Nokia N8: Symbian Successor Due In October
by Ernest Doku
The Nokia N8 has finally been given a release date: it is to hit European shores in October 2010.
Despite the phone's good looks and a few hints from Nokia that they might be releasing Symbian phones in the future, it is has been confirmed that this handset will be the Finnish manufacturer's last effort to push the platform on an Nseries device.
A pre-emptive roasting of a pre-production model by serial leaker Eldar Murtazin has then hamstrung the N8's image ahead of it's launch. Nokia will find it very hard to claw back confidence after such an awful start.
On
paper, the N8's specs do look impressive: it's got a large capacitive
touchscreen, a 680Mhz processor and a 12 megapixel camera. However,
specs alone do little to make a great phone (just take a look at the
Toshiba TG01!).
People want a phone that is easy, if not enjoyable to use, and after some supremely disappointing Symbian-based experiences in the past 18 months, Nokia are going to have to pull off a miracle to make the N8 have any impact on Apple's infamous competition.
How did this get confirmed?
Posted by: BA | July 19, 2010 at 01:41 PM
Don't be silly. There will be lots of Symbian^3 handsets from Nokia. You've completely misunderstood what Nokia has said: "The N8 will be the only *Nseries* running Symbian^3."
8-(
Posted by: Steve Litchfield | July 19, 2010 at 04:02 PM
@BA It has appeared as 'coming soon' on the T-Mobile UK website, and the roadmap we leaked on Omio has it pegged for an October launch.
@Steve Litchfield - Thanks for spotting that. Have given the writer in question 50 lashes for his errant Symbian reference. That'll teach me for posting without looking...
Posted by: Ernest Doku | July 19, 2010 at 06:45 PM
October?! wow.. thats a long ole time.. i was hoping for august :( at least it gives time for some more androids to show on the market to see if i just want to get one of those instead......
Posted by: Adam F | July 19, 2010 at 09:48 PM
I'm assuming the guy writing this is American? Firstly, get over Eldar's review (awful on so many levels - there's plenty of reviews from non-pre judgemental people who manage to review the phone on it's own merits, and not trash it cos they hate Symbian.
Also, as pointed out - N series devices will move away from Symbian, but smart phones are only a partial segment of the Nokia empire, so Symbian will still have it's place on a plethora of handsets (remember, it's open source, so it's not JUST Nokia).
And finally - the whole iPhone dominance is merely on the US home market, which is in no way representative of the global mobile phone environment. Stop it with the lazy reporting!
Posted by: Rob W | July 20, 2010 at 05:42 AM
This is yet another dumb move on Nokia's side. Why tell people that this is the last N-Series symbian phone?? It's like telling people go buy the greatest N900 which can do anything...and then two months later tell the loyal customers that they're screwed because N900 will not be officially supported anymore and we're ditching Maemo. At least assure people that the phone will be supported with the updates for a period of time or at least MeeGo will be released to take over Symbian on it. Otherwise it's a waste of money. It seems to me that Nokia is starting to act like a start up company...maybe we'll use S40, Maybe S60, maybe Symbian 3, 4, maybe Maemo or Maybe Meego. Make up your damn mind Nokia. I'm tired of being jerked around. I'm loosing my patience with you. While I do love my Nokias, I want to be able to use them like others can use their androids, iPhones (I just vomited a bit in my mouth after saying the iWord). The apps are just not there for Maemo or MeeGo. MAKE UP YOUR MIND.
Posted by: Maciek | July 22, 2010 at 01:56 AM