Android For Feature Phones

It has been claimed multiple times in the past that Google is developing a version of Android OS for feature phones. This is to capture the market that has been missed by the company until now. The latest leaks reveal that HMD Global’s Nokia, which is one of the few companies making feature phones, will be the first to launch a device with the new version of Android. In the images, a feature phone in development from Nokia is showcased. The home screen of the upcoming mobile phone features an all-new design for Android. Since the OS was originally designed to work for touchscreen devices, the interface seems to be adapted for use with just buttons.

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On the home screen of the new version of Android, a microphone icon, similar to one seen in Google Assistant is visible. This insinuates that the Nokia feature phone will have the digital voice assistant built-in. Also present on the handset are multiple Google apps like Chrome and YouTube; which seem to be designed to run on a small-sized display without touch input. The rest of the User Interface (UI) is similar to what feature phones from Nokia had in the past. While the images provide authenticity to the claim that Google is working on bringing Android to feature phones; the source claims to take the aforementioned information with a grain of salt, as the images could very well be of a Nokia handset running a new version of KaiOS, another popular OS for feature phones.

Nokia 106

The news Nokia 106 gets a completely new design and the company has also bumped the storage of the phones. The Nokia 106 has a non-symmetrical top-heavy design, small display, and a rubberised alphanumeric keypad. The phone weighs only 70 grams and measures 111.15 x 49.5 x 14.4 mm. It has a 1.8-inch QVGA display with 160 x 120 px resolution. The device has 4 MB of internal memory which allows it to save up t0 2000 contacts.

The Nokia 106 supports dual 2G SIM cards and has an 800 mAh user replaceable battery that can provide upt0 15 hours of talk time. Nokia claims that the tiny phone has a standby time of up to 21 days as the device consumes very less energy in this mode. The device can be charged from an inbuilt Micro USB port. It does not have a built-in camera but it does get the ever -popular snake xenzia game.

Nokia 230

The Nokia 230 is now available in two new colors which are Light Gray and Dark Blue. It is a much more feature rich device when compared to the lightweight Nokia 106. The feature phone runs on Series 30 Operating system and does support user-installable applications. It has a 2.8-inch QVGA display and an alphanumeric keypad. The handset measures 124.66 x 53.4 x 10.9 mm and weighs in at 91 grams. The handset geta a 2 MP rear camera with LED flash and a 2 MP front facing camera which can also record 480p videos.

The Nokia 230 is powered by a user replaceable 1200 mAh battery which can be charged with the inbuilt Micro USB connector. The device has 16 MB of RAM and supports memory expandability up to 32 GB via a microSD card. The phone supports GPRS & uses Opera mini as its default browser. It supports single SIM & accepts Mini-SIM. The Nokia 230 also has 3.5 mm audio jack and Bluetooth 3.0 connectivity. It has some built-in apps like clock, calendar, recorder and reminders app.

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Nokia is yet to announce the price and availability of both the feature phones. Both the pieces of information are expected to announced soon.

One of the highlights of the JioPhone 2 will be its support for popular applications like YouTube, WhatsApp and Facebook. The JioPhone will get a FOTA update on August 15th which will also bring in support for these applications. RIL has also made it clear that the JioPhone won’t be phased out now that its successor has launched. The JioPhone will co-exist and continue to be the effectively free phone.

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One of the key changes in the JioPhone successor is the keyboard layout. The JioPhone 2 features a QWERTY keyboard, made popular by BlackBerry and Nokia phones in the pre-Android and iPhone days. RIL says that this decision stemmed from the customer feedback which also called for a horizontal viewing display. The JioPhone 2 serves both the purposes and is powered by a 2000 mAh battery. In terms of connectivity, the JioPhone 2 has 4G, VoLTE, VoWiFi, 3.5G, 2G, WiFi, LTE Cat4 DL, Radio, Bluetooth, GPS, and NFC.

Out of the box, the JioPhone 2 will run KaiOS, based on Firefox OS. Google recently invested US$22 million in the platform and the OS should benefit from that. Google apps might be coming to the platform as well in the future. Apart from that, Google had announced that the JioPhone will soon get Google Assistant, and the same can be expected for the JioPhone 2.

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The JioPhone 2, at a price of Rs 2999 and all the benefits of Jio should be a great deal for people still in the feature phone ecosystem. The presence of apps like YouTube should benefit the consumer and the platform as well since there are millions of feature phone users in India still.

Design:

The Nokia 8110 4G comes with unique curved design, with a swappable keypad cover, which comes in black and banana yellow colour. However, the device will be available from April 2018 for an average price of 79 Euros.

The Nokia 8810 4G takes the design hints from the original Nokia 8810, which was launched in 1998. The phone comes with a T4 keypad with a replaceable back panel. The design does bring back the nostalgia feelings back into 2018.

Specifications:

The Nokia 8810 4G comes with a 2.4-inch display with 240x 320 px resolution. Under the hood, the smartphone is powered by Qualcomm Snapdragon 205 1.1 Ghz dual core chipset with 512 MB RAM and 4GB onboard storage. However, the smartphone does memory expansion using an external SD card.

The phone comes with 2 MP primary camera with an LED flash, with VGA quality video recording capability. The phone packs in a user replaceable 1500 mAh battery with micro USB port for charging and data syncing. However, there is no front-facing camera on the phone, which is little disappointing.

The device supports dual SIM cards with support for 2G, 3G and 4G LTE networks. In fact, the 4G data can be wirelessly shared using the built-in WiFi hotspot feature. Unlike the Nokia 8 Sirocco, the Nokia 8810 does retain the 3.5 mm headphone jack.

The smartphone runs on custom Smart Feature OS, which comes with Google Maps, Google Assistance and Google Now. In fact, it also features apps like Facebook and Twitter. Additional apps can also be downloaded via the app store.

The free voice and data offers will be provoded by BSNL and Micromax will take care of the manufacturing. The BharatOne is said to have a better camera, larger screen and more battery life than any other feature phone available in the market right now, including the JioPhone.

The date of launch has been intelligently decided to take advantage of the festive season. There is enough proof that Indian consumers like to shop for mobile phones during this season. Recently, Xiaomi announced that it sold over 1 million handsets during the Amazon and Flipkart sales. To believe that people will be eyeing an even more affordable phone during the season is not far fetched.

Reliance JioPhone took the industry by storm when it received over 6 million pre-orders within two days of being announced. So much so that Reliance had to close the pre-orders only a day and a half after it announced the JioPhone. The first phase of the delivery of pre-orders began on September 25th. The consumers can track their orders via the MyJio app but, as of now, the status shows ‘Created’. The tracking of delivery seems pointless right now but, the status should be clearer in the days to come.

There were reports of Airtel also launching a Rs 2500 feature phone in collaboration with one of the homegrown smartphone manufacturers like Lava or Karbonn.

The JioPhone’s popularity has forced other telcos to sit up and take notice of the vast potential in the feature phone market, especially after concentrating on the smartphone market for so long.

Images of an unknown handset has appeared online which seems to be Nokia-branded. It appears to be a prototype handset, and a closer look at the images does not reveal any doctoring. It sports a camera on the back with an LED flash along with suggestions of an antenna design on the body of the phone. 

Additionally, the images do not show a smartphone, but a feature phone. It is complete with a keypad and a non-touch display. This could be either an old prototype which couldn’t be launched before Microsoft took over Nokia, and then got shoved under the carpet, or it could be a future device.

Even though Nokia is not allowed to use its brand on feature phones until 2024, as part of the deal with Microsoft, who knows what this device holds for the future? Watch this space for more scoop on Nokia and its upcoming plans.

The Nokia 1100 was an entry-level handset that came out in 2003. At the time it was perhaps the best thing to ever hit the mobile market. Lets consider this a 2003 post and talk of the specs that makes the phone a true badass. The handset does not come with two cameras, a curved screen or a snapdragon processor. What it does feature is a torch-light, a pair of no-slip grips, dust-proof case, monochrome graphic with, wait for it, 96 x 65 pixels, monophonic ringtones (36 pre-installed, 7 user-made), interchangeable covers, and an unbreakable will (we mean it).

This smooth handset can also store up to 50 contacts and 50 messages (25 sent, 25 received) and gives a whopping 400 hours standby time between charges. But the one thing that really tied this phone together was Snakes II and Space Impact – those 8-bit games that were played by 250 million people around the world.

We say 250 million because that’s how many units of the Nokia 1100 were sold by 2008, becoming not only the world’s best selling phone, but also the best selling consumer electronics device. There are many reasons behind why the 1100 was the craze at the time. For one thing, the phone was highly affordable at about $100 with all the features mentioned above, which were all that one needed at the time.

The phone was discontinued in 2008 because of the next wave of phones that were coming in, However, in 2009, the obsolete device became something of a collectors item as they were being sold for obscene amounts of money – say $32,000 a piece.

But if you thought you had seen the last of the Nokia 1100, think again. There are rumors that the classic handset might come back with a technological makeover. In March this year, the Nokia 1100 was seen in a GeekBench’s database and suggested that the 2016 Nokia 1100 will feature a quad-core 1.3GHz MediaTek MT-6582 processor and will reportedly run on Android 5.0. However, this could all be an elaborate ruse by Nokia to use an old model since under the terms of its deal with Microsoft, Nokia cannot offer a new smartphone under the last quarter of 2016. It would be fun, though, to see what the 1100 would look like fitted with all the new toys today.

Would you like to see the classic Nokia 1100 back in the market? Let us know in the comments below.