We’ve already seen Sony attempt to shake things up in the entry-level market by introducing a custom 1Ghz dual-core processor in the Xperia U, and now MediaTek has announced that it will be throwing its own silicon into the ring. The company has introduced the MT6577 platform, comprised of a dual-core 1Ghz Cortex A9 CPU paired with a PowerVR Series5 SGX GPU and HSPA modem. Everything is designed to run on Ice Cream Sandwich and targets phones with a sub-$200 price.
On top of that, the MT6577 is designed to work with an eight megapixel camera with support for 1080p playback. High-resolution video output is also supported up to 720p, and you can expect to find all the other niceties such as Bluetooth, WiFi b/g/n, GPS, and even an FM radio. Better yet, the platform is pin for pin compatible with the MT6575, so new devices can be created using the same PCBA hardware.
MediaTek says that dual-core processors currently account for over 20% of smartphone CPU shipments, while the entry-level and mid-range smartphone market is expected to swell from 200 million to 500 million by 2016. The company is hoping to capitalize on that growth, saying that it already has several partners on board who will ship products with the new chipset by the third quarter of this year.
It isn’t hard to get an Android 4.0 phone under $200 if you’re willing to sign your life away with a contract. Getting one that’s worthwhile at that same figure contract-free, however, requires some jumping through hoops. MediaTek must be an acrobat, as it just released the MT6577, a chip design for the most entry level of smartphones. The part’s frugal focus doesn’t keep it from stuffing in a dual-core, 1GHz ARM Cortex-A9 processor, a PowerVR SGX series 5 for graphics and an HSPA modem for 3G. Those specifications would only have been cutting-edge in 2011, but they’re very speedy for a starter device in 2012 — fast enough to drive Google’s OS on a 720p screen while supporting 1080p video. The MT6577 is a drop-in replacement for its MT6575 ancestor, and it’s accordingly going to be used very quickly by “leading global customers” this summer. Knowing MediaTek’s most recent clients, that could soon lead to a sea of very affordable phones from Gigabyte, ZTE and others that have no problems eating an Ice Cream Sandwich.
Many Apple fans on the opposite side of the Pacific from Cupertino haven’t had much of a choice to shop from iTunes, even though they’ve had the App Store for some time. There’s now a much better sense of balance: Apple just flicked the switch on the iTunes Store for music and movies in a dozen countries and territories across the Asia-Pacific region. The company singles out our own Richard Lai’s Hong Kong as well as Singapore and Taiwan, but we’d be remiss if we didn’t mention that Brunei, Cambodia, Laos, Macau, Malaysia, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam are also getting the media catalogs, which include local content along with the international hits. It’s a full catch-up as well, with iTunes in the Cloud re-downloads and iTunes Match subscriptions available in every new country. If you’re a huge Andy Lau fan but wanted his albums from the most iPhone-friendly store possible, the wait is over.
This week the folks at Microsoft responsible for the mobile sect of their world have promised a dedicated homepage for Windows Phone version 7.8 specifically. This page will be the future home for Windows Phone 7.8 news, not unlike the page that currently exists for Windows Phone 7.5 and brings with it some excitement surrounding this nearly-next release of the Windows Phone platform. While the next wave of Microsoft smartphones will be rolling out with Windows Phone 8, you’ll be back on Windows Phone 7.8, and you’re going to like it, whether you think you want to or not.
Of course there are quite a few relatively large changes to this next-generation update to the Windows Phone user interface when it comes down to it, beginning with the most obvious: the addition of a tile size. You’ve got colors, three sizes of tiles, and ultra-easy to re-arrange goodness. Next you’ve got an announcement that Audible just hit the Windows Phone app market, and that Words with Friends, Draw Something, and the online banking system PayPal will all be hitting the market soon.
Above you’ll see a brand new Microsoft-made hands-on video focusing specifically on the start screen, with Windows Phone 7.8 live and in-action – this just one of a vast collection of content bits we’re sure will be appearing on the Windows Phone 7.8 homepage soon. The basic push for this version of Windows Phone as a viable alternative for those not quite entirely happy about the fact that their devices will not be upgraded to version 8 of Windows Phone is plain to be seen. Microsoft will certainly be continuing to make an effort to appear fair for legacy users moving forward, you can bank on it.
Have a peek at our own Eyes-on with Windows Phone 7.8 and check out the video from the big event earlier this month here:
Excitement, about a Symbian phone? The Nokia 808 PureView has forced many to reconsider their platform loyalties by virtue of its big number boast: 41-megapixels of camera goodness. The surprise stand-out of Mobile World Congress, the 808 PureView is the first public evidence of a five year labor of love inspired by ultra-high-resolution satellite photography. There’s compromise galore involved, however, to join the early PureView train, so is it worth it? Read on for the full SlashGear review.
Hardware
Miniaturization can only get you so far: if you want 41-megapixels – and Nokia really does – then you have to accept some heft with it. As a result the 808 PureView is a chunky phone, measuring in at 123.9 x 60.2 x 13.9 mm and 169 grams, though it’s biased toward the lens section with its oversized sensor. In the hand, though, it’s actually quite a pleasant thing to hold: the textured plastic back cover feels high-quality and sturdy, and your forefinger butts naturally against the curve of the camera hump.
That’s not to say you don’t notice it when it’s in your pocket. In contrast to the slimline devices we’ve grown used to, the 808 PureView makes for a considerable bulge; we could fit it into a jeans pocket, front or back, but it wasn’t the most comfortable we’ve ever been.
Controls include a three-button strip along the front, for call, menu and end/power, along with a volume rocker, lock switch and dedicated two-stage camera key on the right edge. Along the top there’s a micro HDMI port (for use with Nokia’s CA0198 HDMI kit) under a flap, a microUSB port for charging, and a 3.5mm headphone socket. Nokia includes a wired hands-free kit of decent audio quality, though we had no issues using third-party headsets with the phone.
Up front there’s a 4-inch AMOLED ClearBlack display clad in a sheet of Corning Gorilla Glass. As with all OLED-based phones it has great viewing angles, contrast and color saturation; however, it’s also running at a mere 360 x 640 resolution, and that means individual pixels are inescapable. The grittiness is visible from the outset, as soon as the start-up Nokia logo appears, and permeates throughout the phone experience. Considering the imaging focus of this phone, it’s a disappointment.
Inside, the 808 PureView packs one of the fastest processors to grace a Symbian device, a single-core ARM 11 running at 1.3GHz. It’s paired with 512MB of RAM and 16GB of storage, expandable with up to 32GB microSD cards. Connectivity includes pentaband HSPA (up to 14.4Mbps down/5.76Mbps up, networking depending) which means support for both AT&T and T-Mobile 3G in the USA, along with Bluetooth 3.0, WiFi b/g/n, NFC and quadband GSM/EDGE. Slot in the optional microUSB to USB Host adapter and you can attach peripherals like USB drives, and there’s A-GPS/GPS for navigation and photo geotagging.
Software and Performance
Software is the 808 PureView’s Achilles’ heel. Symbian, rebranded Nokia Belle in this latest iteration, is old in the tooth and considered outclassed by all but the staunchest of fans. With its UI borrowing some elements of Android – such as the drop-down notifications bar and the differently sized homescreen widgets – and sharing the squircle iconography of MeeGo on the N9 it’s certainly the best looking iteration of Symbian to-date, but day-to-day usability is still a pain.
What’s arguably the deal-breaker for Nokia Belle here is the performance. On the Nokia 700, which also runs Belle on a 1.3GHz single-core, we found ourselves conceding that it could make a reasonable entry-level device for the fledgling smartphone audience. Somewhere along the line, however, the 808 lost whatever turn of speed the 700 managed to squeeze from the processor.
The homescreen is fairly swift, but the 808 soon runs out of steam once you get into the apps. In the messaging app we’d sometimes have hammered out a half-word or so before the on-screen keyboard caught up; scroll fast through a full gallery and you’ll see nothing but placeholder thumbnails, turning navigating images into guesswork.
It’s the browser that’s the big nightmare, however, capable of paper of handling full sites but struggling with anything more complex than their mobile versions. Pinch zooming becomes trial and error, tedious since given the low resolution you’ll probably be doing plenty of it. Swipe around the page and you have to wait a second or two for the screen to catch up with you. Flip from portrait to landscape orientation, or back again, and the lag shows itself once more. Most annoying though is how prone to crashing it is, the app periodically shutting down altogether. We didn’t experience a full phone lock-up, but altogether it was enough to make us save our web browsing until we were home.
Oddly, we didn’t experience the same sluggishness on the 808 PureView units running non-final software on our trip to Carl Zeiss several weeks ago. Then, the Nokia seemed as responsive as the 700 had been. It’s possible that the final software tweaks have erred toward scaling back performance in favor of battery life, and if so we’re hoping Nokia sees sense and tips the balance back a little toward usability with a firmware update.
Camera
Make no mistake, the Nokia 808 PureView is all about photography. Nokia’s imaging team spent five years developing PureView – hence it being stuck with Symbian rather than getting Windows Phone like the Lumia series – and took the principles of mobile cameras back to basics in order to improve on quality.
We’ve covered the technology behind PureView on the 808 comprehensively here, but the brief version is that it’s a rethink of how lossless zooming can be supported on a phone. Traditionally that would demand an optical zoom lens, involving bulky moving parts; PureView does it instead with a surfeit of pixels. In PureView mode, the 808 uses its 41-megapixel sensor to capture more typical 2-, 5- or 8-megapixel shots, and in fact Nokia expects most owners to stick at 5-megapixel quality.
Nokia 808 PureView technology:
At 1x zoom, each pixel making up the final frame has around seven pixels on the sensor to feed into it, reducing the likelihood of a glitch or noise making it into the image. PureView can simply ignore any obvious outliers, making for more accurate shots. However, if you want to zoom in, the 808 can take a full-resolution (i.e. 2-, 5- or 8-megapixel) subset of the whole frame, similar to how a digital zoom magnifies a portion but with no loss in detail.
Exactly how much you can zoom depends on what PureView resolution you’re using – the 808 won’t allow you to get past the point where it can save a full-resolution image – so you get more range in 2-megapixel mode than you do at 8-megapixels. It averages at roughly 3x at 5-megapixels. The phone will also allow you to shoot at “full” resolution, either 34-megapixel 16:9 aspect images taken across the full width of the sensor, or 38-megapixel 4:3 aspect images taken across the full height of the sensor, though in that case you don’t get any zoom option.
The 808′s camera app has obviously changed from the Nokia Belle norm to accommodate PureView, and there are three key modes to choose between. Automatic strips you of all manual control bar toggling the Xenon flash between on/off/auto/red-eye modes, defaulting to roughly 5-megapixel frames, though you still get touch-focus. Scenes mode offers a choice of auto, landscape, portrait, sports, night, night portrait, spotlight and snow configurations, again with flash options and touch-focus.
Finally, there’s Creative mode, where the guts of PureView are opened up to more avid tinkerers. The 808 can be toggled between PureView mode – with the choice of three resolutions and both 4:3 and 16:9 aspect ratios – and Full Resolution mode – with either 16:9 or 4:3 settings – and save in either Normal or Superfine JPEG quality modes. Color tones can be switched between normal, vivid, sepia or black & white, and there’s optional bracketing, interval or self-timer modes. With interval, the 808 becomes a time-lapse camera, capable of shooting up to 1,500 images every 30 minutes (or as low as every 5 seconds).
Then there are sliders for saturation, contrast and sharpness, while icons on the preview screen control flash, exposure, lighting type, ISO (from 50 – 1600, with an Auto mode) and the ability to turn off the neutral density filter. Once you have a clutch of settings you prefer, you can save them to one of the three custom shortcuts for easier retrieval.
Is it worth taking the time to play? Oh yes, yes it really is. We reluctantly left Carl Zeiss and our last experience with the 808 PureView wowed by quite how capable the new Nokia is, and nothing from our review unit has convinced us to think otherwise. This isn’t just “good for a phone-camera” either; the 808 is easily able to produce shots that put dedicated point-and-shoots to shame.
Noise is almost non-existent, colors are as accurate as we’ve ever seen from a phone, and – as long as you take the time to tap the screen to set focus – crisp detail. Low light performance is hugely impressive, even before you bother turning on the (excellent) Xenon flash, as PureView squeezes all the extra pixel data into the final image.
In full resolution mode, meanwhile, you lack zooming ability but you get images of a scale that would traditionally demand a dedicated camera. There’s something near-magical about being able to glance across an image, think “what’s going on there?” and zoom in without facing a screenful of pixelated mush. At 34/38-megapixel resolution there’s no PureView finessing going on – there aren’t the extra pixels to enable it – but it does demonstrate just how capable the sensor and companion Zeiss optics are.
As for video, the 808 PureView will record in Automatic, Scenes (auto, low light, sports, spotlight and snow) or Creative modes, at 360p, 720p or 1080p resolution. A choice of 15, 24, 25 and 30fps frame rates are supported, plus the same color tone options as in stills mode, together with exposure and contrast. Since even 1920 x 1080 Full HD resolution doesn’t come close to what the 808′s sensor is capable of capturing, the same PureView oversampling is used to improve video quality, and just as with stills the evidence of that comes through in the final frame.
Nokia 808 PureView 1080p HD video sample:
Our only complaint is the somewhat sluggish continuous autofocus, which has a tendency to wander and is occasionally slow to refix. You can, however, tap to manually set a focus point. While your fingers are near the screen, it’s worth playing with Nokia’s clever zoom control: you can pinch-zoom, of course, but we found it easier to use the single-finger zooming where sliding your thumb up and down adjusts the degree of magnification. It’s easy to keep both hands steadying the 808 and still zoom in, and when you’re zooming during video capture the actual magnification doesn’t happen until you lift your finger, allowing you to precisely frame without the hunting of regular systems. Alternatively you can use the zoom rocker, and unlike the stepped zoom levels of some devices, it’s a silky-smooth transition.
Nokia 808 PureView 1080p HD video sample:
Audio during video recording is often overlooked, but Nokia has saved a little magic for that, too. The PureView has twin microphones for capturing stereo sound, but it also includes Rich Recording, a way to capture high-volume audio without suffering from distortion or clipping. In fact, Nokia claims the 808 is capable of handling four-times louder sound than regular phone microphones, without having to introduce the sort of filters that can leave the audio track weedy.
Going by Nokia’s spec sheet, the 808 PureView should be able to capture the sound of a jet engine from 100-feet away without any stereo distortion. Topping out at 145dB, in fact, it’s beyond the point where human ears would likely suffer permanent damage even if they’re equipped with hearing protection. An average rock concert, meanwhile, at a more humble 115dB should be no problem at all for the 808 PureView, though we’ll need to schedule one on our jam-packed social calendar to actually test that out.
Getting photos and video off the 808 is reasonably straightforward. The phone can be set to show up as a Mass Storage device when plugged in via USB, appearing on your PC or Mac as an external drive (rather than demanding a management app as per Windows Phone). However we were surprised to find transfers very sluggish to our test Mac: shuttling just over 440MB of photos and video took around five minutes, in fact. There’s no native option to automatically upload images to an online gallery.
Nokia has already confirmed that PureView technology won’t be limited to just the 808. However, that’s already prompted confusion around just what sort of resolution sensors we can expect in future Lumia Windows Phones. PureView does not necessarily mean 41-megapixels – Nokia picked that number to satisfy headlines and deliver a 3x optical zoom equivalent for 5-megapixel frames – but instead refers to the oversampling technology; a lower-resolution sensor would still deliver a lossless zoom, albeit with a smaller range, while allowing for a thinner device.
Phone and Battery
Nokia has a strong track record with phone radios, and the 808 PureView is no exception. We had no issues with keeping a signal, and the dual-microphones meant in-call audio was clear. The 808′s 1,400 mAh battery is rated for up to 6.5hrs of 3G talk time or 540hrs of 3G standby, though the actual sort of longevity you’ll see from it is very much dependent on how much you play with the camera. The Xenon flash in particular will chug through battery in short order. In practice, we managed a day of relatively eager use before we had to reach for the mains adapter.
Wrap-Up
Viewed as a modern phone, the 808 PureView is a recipe for frustration. It’s heavy and chunky, the screen lacks pixels, Nokia Belle is short on apps and long on aggravation, and even those apps that are onboard run with varying degrees of wretchedness on the wheezing processor. When the 808 starts to make more sense is when you flip it around, and consider it not so much a phone with an amazing camera, but an amazing camera with a 3G internet connection.
With such mundane matters as messaging, internet browsing, multimedia and apps left to a more flexible (but less photographically-capable) platform like iOS or Android, that frees up the 808 PureView to do what it undoubtedly does best: take awesome photos and video. If you can find space in your pocket or bag for two phones, and you’re a keen shutterbug, then there are huge advantages to using the 808 rather than your regular phone camera.
Therein lies the rub: at $699 unlocked and SIM-free in the US, it’s an expensive second device. That would get you a good Micro Four Thirds camera, though blind testing suggests the 808 can produce photos as good as, or better than, such compacts. It would also be enough for an entry-level DSLR, though you’d lose any semblance of pocket-friendliness in that case.
In the end, though, even the fact that we’re comparing the 808 PureView to DSLRs is testament to Nokia’s achievement. Few people will actually go out and buy it themselves, but then the 808 is really a test bench for PureView technology, a proof-of-concept. Now that it has convinced us of its merits, Nokia can leverage the branding to differentiate its Windows Phone range. Frankly, the sooner it can do that, the better.
HTC is going on something of a certification tangent: it’s following its PlayStation Suite approval with its own program, HTC Connect. Home AV equipment with the label promises to lift the standards for streaming media to or from one of HTC’s devices. The rubber stamp will be limited at first to DLNA audio and video, but it should eventually include just about anything that doesn’t involve a wire, such as Bluetooth, in-car media, NFC and wireless speakers. There isn’t an immediate deluge of partners. HTC has scored a rather big ally, however: Pioneer’s DLNA-ready receivers and wireless speakers this year, and beyond, will flaunt the HTC Connect badge. Don’t brag about the media credentials of your One X just yet. Although the Connect seal of approval won’t be needed for media streaming anytime soon, it will only be coming to the One series through an upgrade in the months ahead.
Those of us yearning to bring Huawei’s Ascend D Quad on summer vacation will have to file that dream away for next year. The company’s consumer division chief, Yu Chengdong, has pushed back the phone’s volume production from this month to August. Blame for the setback rests squarely on that custom-developed K3V2 processor — there have been “technical problems” getting it ready, if we go by Huawei’s less than precise explanation. The timing certainly isn’t what we’d call ideal: now that the Galaxy S III and One X are both common features of the smartphone landscape, the Ascend D Quad’s performance won’t be turning nearly as many heads when it arrives. We’ll have to make do with the solid Ascend P1 in the meantime.
Just yesterday we saw details leak of RIM’s new BlackBerry handsets, with touchscreen and QWERTY keyboard offerings that will both run BlackBerry 10. N4BB is back with yet another leak, this time of the revamped BlackBerry Messenger that will debut along with the new version of the operating system. The biggest change seems to be a redesigned user interface with an eye-catching color scheme.
In fact, the company will supposedly use several different themes for BBM in Blackberry 10. The first mixes things up with a white and green color scheme that looks surprisingly easy on the eyes, while the second adds black into the mix. There’s a technical reason for that change: both handsets detailed yesterday will make use of OLED screens. When presented with pure black elements, OLED pixels completely turn off, unlike LCDs which are still backlit regardless. That can lead to drastic power savings, with one of the leaked BBM slides estimating a 25% decrease.
Tweaking the colors even further in favour of darker tones such as grey and blue will lead to even bigger savings: 75%, or so the slide claims. It’s a trick that manufacturers such as Samsung have used in the past to maximize battery efficiency combined with aggressive auto-brightness settings. Otherwise, feast your eyes on the redesign above and below, which seems to fall in line with what we’ve seen so far from BlackBerry 10.
More and more companies are turning to the overall user experience instead of powering through with raw specs, and HTC has announced a new program that once again signals that shift. The company has taken the wraps off its HTC Connect program, aimed at allowing accessory and electronic manufacturers to take advantage of video and audio streaming capabilities.
If it sounds similar to Apple’s AirPlay, that’s pretty much exactly what it is, but with HTC’s devices instead. The company is hoping that in-home and car accessories will take advantage of the program, and we imagine it’ll take home a nice license fee in the process. HTC say that the latest One series will be the first phones to take advantage of Connect via a future software update.
As for launch partners, HTC say that Pioneer is the first to jump onboard. HTC Connect will be included as part of its new receivers and wireless speakers, and DLNA will be along for the ride too. HTC say that while the first products will be DLNA based, the program will extend to Bluetooth, NFC, and wireless speakers in the future.
It was scarcely a day ago that we got a first peek at what could be the first BlackBerry 10 devices — and now we’re looking at what may be BlackBerry 10’s cornerstone app, a reworked BlackBerry Messenger. As long as N4BB‘s details prove legitimate, the centerpiece of the app will be its theming: owners can customize the chat bubbles and backdrops to fit their finicky ways. Of course, this being an efficiency-obsessed RIM, the theming should also be integral to keeping power consumption to a minimum: the darker the colors, the less energy a BBM conversation demands from a future BlackBerry’s big OLED screen. We don’t know whether any changes will prove more than skin deep, although the switch to the QNX-based OS might prove enough at first. We’ll know everything soon enough should of a September release for the first phone be more than just a feverish dream.
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