Nokia Announce the New N97
Today Nokia have announced details about the new Nokia N97. This is to become Nokia’s top spec’ed phone although they are not calling it a phone.
“…the world’s most advanced mobile computer, which will transform the way people connect to the Internet and to each other.”
I first thought that was a pretty wild claim given the fierce competition and you never know what the next big thing will be. While I am impressed with some of the specs of this phone, I am still reserved in my judgement, just because it is a big claim.
That said the specifications are impressive here are a few:
- 3.5-inch, 640 x 360 pixel (that’s 16:9)
- Touch screen
- An “always” open “Homepage”
- A-GPS
- Electronic Compass
- QWERTY Keyboard
- 32 Gig Onboard Memory
- Micro SD Slot - supports up to 64 Gig of memory
- 5 Megapixel Camera with Carl Zeiss optics
- DVD Quality Capture
- Continuous playback of audio for 1.5 days and about 4 -5 hours for video
- WiFi
That is about all they are saying right now. There is a video floating about and it should be at the bottom of this post if I can manage to wrangle the new widescreen format from YouTube, spose that will work perfectly on the N97…
I just can not help but notice that Nokia are using screen rotation in a similar manner to the iPhone and a few other things. Not sure where the ideas came from but it is clear this is a logical direction for small mobile appliances to go.
There is also a strong emphasis in the press release on social networking and a hint at geolocation features. The other thing I noticed was the RSS feed on the “Homepage”, nice touch. I like the idea of the Homepage and having actual content displayed on it. This is something relatively new. Maybe in the future we can use an actual service like Netvibes or Pageflakes?
One thing I don’t like the look of is the flip top keyboard, just a bad feeling about it. Looks like it will be the first thing to break and a pain in the butt to use.
Be great to hear from the phone buffs out there as to what they think about the new Nokia N97 top dog.
"I Want To Be a Celebrity"
Buy at 
I’m excited! That said I moved from the E51 to the E71 Saturday so it’ll be a long time before I go to 5th edition.
I gotta lose the tin cans and string approach one of these days… maybe buy a suitcase phone.
Herne, you might as well wait two more years for LTE at this point. All three of your operators will offer HSPA in a year and LTE in 2010.
Who knows what’s up with that Egyptian conglomerate.
It looks very yummy, but based on past experience DVD quality means 640×480.
WOO, AN ELECTRONIC COMPASS
I know I need an electronic compass when I’m in my office…
Because the GPS doesn’t have one of those…
This phone might have been cool if they had decided to put actual well thought out technology.
By reports from Europe on this thing it is a battery hog (not that the iPhone is any better) and that the test models have been flakey
Weighing 5kg, lasting 2.3 seconds in action. Ladies and gentlemen, in the left corner, Nokia N97.
I’ve had a phone like this from Nokia already. Too big, too heavy, too annoying and you cannot carry it in any pocket to walk comfortably. Symbian OS is slow as well. If I wanted to carry a suitcase to put my phone into, I’d buy a Blackberry.
Now I have the lightest phone on the market with everything I need.
magnetometer is used for google street view on the G1
my E51 and E71 are not slow
I can can keep 3G on 8 hours and still have half my battery
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if you want a “phone” get a jitterbug and diapers
Phones definitely fall in to the can’t comment until I’ve played with it category for me. You can compare tech specs until you’re blue in the face, but then the higher spec falls down by having a crappy UI that’s impossible to understand and hides all the useful stuff 6 deep in the menu. It’s also a matter of taste… I loathed the Nokia interface when I first got one, having grown used to Sony Ericson’s way of doing things, but got used to it in the end!
@Eric - lol, I can do that with my iPhone easy!
but now you can street view even if you’re wearing a mittens!
that will be great for all the mitten fans
S60 configuration is a pretty strange thing. it’s a contest to see how many times you can make someone click to change something simple. Nine clicks to get to my Application shortcuts on the home screen. Now that requires some serious dedication.
Hopefully Symbian Foundation will get a little help from UIQ on this sort of issue or make it easy like on ip0wn.