We find same 350 mb max user storage, 16Gb internal memory, 256 MB RAM and 1 GB NAND. Have I missed something? No!! its not me, its Nokia, who missed inclusion of MicroSD card. Blame the same design decisions that took the liberty of battery changing away for keeping the dimensions insanely slim. So, no MicroSD card Support in Nokia E7-00.

I will say that USB On the GO might become the big reason of loosing MicroSD cards support in many devices soon and sure a place, where a manufacturer could think of compromising now. But sure, many will feel annoy as it makes you to have three things in pocket; A cable, A pen drive and Nokia E7. There are reasons to be annoyed.

Connectivity While the other two devices were the budget editions in their ways, being the flagship of E-Series, Nokia E7-00 had no reasons to keep a break over connectivity options. So, from pentaband to Bluetooth 3.0, from USB OTG (Nokia Adapter Cable for USB OTG CA-157Connector) to HDMI (Nokia Adapter Cable for HDMI CA-156), you find everything here so that you may not feel any missing connectivity option with it. Same richness, when we talk about security features and protocols supported, Nokia E7-00 is always one step ahead of whatever you might have seen in a Nokia E (Except battery life, will discuss later).

Other advanced features Ovi Maps, free navigation, USB OTG kind of things becoming kind of granted now, when we talk about high end Nokia, same about software’s like Quick Office Premium and Adobe PDF.

What’s not here is 2mm charging and FM-transmitter. Rest everything, you would have seen in other two devices, find a place here in Nokia E7.

Lovely is HTML Emails part, which Nokia E72 been craving since like decades. Such a big screen is sure powerhouse and complete solution for all kind of business needs. People will really come to think if they need to buy Netbooks.

This is also expected to have much important features like remote lock and wipe and may be many more will come out in news as the day progresses. Marketing works that way.

Multimedia, Camera It was Nokia that started that even Business Phones should have best of cameras and others are just trying to catch up now. But still we found only E72 as the best attempt on camera from Nokia side.

Many found themselves frustrated to hear about a camera of 8 MP without auto-focus. If just that was included then without any doubt sales of Nokia E7 might have beating Nokia N8 and business oriented people weren’t having any doubt in mind.

While Nokia E72 was able to focus in range 10cm to infinity, we are stuck with 50 cm to infinity for Nokia E7-00. I don’t mind not having Dual LED in place of Xenon here, but Business phones should be able to take close scan like images of documents. That’s a huge use case. We really feel like 8 MP wasted here even if its not that disappointing in comparison to others (Samsung SGS don’t even have Flash leave focus/ auto-focus aside).

Still like rest of two devices, it can record 1280 x 720 videos @25fps with video digital zoom of 3x. Aperture here is f/2.8. Why no one thought about variable aperture again after Nokia N86?

Power management Here comes the critical part, when one wishes to make a Touch Screen Business Smartphone. Nokia E-Series phones were meant to have insane battery lives with 1500 mAh batteries and E72 had 13 hours of talktime, but sure when you have a 4” screen, then compromises will be on the way.

GSM Talk Time up to 9.0 hours
WCDMA Talk Time up to 5.0 hours
GSM Standby Time up to 18 days
WCDMA Standby Time up to 20 days

Honestly, if we think about others, then even the above stats look awesome, but as per Nokia E-Series standards, sure its not exactly on the mark and real test will begin when the device would be out.

Not to mention, it was impossible to provide a replaceable battery in this dimension. Face it, you can’t have it all. A super slim device and that too with moving part, can’t work.

Price The price point is real huge at 495 EUR means 631 USD or 30, 000 INR and will not attract buyers that easily as Nokia N8, C7 and C6-01 would be making, but sure this is a device that many geeks will look for. I just wish, if Nokia wouldn’t have compromised on Camera, though I know making this much slimmer device was real hard.

Wanna see how Nokia E7 will look like?

Or even Hands on …

So, this was all about Nokia E7-00 first impressions, many thing will come out in more clear in next days and may be new Nokia PUSH will make its debut presentation on one. So many things have to be seen yet.

It has gone bigger than expected, but my post is not finished yet. Still things to talk about are services and those 3D glasses, but I guess, now I will be back by next day night only. So, till then ..

photo of Nitish KumarNitish Kumar