Hasta La Gadget!

Consider this little slice of photography uncorroborated for now, but we just couldn’t ignore a device that’s ostensibly running MeeGo software while sporting a bold Nokia logo front and center on its shell. This mysterious slate has cropped up over at the mobile-review forums, where amateur sleuthing has already noted that the landscape centering of the Nokia logo is atypical — both the N97 and N900 have it off-center — which may well suggest this is a landscape-centric tablet first and a phone second (if at all!). Assuming the brand name imprint is the same size as on the N8 (Nokia loves to standardize those), we could be looking at a 4.5-inch screen on what is either an internal test device, or, more optimistically, a prototype for actual hardware. It’s worth noting that the MeeGo seen on board is of the stock variety, whereas Nokia intends to ship its new flagship device(s) with an as-yet-unseen set of UI customizations collectively known as Harmattan. So we’re certainly not looking at anything close to a final hardware / software pairing, but we are looking at something.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

Continue reading Is this Nokia’s tablet-shaped MeeGo device?

Is this Nokia’s tablet-shaped MeeGo device? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 Jan 2011 03:26:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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At CES and the NAIAS in Detroit this year we saw ever more powerful smartphone integration, but nothing like this. Nokia Asia teamed up with two Chinese coders, An Jiaxuan and an unnamed friend, to whip up a C7 app that controls a BMW 1 Series. They said it took them only 20 days to get things ready but we’re thinking adding the remote controls to the car itself must have added some further time to that. The result is in the video below, a short test drive that Nokia promises “isn’t special effects.” See for yourself and let us know if you spot a meatbag driver hiding in there somewhere.

Continue reading BMW gets Nokia C7 remote control, James Bond can eat his heart out (video)

BMW gets Nokia C7 remote control, James Bond can eat his heart out (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 20 Jan 2011 11:03:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Our subsidized Symbian superphone dreams remain squashed, but it looks like we might have a different party to blame — the Wall Street Journal‘s anonymous sources say it was Nokia itself who decided to pull plans to launch the X7 exclusively on AT&T. Originally, the phone would have waved the white globe banner at Mobile World Congress next month, but Nokia reportedly decided that AT&T didn’t have its back, and wouldn’t provide sufficient marketing support — and cheap enough subsidized prices — to make it worth the company’s while. If you simply must have the handset and live in the US, though, we’re sure you’ll still find a way. It’s only a matter of time before Nokia launches in countries more willing to play ball… and unlocked models appear on eBay.

WSJ: Nokia X7 canceled for AT&T, but at Espoo’s behest originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 19 Jan 2011 21:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Whether you knew it as Comes With Music or Ovi Music Unlimited, the sad fact is that pretty soon you won’t know it all — Nokia’s subscription music service is being shut down almost universally, with the exception of a few select markets like China, Brazil and South Africa. Reuters reports that the use of DRM to lock down content to less-than-cutting-edge devices was a major stumbling block in the rollout of what was originally supposed to be a major iTunes competitor. Those who are already signed up will continue to have access to their music libraries indefinitely, but won’t be able to access new tracks once their current subscription expires. From then on, you’ll only have the DRM-free Ovi Music store to keep you warm during those long Finnish nights.

Nokia shuts down Ovi Music Unlimited service in most markets, cites lack of traction originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 17 Jan 2011 07:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Don’t believe the recent gossip that Nokia and Microsoft are hooking up to make a Windows phone. A former employee of Nokia claims it isn’t happening.

On his personal blog, Watts Martin explained that a partnership between Microsoft and Nokia isn’t even close to happening, because it’s unlikely Nokia would cede control of an OS to a third party. UPDATE: Martin left Nokia earlier this month, Wired has learned.

“There is no guarantee of that at all, because it is stark raving loony,” Martin wrote. “A lot of the reporting on Nokia I’ve seen seems to miss a fundamental fact: they are, in their fashion, just as insistent on control over their ecosystem as Apple is.”

Nokia has been a diehard supporter of Symbian, an open-source operating system that’s a decade old. For years, Symbian has been the worldwide leader in smartphone OS marketshare, but some analysts say it could soon be dethroned by Google’s Android OS, which has a more modern user interface and several manufacturing partners.

“Market share is an existential threat to Symbian, it imperils the very existence of the platform,” said Gartner analyst Nick Jones. “And the main reason Symbian is losing share is the user experience which isn’t competitive with Apple or Android.”

Eldar Murtazin, editor in chief of Mobile-Review editor, claimed last week that Microsoft had begun talks to make Nokia-branded smartphones running the Windows Phone 7 OS. The bleak outlook for Symbian got the tech press wondering if such a partnership would be likely.

Martin’s answer to that question would be a firm “No.”

“Nokia really does have their OS strategy figured out, and it’s a good one,” he said. “What they don’t have figured out is user experience design…. The good news for them is that over the last year they’ve started to take all those problem seriously. The bad news is that they needed to have been taking them seriously in 2007.”

See Also:

• Nokia Phones Hacked to Run Android
• Symbian OS Is Broken. Can It Be Fixed?
• Wired 7.09: Just Say Nokia

Photo of a Samsung phone running Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7: Mike Kane/Wired.com