In this podcast we cover current developments around Nokia's Ovi strategy including Sync, Share, N-Gage, plus we chat about all aspects of the Nokia N96, following on from our hands-on preview. Finally, we rant and rave a little about Google's new native search 'client'. Here's the link: Insight no. 14, plus the RSS feed to sign up for the future.
One component of Nokia's Ovi which hasn't had quite so much attention is Sync. This just popped up on the main Ovi toolbar, trailing what Sync will offer. See below for the details.
Fans of PiZero will want to note that there's another class theme available, in full vector format, for all S60 3rd Edition smartphones, including widescreen devices like the E90. Presenting... Silver.
The first batch of next generation N-Gage games has now become available through the public beta test, so we've started reviewing them. Our first ever Next Gen N-Gage review is Block Breaker Deluxe, an unofficial remake of the old classic Breakout.
Over on Guy Goma Kewney site, James Sherwood has pictures of a lovely mobile phone battery solution from MWC - the Philips 9@9j mobile phone takes not only a custom Lithium Ion battery, but also has a slot to take a regular AAA battery to top up the main battery for another three hours of talk time. If I was travelling, and I had the option to strap in a standard cell to my Symbian phone, I would be right there.
I forgot to mention that Smartphones Show 53 went live a couple of days ago, with some nice video footage of the Nokia and Sony Ericsson S60 and UIQ 3 hardware launches, shot by Rafe, plus comments from me, iPhone tips and a look at how far the Nokia E90 has taken me since my Psion-toting days, ten years ago. Rafe's Mobile World Congress video clips will feature in their entirety in exclusive AllAboutSymbian video podcasts in the next few weeks, so stick around.
Knuckle down for the real thing, guys and gals, AAS proudly presents Rafe's definitive hands-on preview of the recently-announced Nokia N96. From the DVB-H TV receiver to the new codecs to the music controls to the auto-geotagging of photos, it's all covered. Rafe spent quite a time with the N96 and it shows. Read the feature to find out how the N96 compares to the N95 variants and to the N82 - is there a definite flagship?
As noted by SymbianOne Symbian recently updated P.I.P.S. and version 1.2 now supports the latest UIQ phones. 1.2 also adds a full-featured port of the Open Source zlib compression library. The 1.2 version was made available to S60 through the Novemeber Open C release.
Tzer2 has been busy, over on All About N-Gage, listing 10 things that would be really cool on the new next-gen games platform. Do you think any of these semi-predictions will happen? Let Tzer2 know in the comments!
When it made its first appearance at the Symbian Smartphone Show last year, it was the talk of the town. DreamSpring, the team who brought us DreamConnect, have at last announced the availability of DreamLife, an integrated contact and calendar manager for UIQ 3 smartphones. Read on for the press release.
Some events for your diary, should you be in the area. I'll start with the one I'm at(!). On March 5th at the 3Bs in Reading, UK, there's a chance to try out the Nokia N82 to take Xenon-flash photos and see me with my rock band, Shed Music. The fun starts at 8.30pm. On the same night, March 5th, WOM World are holding an Nseries get together at the Crown, in London, from 6.30pm. Finally, there's an S60 event in Milan, Italy on March 11th from 8pm. Phew!
With the MWC and now GDC events under our belt, Ewan Spence draws from all the clues that Nokia has been dropping and comes up with a connected, converged epiphany into the future of gaming. The unification of smartphone functions, social networking and gaming is just around the corner, perhaps. Personally, I can't see any real showstoppers.
Google has released a native client for Google search for S60 phones. The application, available via the Google mobile site, places a shortcut to a Google search box on the Idle screen (unfortunately only for devices with either a 'Ctrl' or 'pencil/edit' key), but is also accessible via the usual application launcher on all devices. Typing in a query to the search box and pressing search opens up Web and takes you to the results page for that Google query in one go. It uses the new Google Mobile search service we mentioned a few weeks ago. Read on for more.
There are two video interviews with three of the executives behind N-Gage over on AllAboutNGage now, with fairly frank and interesting answers to (more or less) the questions that you've been wanting to ask. Good stuff.
Nseries video supremo James Burland echoes many of my own sentiments in chewing Nokia out over the VGA capture in its Nseries devices - the resolution ticks the right box but fails miserably for frame rate and focus. A justified rant? I think so.
