Nokia may be the underdog in the smartphone industry but it is fighting hard to beat competition. The company has introduced three new smartphones running Symbian operating system. The devices also integrate with the company’s improved Ovi services and apps store.
The three new phones are the Nokia E7, Nokia C7 and Nokia C6. Though display sizes and features vary across them, the devices have in common support for multiple homescreens and visual multitasking.
The phones are all expected to begin shipping before the end of the year.
Nokia has faced criticism for the user interface and Symbian operating system powering its phones. The company’s hardware and industrial design on phones have won it kudos but when it comes to the user experience, even die-hard Nokia fans hesitate to pronounce it the best. Meanwhile, the rise of Android OS and the proliferation of Apple’s iPhone has put additional pressure on Nokia.
Nokia says it remains confident that Symbian OS can stay ahead and to ensure that it has rewritten parts of the OS to make it faster and easier to use.
“Despite new competition, Symbian remains the most widely used smartphone platform in the world,” says Niklas Savander, executive vice president at Nokia in a statement.
Though the new phones sound like an alphabet soup, here’s the lowdown on each. There’s no word on the processor used in any of these phones but Nokia has offered enough details to get consumers excited about the devices.
Nokia E7
The E7 is Nokia’s new phone targeted at business users. The device has a 4-inch touchscreen, access to Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync, security features such as lock and wipe functionality and access to Microsoft Share Point Server.
The phone has a full keyboard in a design similar to that of the Motorola Droid.
The E7 is pretty slim, about 13.6mm thick. It has a 8-megapixel camera and comes with 16 GB of on-board storage.
The E7 also boasts an HDMI connection and Dolby Digital Plus Surround Sound. Users can customize up to three homescreens and get updates from Facebook and Twitter on their homescreens. The E7 will offer about 9 hours of talk time and 18 days of standby time.
The device will cost about 495 Euros ($645), excluding taxes and subsidies.
Nokia C7
The C7 is a phone for social media addicts. The device pulls feeds from social networks such as Facebook and Twitter and integrates email from Yahoo, Gmail and other accounts to show them directly on the home screen.
The C7 features a 3.5-inch AMOLED display and is about 10.5 mm thick. It has a 8-megapixel camera and can shoot video at 720p resolution. The phone has 8GB of onboard storage–expandable to 40 GB with microSD.
The device is estimated to be priced at 335 Euros ($437), excluding taxes and subsidies.
Nokia C6
The C6 is the baby of the group. The phone has a 3.2-inch AMOLED touchscreen display. And as with the C7, this phone will have a 8-megapixel camera. It will support microSD up to 32 GB and capture HD video in 720p.
The C6 will cost about 260 Euros ($339), excluding taxes and subsidies.
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Photos: Nokia
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