Developers with access to Nokia’s Remote Device Access (RDA) tool have “discovered” a bunch of new Lumia and Belle phones. Interestingly, four of these handsets seem to be Windows Phone devices while the Belle 805 should be running on Symbian Belle.
According to Nokia Power User, the Lumia 920, 950, 1001 and Nokia 510 could be authentic or just misinformation planted by rumormongers. However, the blog believes that the Nokia 510 and Belle 805 are likely “authentic” and that the Nokia 510 could be the “cheapest Windows Phone 7.5 device” aimed at competing against Android.
We think the blog could be right because it doesn’t make any sense for Nokia to release any new high-end Windows Phone 7.5 handsets at the moment with Windows Phone 8 (WP8) expected to launch soon. However, a budget device like the Nokia 510 running the Tango update could be just the thing to maintain Nokia’s presence in the smartphone market before the WP8 mobiles arrive.
Nokia and Microsoft have made the mobile versions of Word, PowerPoint and Excel available to select Symbian Belle handsets. The add-on is given through a free software update to those eligible for the update. If you own a E7, C7, C6-01, X7, Oro, 700, 701 or 603 you can get the apps directly from the Nokia Software Update utility.
If you’re a Word user, you’ll appreciate the fact that with Word mobile, you can save or send documents while preserving tables, SmartArt and charts, or the pinch/zoom functionality to easily view and edit documents.
In PowerPoint mobile, you can edit presentation texts and speaker notes, or use the Outline view to quickly browse through slides. With Excel mobile, you can create charts, or insert formulae and view rich data and charts from anywhere.
Another really convenient feature of Office Mobile is that it gives you a single view to documents – whether they’re stored on your phone as files, as email attachments, or on your company SharePoint site.
If you are waiting to get the newer version of Nokia Devices, they might just come preloaded with MS Office goodness.
Nokia has broken every possible camera record, with its new Nokia 808 PureView Smartphone. The new 4 inch 360 x 640 (nHD) device runs a new featured version of Belle OS on a 1.3GHz single-core chip and 512MB of RAM and 16GB onboard storage. But, all these things are not what make the purview 808 special, its actually the camera technology. The PureView 808 is capable of capturing images at a whopping 41 Megapixels and 34-megapixels for 16:9 images, the camera also shoots 1080p with continuous autofocus.
The technology means that taking typically sized shots (say, 5 megapixels) the camera can use oversampling to combine up to seven pixels into one “pure” pixel, eliminating the visual noise found on other mobile phone cameras. On top of that, you can zoom in up to 3X without losing any of the details in your shot – and there’s no artificially created pixels in your picture, either.
Otherwise, you can use ‘Creative Shooting Mode’ to capture images at high resolution – 38 megapixels; then reframe, crop and zoom to find the best “picture within the picture” after the image has been shot and before saving it at convenient sizes for sharing and storage.
Nokia sets a new industry standard with the first in a range of high end experiences based on exclusive Nokia PureView imaging technologies.
Barcelona, Spain – Nokia today ushered in a new era in high-end smartphone imaging with the Nokia 808 PureView. This is the first smartphone to feature Nokia PureView imaging technologies, bringing together high resolution sensors, exclusive Carl Zeiss optics and Nokia developed algorithms, which will support new high-end imaging experiences for future Nokia products. The Nokia 808 PureView features a large, high-resolution 41 megapixel sensor with high-performance Carl Zeiss optics and new pixel oversampling technology. At standard resolutions (2/3, 5 and 8 megapixels) this means the ability to zoom without loss of clarity and capture seven pixels of information, condensing into one pixel for the sharpest images imaginable. At high-resolution (38 megapixelmaximum) it means the ability to capture an image, then zoom, reframe, crop and resize afterwards to expose previously unseen levels of details. With superior low-light performance and the ability to save in compact file sizes for sharing in email, MMS, and on social networks, the Nokia 808 PureView makes it possible for anyone tocapture professional looking images in any conditions.
In addition to superior still imaging technology, the Nokia 808 PureView, also includes full HD 1080p video recording and playback with 4X lossless zoom and the world’s first use of Nokia Rich Recording. Rich Recording enables audio recording at CD-like levels of quality, previously only possible with external microphones. The Nokia 808 PureView also features exclusive Dolby Headphone technology, transforming stereo content into a personal surround sound experience over any headphones and Dolby Digital Plus for 5.1 channel surround sound playback.
“Nokia PureView imaging technology sets a new industry standard by whatever measure you use,” said Jo Harlow, executive vice president of Nokia Smart Devices. “People will inevitably focus on the 41 megapixel sensor, but the real quantum leap is how the pixels are used to deliver breath-taking image quality at any resolution and the freedom it provides to choose the story you want to tell.”
About Nokia Nokia is a global leader in mobile communications whose products have become an integral part of the lives of people around the world. Every day, more than 1.3 billion people use their Nokia to capture and share experiences, access information, find their way or simply to speak to one another. Nokia’s technological and design innovations have made its brand one of the most recognized in the world. For more information, visit http://www.nokia.com/about-nokia.
Nokia is really struggling with their Symbian phones, especially after the announcement of the end of days for the OS. Nokia Belle is the name given to the dying OS and the new revision brings some promise. Lets see how the Nokia 701 with Belle does in our review.
Build Quality
The Nokia 701 is exceptionally well built, If you have handled any of their E-Series metal phones, you will feel a similar sort of construction here. The back cover and top front bezel are all steel, the frame and remaining parts are solid plastic with a nice paint job that fools you into believing that the whole phone is made of metal. The 701 is also considerably heavy and feel really solid in the hand . The glass however, sits flush with the bezel and is prone to cracking if the device falls face-first. Overall the build is up to mark if not above it.
Specs
Price
Rs. 17,990
Frequency
Quad Band
Phone Style
Candybar touchscreen
Thickness
11mm
Length
117.2mm
Width
56.8mm
Weight
131g
Built-in Memory
8GB
Additional Memory
microSD – up to 32GB
High-speed Data
GPRS, 3G, HSDPA
Connectivity
Bluetooth, USB, Wi-Fi, A-GPS
Screen Size
640×360 pixels, 3.5 inches
Secondary Screen Size
N/A
Screen Colours
16 million colours
Camera
Yes
Camera Resolution
8 megapixels
Flash
Yes, dual LED
Radio
Yes, with RDS
Battery
1300mAh, 6hrs talktime, 504hrs standby
Display, Camera and Multimedia
The display on the 701 is supposedly the brightest display in the world. It has a 1000 nits brightness and excellent outdoor visibility. The screen is also very responsive to touch and has great color reproduction.
The camera was a let down especially because sits a fixed focus camera, so has a lot of limitations. The video quality is mediocre and pictures are decent. Indoor performance is poor to say the least. Don’t rely on the camera much if you are a happy snapper.
Audio quality from the speaker is impressively good, the sound has deep bass and great quality mids and highs. The included earphones can be used for daily medium use, If you like listening to good quality music on your phone consider investing in a set of good earphones.
OS, Apps and Internet
Belle is possibly the only OS from the Symbian range that can truly compete with the Likes of Android and iOS, still not truly there, the OS is much more responsive than the previous builds and offers a more-Android-esque UI. Switchable dashboard, a notification panel, app drawer and widgets that mimic Android. Still, its user friendly , but certain things such as age old connectivity options and old menus are a let down.
Apps are limited to the ones on the OVI store and there are a lot now-a-days . From Angry Birds to NFS you even have Whatsapp and Skype.
Internet browser is still slow and laggy, pinch to zoom does not work and the browser cannot render a full page within the screen. The need to pan limits what you are looking at in the phones screen. There are however tons of apps from the Ovi store like : Opera Mini, and U browser that make the internet experience a lot better.
Battery Life
The Phone has a really bright display so you would expect a high battery drain, contrary to that battery life was excellent with over 5 hours of talk time, sometimes even 7 hours. the phone lasted 5 days on standby which was needless to say – impressive.
Conclusion
The Nokia 701 is proof that the company is really trying to prove itself in what has now become a world of iOS, Android and Windows Phone 7.5. The build quality is superior and so is the display , the OS is a drastic improvement over previous gen interfaces that were usually a let down. However, that being said, the phone feels a bit overpriced, and we have seen capable companies with better softwares and hardware throw out better phones at lower prices. We fail to understand why Nokia keeps pricing their phones so high. If you are a die hard Nokia fan and still need a fix of that Symbian Love this phone should suit you, bear in mind that the optics are sub satisfactory.
Nokia is playing games, in a old school fashion. The overall morale and sales of Symbian devices have dipped since Mr. Elop announced that they would be dropping support for the devices back in June. Nokia has found a very “Delhi” way of dealing with the problem, change the name!. Nokia has rebranded all current and upcoming devices as running on “Nokia Belle”. The Symbian name has been let go and without much fanfare, to much disappointment of Symbian lovers and owners.
[threecol_one]”The all new Nokia Belle (previously Symbian Belle)…”[/threecol_one]
[threecol_two_last]The small little mention in the list of upcoming devices is the only mention of this change that marks the end of an Era. Looks to us Nokia is trying its best to get rid of remaining hardware before it pushes forward all mighty WP7.5[/threecol_two_last]
The Nokia 600 was a replacement to the long series of Nokia Music phones. But looks like the company is no longer interested in selling this particular device. This is another sad demise of a Symbian device, truly sad. The company’s taken down any pages on its websites that are related to the product from the main and developer websites. The device ran Symbian belle and had a 360 x 640 pixels, 3.2 inches display with full multitouch support. The device also had a 1 GHz processor, 2D/3D graphics HW accelerator, which would have made it a fast and responsive device.
The thing is, after careful consideration, we have decided not to ship the Nokia 600.