I didn't have to think too hard about how to apostrophise the headline - after all, Nokia was using the term smartphone for its Symbian-powered devices a full five years before Apple and Android came along and the American tech press decided that the word needed reimagining. However, both approaches - which I've commented on before - are valid, and I thought it worth assessing where we've got to as we head towards the end of 2012. Was Nokia's definition right all along? Or is a modern 'smartphone' much smarter after all? I look at the two ultimate exponents of the two definitions, the Nokia 808 PureView and the Samsung Galaxy Nexus.
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.
Walking almost hand in hand with the age of Symbian (roughly 2000 to 2012), the term 'Nokia Communicator' is still a term that commands a degree of respect from many tech fans. But what did Nokia mean by this, which devices down the years have deserved the term, which was the last of the breed, and is the 'Communicator' now dead in the water?
Following our review series on the Nokia 808 PureView, here's the first in a series of brief tutorials, showing how to get the most out of the smartphone's stunning camera module. Here, I show how to shoot 'bokeh', photos enhanced through deliberate use of depth of field to ensure that part of the shot is out of focus, for artistic effect.
It's all very well having a high end autofocus camera in your Symbian-powered Nokia N8 or 808 PureView - but having a great camera doesn't necessarily mean that you'll automatically take great photos. My last 'photo tips' piece on All About Symbian was three years ago, making it high time I updated my thoughts on taking better shots for 2012.
I've had surprisingly many requests to include the Nokia N86 in my upcoming Nokia 808 PureView camera comparison review part, comparing the native 8MP with the 8MP PureView mode - and I was preparing to disappoint the requesters, since my comparison phones were the N82, N8 (i.e. staying with the Xenon blood line) and HTC One X. However, never one to let the side down, I popped out just now and shot a sequence of test shots, analysed below. Summary: keep the N86 if you're into snapping flower macros, otherwise the 808 blows it out of the water.
I think I shocked a few people when I declared, back in January, that the feature at the top of my shopping list when choosing a smartphone was a loud speaker. I did justify this, mind you, before quoting a few phones from all platforms in some sort of best-worst order. What I'd like to do here is go further, keeping the list to just the Symbian world, this being AAS. Which Symbian phone will be at the top of the tree?
The period 2001 to 2011 should be celebrated, it's the decade when the humble 'mobile phone' become more, so much more. And it's worth noting Nokia's part in this transformation, with five things listed here that the company absolutely nailed in the fight to give us more and more powerful phones. But I also can't let such a retrospective go by without a similar attempt to identify the five biggest mistakes that Nokia made, leading to its somewhat troubled existence in the smartphone world of 2012.
The 'my phone (or smartphone platform) is better than yours' debates across the tech world rage on, somewhat amusingly. Yes, I know that megabucks are involved, that sales of successful products now reach into the many tens of millions, that each launch is bigger and better funded than the last. But I also can't help notice that we've only been seeing gradual improvements for the last five years and that, in truth, I could happily use almost any top-end device from that entire period to accomplish all the things I need a smartphone to do.
I've done other top lists here, based on functionality and innovation, but never one based on pure cosmetics and elegance. And, with that in mind, we discover in my latest Top 10 a few unsung heroes of the Symbian world. You see, the raw power and functionality usually championed on this site often comes with something of a price in terms of compromises to appearance - the devices on offer here include some which are fairly unusable out in the world but which look a treat...!
