Hasta La Gadget!

The Nokia 808 PureView has a 41-megapixel camera sensor. But you knew that. The crystallization of five years of imaging R&D has landed, and the timing couldn’t have been better for Nokia. Alongside uncomfortable financial reading, its move to Windows Phone hasn’t exactly set the smartphone world alight just yet. It’s seemingly established itself as the go-to WinPho choice for American customers thanks to some aggressive pricing, but with news that the next iteration of Windows Phone won’t come to the Lumia 900, many will hold out for Nokia’s next handset. Whatever that device will be, it’s likely to bring the same PureView technology we’ve got here on the Nokia 808 PureView — a Symbian-based handset whose software has seen better days. However, OS be damned, it still blew away attendees at this year’s Mobile World Congress. Impressive stuff, given that it’s the same show where HTC’s admirable One series debuted.

That huge sensor is paired with a new five-element Carl Zeiss lens and a refreshed flash with double the strength of the one on the Nokia N8 — the existing cameraphone champ. But behind the technical bullet points, it’s how Nokia maximizes the 41-megapixel sensor, oversampling with those pixels to create improved 5-, 8- , 3- and 2-megapixel images, reducing noise and improving low-light performance. However, when it comes to software, Symbian Belle (with Feature Pack 1 in tow) lags behind the likes of Android, iOS and Windows Phone in user experience and app provision. Similarly, the chunky handset flies in the opposite direction of the trend for slim smartphones. Is that camera module really all Nokia thinks (and hopes) it is? What’s more, is Symbian relevant enough for such future-facing goodness? Let’s find out.

Continue reading Nokia 808 PureView review: the future of mobile imaging, wrapped in the smartphone past

Nokia 808 PureView review: the future of mobile imaging, wrapped in the smartphone past originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Jun 2012 13:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Reactions to news that Windows Phone 7 devices would never turn into Windows Phone 8 handsets were decidedly mixed, but the company is now making sure people know just what’s in the coming “pattern of upgrades.” Company evangelist Ben “The PC Guy” Rudolph shot this video of Windows Phone 7.8 running on a Lumia 900, showing off its updated Start screen with resizable tiles. We weren’t able to get hands-on time or take video when we saw one of the phones in person last week, but now you can see how smoothly it works for yourself. There’s more than just a video, as Ben’s blog post points out a new Windows Phone 7.5 site set up to keep owners updated on all the new features and apps they are getting (like Audible, Words With Friends and Draw Something), as opposed to focusing on the ones they’re not.

Microsoft accentuates the positive, gives Windows Phone 7.8’s new start screen a closer look (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Jun 2012 00:52:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Microsoft is adamant: it has no plans to make its own Windows Phones, and anything to the contrary is baseless speculation. The Surface tablet announcement had hardly crossed the wire before rumors of a home-grown smartphone began to proliferate, culminating in a clear denial of any “going it alone” intentions earlier on Monday. Have no doubt, though: Microsoft may be denying own-brand Windows Phones today, but that’s not to say it won’t announce them tomorrow.

Let’s not forget, this is the same Microsoft that roundly denied any phone plans whatsoever… until it revealed KIN. The teen-centric handsets may not have been sales successes, but they nonetheless confirmed the dirty little secret in the tech PR game: that any denial, no matter how earnest sounding at the time, is usually only valid until the end of the day.

Surface is a misdirection, if you’re using it as evidence that Microsoft is planning a more aggressive attack on the hardware market. If the rumors are true then only WiFi Surface models are on the cards to begin with; no tricky carrier negotiations to deal with, no awkward positioning rivalries with cellularly-enabled iPads to confuse store shelves.

“Microsoft will do what it needs to to do make Windows Phone a success”

Microsoft will do what Microsoft believes it needs to do to make Windows Phone a success, even if it means throwing OEM partners under the bus to achieve it. So far it has a strong, easily moulded brand already in the smartphone ecosystem in the shape of Nokia, a company now so dependent on Windows Phone that it, more than even Microsoft itself, is primarily reliant on the platform becoming a sales success for its future. If Windows Phone stalls, Microsoft will find itself without a foothold in the smartphone space; for Nokia, meanwhile, it’s game over.

Whether that makes a Nokia buy-out more likely is the stuff of endless rumination. There are compelling arguments either way – greater control and an existing manufacturing base on the positive; responsibility for what’s clearly a struggling company, and the risk of alienating other OEMs currently onboard on the negative – and, if Surface really is the tell, then we’ll need to see how Microsoft reacts to the Windows market to get an understanding of its longer-term intentions. Opinion is split as to whether Surface is a short-lived motivator to spur OEMs into imaginative action or a longer-term commitment to own-brand hardware.

Nonetheless, while the denials may come thick, fast and obstinate today, be under no illusion: all that could change in an instant if Microsoft’s soothsayers decide the company’s fortunes are better served with an in-house product.

Forget Denials, Microsoft’s Windows Phone is still a contender is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
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Nokia has certainly gotten a whole lot more serious in the smartphone industry by taking the bold move of throwing their weight behind Microsoft’s Windows Phone platform, and they certainly did so to pretty much success. At least the Nokia Lumia range did help the Finnish company crawl back from what looks to be a precipice that has a long and hard fall following it. Joe Belfiore did demonstrate some features of Windows Phone 8 at the Windows Phone 8 Summit last week, on what seemed to be Nokia’s very own Windows Phone 8 prototype.

We do know that it comes with a zoom lens which should be of some note, and there are whispers of vibration reduction thrown into the mix. So far, this is just a prototype device that was built for testing purposes as well as making sure that all of its hardware will jive without exploding, so do not expect the final hardware release to resemble the prototype’s design.

By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Nokia Lumia 900 to get Windows Phone 7.8 in a few weeks? , More on Nokia Drive on Windows Phone 8 smartphones,