All About Symbian - News Headlines

News Headlines - Hardware

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Canalys Q2 stats show Nokia's Symbian world smartphone marketshare at 38%

Canalys has just released a limited set of numbers for smartphone sales in Quarter 2, 2010, showing Nokia with a leading 38% marketshare across the world, with actual sales of its Symbian-based smartphones up 41% year on year. RIM's Blackberrys were second in terms of smartphone marketshare, with 18%, while Apple was at 13% worldwide. Android-powered smartphones made up a lot of the 'noise' in the analysis, split across a multitude of manufacturers, but showing very siginificant growth, as you'll see from the table below.

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Links of Interest, Industry at 17:33 BST, Aug 2nd || 9 Comments

AAS Insight 129 - N8 pre-order, Vodafone Clicks, Questions

In All About Symbian Insight 129, we start with a number of short items: Angry Birds as a favourite game, Qt on Samsung and Sony Ericsson, Vodafone Mobile Clicks competition. In the second half of the podcast we respond to number of listener questions, from a discussion of how quality impacts on user experience, to how Nokia should market the N8 and the possibility of an Android Nokia device. You can listen to AAS Insight 129 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.

# Posted by Rafe in Software, Hardware, Developer, Industry, Editorial Thoughts, Games, Services at 8:30 BST, Aug 2nd || 8 Comments

Never too old for a wedding - a Day in the Life of the Nokia N82

David Gilson turns blogger in this 'Day in the Life of the Nokia N82', bought by him for camera duties and becoming his tool of choice for an all day wedding event. Read on for his impressions of this three year old device and its Xenon flash, sample photos and even a battery report - it seems that rumours of the N82's demise have been greatly exagerated...

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous, Editorial Thoughts at 8:19 BST, Jul 29th || 13 Comments

The sadly flawed Symbian world top-end line-up - looking to the N8

In this feature, I've been taking a long hard look at the top-end smartphones in the Symbian powered world over the last three years, pointing out their flaws and frailties, and - where appropriate - pointing out what should have been done to fix things up. Yes, Symbian has been cracking along with record momentum in the mid-tier, with Nokia trouncing the iPhones, Blackberries and Android phones in terms of raw unit sales, but Symbian's partners have been scoring rather a lot of own goals in recent times. And what of the 2010 Symbian^3 crop, such as the imminent Nokia N8 - will these suffer a similar fate? I'm optimistic...

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous, Editorial Thoughts at 11:18 BST, Jul 28th || 69 Comments

The Qi standard for wireless charging now defined

The Wireless Power Consortium has now finalized the interface definition for a low-power specification for charging devices wirelessly. The exact details will be published publicly on August 30th. The specification is currently limited to 5 Watts, more than enough for all USB-charging Symbian-powered phones. Devices that want to comply with the standard will have to pass third-party certification before the manufacturer is allowed to use the 'Qi' logo on the device or its packaging.

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous at 10:01 BST, Jul 27th || 0 Comments

AAS Insight 128 - TnP, Symbian DevCo and Nokia Q2 results

In All About Symbian Insight 128, we open with a round up of recent news including the formation of the Symbian Developer Cooperative, the retail availability of the Nokia C6, news of the i8910 HX7 firmware, and Nokia's Conspiracy for Good. Rafe talks about his experience with Track and Protect and Ewan asks whether Symbian needs a reference device. Finally we talk over Nokia's Q2 2010 results. You can listen to AAS Insight 128 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.

# Posted by Rafe in Software, Hardware, Editorial Thoughts, Services at 22:03 BST, Jul 26th || 4 Comments

HX7 on the i8910 HD gets Qt built-in

There's a surprise release from arch-Samsung i8910 HD-modder HyperX and his helpers today, in that there's a brand new version of HX7 out this morning. In addition to all the other customisation and battery saving goodness in HX7, the QT 4.6.2 Symbian^3 QT libaries are now integrated - seems like this device is edging towards to the Symbian^3 spec of devices like the Nokia N8?

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous, Links of Interest at 8:50 BST, Jul 26th || 13 Comments

Defining the Smartphone - part 2 (testing the definition, head to head)

As mentioned in part one of my Defining the Smartphone feature from earlier in the week, the very word now encompasses a surprising range of hardware, with some claiming that the older phone-like devices are outdated when compared to the modern capacitive touch slabs and that the former shouldn't even be called smartphones. In this, part two, I attempt to quantify the various attributes of two of the extremes from the smartphone world, I take the latest evolution of Nokia's classic S60 slider form factor, the N86, and pitch it head to head with the current highest rated Android smartphone in the UK, the HTC Desire. Will my own smartphone definition hold water?

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous, Editorial Thoughts at 8:20 BST, Jul 26th || 31 Comments

Dust to dust... a capacitive Nokia Care Point story

Having used a Nokia X6 for a few weeks, I became painfully aware of a few dozen dust particles and the odd small hair stuck under its capacitive screen. Read on for an explanation of how they got there and what was needed to both remove them and stop dust encroaching in the future.

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous at 9:10 BST, Jul 24th || 40 Comments

Nokia Conversations addresses "buttons on smartphones"

They might have well started flying a kite in lightning, because this is going to raise some eyebrows. Nokia’s latest blog post on the Conversations site starts out with “My name is Ian and I prefer buttons on my mobile phone.” You can probably guess where the conversation is going, because many people believe that the only form for a smartphone is a touchscreen slab. It should be a good debate!

# Posted by Ewan in Hardware, Links of Interest at 11:39 BST, Jul 23rd || 12 Comments

Does Symbian need crowd pleasing reference hardware?

Following on from Steve’s discussion earlier this week on discontinued smartphones, it’s been interesting to watch the reaction from other publications around Google’s Nexus one no longer being sold, and how it was a failed experiment and customers will only buy devices from the High Street. Regardless, it's a path I think Symbian should think about going down...

# Posted by Ewan in Hardware at 20:19 BST, Jul 22nd || 32 Comments

C6 appears on sale at Nokia UK store

Nokia's latest Symbian^1 device, the C6 has appeared on sale at Nokia's UK store. The C6 is a touchscreen phone with side-sliding QWERTY keyboard, featuring the same homescreen widgets as seen on the N97 and N97 mini. It was announced back in April along with the C3 and E5. The emphasis of the April release was to 'democratise' the market by bringing unlocked handset prices down to a more affordable level. Therefore, we're a little surprised at the £289 price tag on the C6. Of course, prices on the Nokia UK store are typically higher than 'street' retail prices, but this is still different from the £230 price tag we expected.

# Posted by David in Hardware, Links of Interest at 10:58 BST, Jul 20th || 22 Comments

Getting older: Obsolete, End of life, or simply Mature

It all started when I updated my Smartphone Grid, deleting a couple of devices which I considered too old to recommend to people. Somewhat foolishly, I used the word 'obsolete' in my Twitter conversations with readers and this led to a (ahem) stimulating exchange of ideas around the whole idea of what happens when a smartphone is no longer sold and/or no longer updated. Read on for my thoughts on the subject of what happens when our beloved devices get to three score years and ten (in machine years!)

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous, Editorial Thoughts at 7:25 BST, Jul 20th || 23 Comments

AAS Insight 127 - Terminal Mode, Opera 10.1, Maps Reporter

In All About Symbian Insight 127, we open with a discussion of Nokia's Terminal Mode, which is seeking to create an industry standard for the next generation of integration between cars and mobile phones. We follow this up with news of the Opera 10.1 beta, a sale of games in the Ovi Store, the announcement of furtiv's support for DropBox, the addition of Maps Reporter to Ovi Maps, and the opening of the Qt Developer Network. There's also a brief discussion of the number of software releases for S60 3rd Edition phones versus S60 5th Edition phones. You can listen to AAS Insight 127 here or, if you wish to subscribe, here's the RSS feed.

# Posted by Rafe in Software, Hardware, Developer, Editorial Thoughts, Games, Services at 7:00 BST, Jul 20th || 2 Comments

A look at an important relationship for your smartphone - networks and manufacturers

The relationship between the network and manufacturer has always been one of the more opaque areas in the history of the mobile phone – and as the demands of modern smartphones push the capacity of the networks, the discussions and bartering on both sides continue behind closed doors. Which sometime open a little bit. Wired author Fred Vogelstein has posted a detailed look at the marriage of AT&T and Apple. See below for a quote.

# Posted by Ewan in Hardware, Links of Interest, Industry at 0:29 BST, Jul 20th || 0 Comments

Defining the Smartphone

In leaps and bounds, the term 'smartphone' is being bandied about by manufacturers, analysts, journalists, developers and end users across the world. Which would normally be a good thing, except that there are many definitions, all totally different. What exactly defines a smartphone in 2010? What did it used to mean in 2007? Or 2003? With reports regularly quoting the word, it would be good to all agree what the word means, surely?

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous, Industry, Editorial Thoughts at 7:29 BST, Jul 19th || 22 Comments

Nokia prioritize antenna performance over design

As a follow-up to Apple's emergency iPhone 4 press conference yesterday, in which Steve Jobs claimed that all smartphones suffered from similar reception problems when held tightly (and also erroneously quoted Nokias as having "stickers on the back that say 'Don't touch here'"), Nokia has apparently responded with a statement, quoted below.

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous, Events at 7:50 BST, Jul 17th || 60 Comments

Bug fix update for the popular Nokia E75

The popular QWERTY slider E75 has had a firmware update today, to v211.12 (from v210.12), not available over the air for me, but there via Ovi Suite and Nokia Software Update, as a 146MB download. The E75 has User Data Preservation, but backup anyway, just in case, beforehand. The update is mainly bug fixes, listed below.

# Posted by Steve in Hardware at 12:09 BST, Jul 15th || 5 Comments

Nokia's Terminal Mode (car integration) progressing

What's the next step for mobile phone and car integration? One option is Nokia's Terminal Mode technology, which proposes an industry standard for the integration of mobile phones (and their applications) into the car environment. Nokia has developed Terminal Mode in conjunction with CE4A (Consumer Electronics for Automotive) and recently held the Terminal Mode Summit at their Espoo offices in Finland. This gives us a good opportunity to review what Terminal Mode is about and what progress has been made to date. Read on....

# Posted by Rafe in Software, Hardware, Miscellaneous, Industry at 10:36 BST, Jul 15th || 6 Comments

Good Photos mean 50% Good Camera and 50% Good Photographer

The popular misconception about camera phones is that the higher the spec level, the better the photos you'll take. While I'll accept that there is correlation there, another big factor is the skill (or, more accurately, imagination and common sense) of the user. In truth, you don't have to own the current top-rated camera smartphone costing megabucks in order to turn out pleasing photos. Check out the sample photos at the top of this feature - I've got a mini-quiz for you...

# Posted by Steve in Hardware, Miscellaneous, Editorial Thoughts at 9:13 BST, Jul 15th || 21 Comments