It's arguably one of the dirty little areas in the Nokia and Symbian world, something that you'll get burned by if you're not very careful. I've alluded to best practice several times in article comments but it's now time to spell things out loud and clear. I've ranted about the importance of having a replaceable battery before, but where on earth do you get a new battery from? There are so many charlatans wanting to sell you something cheap... here are a few pointers and rules.
After travelling across the West of England over the last four days, the disconnect between the hype at the cutting edge of the smartphone world (where a phone or system gets blasted because it 'only' offers 6Mbps downloads, etc.) and the reality for normal people has never been more evident. I know I've ranted in the distant past along similar lines, but the situation's getting worse, not better, with time.
The Nokia E6 has been around for a year now - the Motorola Pro+ for about six months. Yet this is the first time I've had both in the same place for direct comparison, and one which is still very relevant since both offer the rather rare (in 2012) qwerty candybar form factor, with always available keyboard and full capacitive touchscreen. I think it's fair to say that both devices are somewhat compromised, though there's an interesting tussle between the E6's higher quality components and the Pro+'s larger display and faster processor.
One of the very first things I did when getting the Nokia 808 PureView was to check availability of spare batteries. Nothing. And I still can't find a decent source for the BV-4D online, reducing the advantage of having a 'replaceable battery' to being able to pull it out if there's a problem. But a comment to yesterday's story about the N97 mini got me thinking. What existing Nokia batteries might fit - and work - in the 808? Might I already own a number of spare batteries for it?
This is the third in a series of articles giving real world, honest feedback from Symbian users of varying levels of expertise who have tried moving to Windows Phone in general and the Nokia Lumia 710 in particular. Here Stephanie Brear, admittedly a user quite far from the Symbian cutting edge, finds that the 710 is a 'massive improvement' from her 5230 - perhaps not surprising, but a good example of the type of user upgrade that Windows Phone is perfect for.
I commented the other day that the Rich Recording in the Nokia 808 PureView has the potential to change the way we capture our lives, digitally - i.e. when no scene, no noise environment is off limits and everything comes out accurately, why be restricted by the technology, why not go for it and shoot anything you really enjoy, anything you love. The same applies just as strongly to the PureView zoom - add the two together and your smartphone becomes the ultimate phone for the Digital Creator, whether now on the Nokia 808 on Symbian, in the near future on Nokia Lumias on Windows Phone 8, or on another manufacturer's implementation of similar technology in a year or two.
Cloud storage is becoming ever more popular. Thanks to the rise of Dropbox, both Google and Microsoft felt the time was right to launch their own solutions, which also include tools to edit files as well as just storing them. While cloud storage gives us the ability to access our files anywhere, and instantly share them with anyone in the world, it comes at a cost - and not just a financial cost.
As regular readers will know, I do like to pick head-to-heads which are appropriate - it's maddening when I see another blogger pitch items which are a wild mismatch in terms of form factors, prices and use cases. Here we have three mid-priced smartphones, all offering good value for money, all definitely phone-sized rather than superphone-sized. One powered by Symbian, one Windows Phone and one Android. What are their pros and cons, which comes out on top overall?
A month ago, I put the (then upcoming) 808 PureView against the (also upcoming) Galaxy S III in tabular, opinionated form. And, having now used both smartphones, reckon I got the verdict spot on. However, the SGS III is a monster form factor, with 4.8" screen, so I thought I'd cast around for something current and cutting edge that's more the Nokia 808's size. Aha - the HTC One S, with almost identical specs to the flagship One X, yet within a more conventionally-sized phone form factor. Read on for my head to head.
This morning's news from Nokia was bleak, with 10,000 job losses and a revised financial outlook that will see the company's key Devices & Services division report losses of several hundred million Euros for Q2 2012 on the 19th July. Media coverage has understandably focused on these key points, but a number of important strategy changes were part of today's announcement and these are worth examining in more detail.
