PHONE ARENA

After all of the excitement surrounding Nokia’s move to abandon Symbian (the burning platform) and move to Windows Phone 7, there might be a long wait before it actually appears on Nokia’s phones. Windows Phone 7′s capabilities have some limitations that Nokia will need to deal with, and it may not be easy for them. Nokia had hoped to lower its R&D expenditure by adopting WP7, and maybe they will in the long run, but that doesn’t look likely in the near future. There are some problems that need to be addressed first.


For example:

• Devices with WP7 must have three buttons, not four
• WP7 currently supports just one CPU and one screen size
• Third party applications in WP7 can’t multitask (something that Symbian did very well)

Microsoft has been very rigid about how OEMs can build phones with WP7, but likely they had to loosed those restrictions to make this deal with Nokia. Nevertheless, making the new ecosystem work is going to take time, and if Nokia wants to get WP7 devices out this year, time is short. Meanwhile, the iPhone and Android have set a high standard that WP7 may have trouble living up to.
Nokia developers have been discussing some of the limitations of WP7 here. Also, check out SlashGear’s analysis of Nokia’s choice of WP7.

Nokia CEO Stephen Elop has revealed that the company’s board only settled on adopting Windows Phone and a Microsoft partnership the night before the Friday announcement last week, a last-minute decision that hugely impacts the future of the Finnish company moving forward. Speaking to SlashGear at Mobile World Congress 2011 this week, Elop confirmed that Android – and sticking with the Symbian and MeeGo roadmaps – had remained on the table up until the last minute, with the chief executive having to make a number of calls, including to Intel’s Paul Otellini, in the few hours between the board’s decision and the London event.


Elop denied that Intel had been left in the dark about Nokia’s decision, despite reports over the weekend that Intel had only discovered the plan to marginalise MeeGo back into the labs during the press event itself. “[Otellini] knew that we were going through a decision process” Elop told us, saying that he “spoke to Paul multiple times” and called the CEO two hours after the board had decided on Windows Phone. “He expressed disappointment” is all Elop would say about Otellini’s reaction, though he did admit that “it’s obvious why it’s disappointing.”
The two companies will in fact meet at MWC 2011 this week, on Tuesday February 15, to discuss the future of MeeGo and how it might evolve. The two companies are in different positions, he suggested, and Nokia still respects the direction Intel chooses to take pursuing the platform – it’s still a founding member, he highlighted – but “we had to make our own decisions.”

 

 Specifications

Networks	GSM | HSDPA | HSUPA 850 | 900 | 1800 | 1900 | 2100
Form Factor	Slide | QWERTY | Touchscreen
Main Screen	3.4" TFT Capacitive touchscreen,16M Colors,320X480
Mobile OS	Microsoft KIN Windows CE based
CPU
Apps Platform	Java CLDC 1.1, MIDP 2.1, Mobile 3D
Memory	8 GB, 256MB RAM
Memory Card
Dimensions	111 x 60 x 16mm
Weight	133g
Camera	8.0 MegaPixels , Digital Zoom
Bluetooth	V 2.1 A2DP + EDR
Wi-Fi	802.11 b/g
Wireless Data	GPRS | EDGE | 7.2Mbps HSDPA | 2.0 Mbps HSUPA
Mobile TV	n/a
Released	2010q3