Insight 76: N86, N-Gage, N97

[slitchfield]

In this Insight, Rafe, Steve and Ewan talk about the Nokia N86, a visit to Symbian, N-Gage Games (Dance Fabulous and Pinbusters) and general reaction to the N97.

Read on in the full article.

[Lord Dextro]

Gentleman,

As always great podcast. I love the fact that you guys like to educate us not only in the symbian world, but also with our vocabulary. Very nice! niche indeed!

I just wanted to comment on how you ended the podcast with a fade out. That was very professional sounding. Well done.

Ewan's sense of humor, while distracting at times, brings a certain entertainment appeal to your show. I especially liked how he mock quoted Shakespear in the last podcast (75). Freakin funny is all I have to say! Put it on a T-shirt, I'd buy it: "Got Niche" on the front, and Ewan's words on the back.

The N97 became my replacement phone from my N95. While I agree that this phone has some quirks, I'm confident that those quirks will be worked out. I've read and watched quite a few reviews on the N97. Infact, I still do. Of all the opinions out there, I trust Cnet's the least. Any reviewer that gives a phone (which I'm not going to mention) extremely high marks yet has "variable call quality" issues with it, while giving lower marks to the N97 that does a whole lot more better, doesn't seem like he or she is playing with a full deck. Alot of these people, like you mentioned on your podcast, haven't gotten past the applications screen before resounding the obvious "talk points" created by the bandwagon.
They try to sound objective, but instead come off as sounding inexperienced or naive. Yet they host their own tech show?! Gadgets have inexplicitably become political. Where as popular opinion overrides objectivity.
This is why I like your show the best. I can identify with each of your points of view on each product. Your reviews just simply make sense. Could be a good tag line: "Making Sense of the Symbian Side of Life".

Keep up the good work guys!

Jeremy

[svdwal]

Sorry, guys, but Mac OS/iPhone OS is not based on Linux. Mac OS/iPhone OS is a kind of BSD with the Mach kernel at it's core. A system that is even older than Symbian OS ;-)

[slitchfield]

Sander - I thought I said that Mac OS X was built on "Unix"? I know Linux is much more recent etc.

[Arthur]

Here come the three musketeers, the Nokia apologists.

Of course they fail to mention that it's not only Fry that is critical of the N97. How about all the countless other "non fan boy" reviews ?

[rvirga]

The iPhone is not based on Linux!
It's based on Mach BSD, that is BSD running on top of a Mach kernel.

[RogerPodacter]

Thank you guys for bringing up the topic of all this "s60v5 touch is outdated and rubbish" that i hear everywhere. i just dont agree with those viewpoints. personally i find 5th edition very usable and i honestly prefer the way the OS functions. the ONLY thing i do agree with is the scrolling thru long lists. sure they can and they WILL implement kinetic scrolling (we all saw the video of the newest touch s60v5 phone with kinetic scrolling).

when i use my roommates iphone i actually feel like the OS is too "static", or just not dynamic. err i dunno how to quantify what i'm saying. but the double tap in s60v5 i find useful. often times i look thru my music library, and might single tap a song as i'm sitting deciding what to play. or sometimes you might want to single click something and perform another option, like send it to someone or change a setting. quite frankly i think nokia struck the perfect balance with this thru the entire OS. single click for all apps and menus, and double clicks in long lists.

[brendan]

just wanted to say that i really enjoy listening to the podcasts - thanks!

even though I haven't owned a nokia phone since my n95/e90 days i still really enjoy the site.

I've just bought an N97 - upgrade for me from E61i.

I have 4200+ contacts.

This phone, with 32M RAM firstly cannot sync all the contacts (gets to 3000+) and fails (not enough memory), and then when you try to run ANY application - including Nokia messaging - the phone keeps hanging with the not enough memory error - close some applications and try again.

It seems our Symbian friends have not stayed in sync with the hardware designers - yes it has 32G memory, but only a small amount addressable by the Contacts application.

Logged a support call with Nokia - no sensible answer - at all.

I was about to buy an iPhone 3Gs - but love the bullet proof phone capabilities of Nokia - however, when I arrive back in London on Friday, the N97 goes back to Nokia and i'm buying an iPhone from an unlocked country!

Unless anyone has a work-around...

Ta

Mike

Originally Posted by Arthur

Here come the three musketeers, the Nokia apologists.

Of course they fail to mention that it's not only Fry that is critical of the N97. How about all the countless other "non fan boy" reviews ?

And here comes Arthur! Forever whining about everything. 'Nokia apoligist' eh? Funny how he doesnt like people labeling others 'apple fanboys' yet he goes around labeling people whatever the hell he fancies.

[celios]

Originally Posted by Arthur

Here come the three musketeers, the Nokia apologists.

Of course they fail to mention that it's not only Fry that is critical of the N97. How about all the countless other "non fan boy" reviews ?

If you don't like it, don't buy it Arthur! But for pity's sake, stop telling everyone else how much you don't like it, and content yourself with waiting for your precious internet tablet.

[Arthur]

Originally Posted by Unregistered

And here comes Arthur! Forever whining about everything. 'Nokia apoligist' eh? Funny how he doesnt like people labeling others 'apple fanboys' yet he goes around labeling people whatever the hell he fancies.

You really don't grasp it do you? The difference is I am NOT a fan boy of Apple or, for that matter, of any manufacturer. The three AAS guys in my opinion are. I have owned nothing but Nokia phones. I don't have any Apple products nor am I interested in them.

It is my right to say that N97 is a colossal failure. But who am I to talk? Read the majority of reviews and you will start to get the picture. Can they all be wrong?

Originally Posted by Arthur

You really don't grasp it do you? The difference is I am NOT a fan boy of Apple or, for that matter, of any manufacturer. The three AAS guys in my opinion are. I have owned nothing but Nokia phones. I don't have any Apple products nor am I interested in them.

It is my right to say that N97 is a colossal failure. But who am I to talk? Read the majority of reviews and you will start to get the picture. Can they all be wrong?

Yes I know you're not an 'Apple fanboy', that's been very obvious for a long time. And yes you have a right to call the N97 a "COLLOSAL FAILURE". But what right do you have in calling others 'Nokia Apologists' or 'Nokia Employee'? It's their right if they decide they like the N97. I for one don't like it but I don't go around insulting others who do. You're not the only "POWER USER" around here.

[Ewan]

Originally Posted by Arthur

The three AAS guys in my opinion are. I have owned nothing but Nokia phones. I don't have any Apple products nor am I interested in them.

It is my right to say that N97 is a colossal failure. But who am I to talk? Read the majority of reviews and you will start to get the picture. Can they all be wrong?

Arthur yoru commetns are always noted, but let me address that last point by pointing out a multitude of consumer electronic devices that have been deried in print and turned out really nice, and countless others that have glowing reviews and been rubbish in use. I could list some but I'm sure people will see whatever bias you wish to see in any list I make.

And I've been in this game long enough to be called a fanboy on many issues. With a site called All About *Symbian* I'm sure listeners will be able to listen to the cast and realise where we stand. But I do think there's a long way between "people who like the products" and "apologists" so I'd refute the "here come the apologists" line as being far from a reasoned statement.

;-)

[Lord Dextro]

Well that was certainly an intelligently stated rebuke. Well said!