Nokia launch the N8 – finally a “top end” Symbian handset
So, this morning Nokia finally got round to launching the N8, possibly *the* most leaked Nokia handset in history. However, they’ve been forced to admit that the OS it runs (Symbian^3) isn’t ready, so the phone won’t actually be available until Q3 this year. (that’ll be September then)
The problem with this phone is that while it’s the best hardware Nokia have ever launched, it’s not at all innovative. Samsung launched an almost identical handset LAST year in the form of the excellent i8910 and SonyEricsson also launched a comparable handset last year, in the under-developed Satio.
Where the Samsung handset looses out is in pixel count with a 8MP camera as opposed to a 12MP camera and LED flash as exposed to Xenon.
Where the SonyEricsson handset looses out is in internal storage with 0GB as opposed to 16GB and with a resistive touch screen as opposed to a capacitive touch screen.
However, if you take those two devices together, you’ll notice that they feature all, or at least 95% of the hardware features Nokia have put in the N8.
…but hardware is not everything, as Apple have shown with the iPhone. OS and UI and usability (UX) is key. Um, well, Nokia don’t really have anything to offer here. Symbian, even in ^3 variant, is looking horribly clunky in its interface compared to the latest offerings from Apple (with iPhone OS 4 *even* supporting multitaskting) and Andriod, which with SonyEricsson and HTC add-ons has one of the best UIs available at the moment. Symbian^3 has essentially the same interface as Symbian^1 (S60 V5) with only minor tweaks to remove the random single / double tap confusion of S60. But otherwise, it *LOOKS* the same, and in these days that’s not going to work. It needs to be different, and significantly so, otherwise it’ll be perceived as more of the same rubbish we’ve had for 4 years now.
Come on Nokia, SonyEricsson, Samsung & the other non-active Symbian licensees – get on with it and produce a quality Symbian^4 device, with innovative hardware AND an OS / UI that’s up-to-date in 2010. If you don’t, iPhone, Android, Bada and others are going to steal your market share!
