TamsS60 – the Symbian Blog

MobiHand has just informed me of an important change in company policy which will allow their developers to compete more effectively in ultra-low-price markets. Their move comes at a crucial time as credit crunch and iPhone push application prices down – enjoy:

We are happy to announce a change of price limits intended to allow you greater pricing flexibility.

The current $3.95 minimum product price in the MobiHand Catalog is changed to a minimum selling price of $0.99 in MobiHand network stores and $2.95 in developer shopping carts.

Please do not set any product price less than $0.99 for sale in any MobiHand store.

If you use a MobiHand shopping cart in your website or application, please do not offer any price or discount that results in a net selling price in the shopping cart that is less than $2.95. If you need to sell any product for less than this amount, please contact us to arrange a modified shopping cart fee that allows us to meet your needs without incurring losses on individual transactions.

Even though I am not too motivated to lower my products prices as of this writing, the added flexibility definitely is nice to have. Congratulations to MobiHand…

Developers hoped that the 7205 Intrigue (which will be sold by Verizon USA) would run some kind of S60…a hope which unfortunately turned out to be false.

PhoneScoop got their hands onto the device and produced a 7 minute video review – disable that flash player and hit the movie below if you feel like an opportunity missed:

Rumors of an eight-week delay hitting AT&T’s version of the Nokia E71x have turned out to be false – the image on the left is from an official AT&T web site, while the text below is from an official AT&T press release:

Nokia E71x

The thinnest smartphone on the market, the Nokia E71x, will be available in the coming weeks for $99.99(1) and features a black steel finish and award-winning design. The Nokia smartphone, based on S60 on Symbian OS(TM) offers the Wi-Fi and the flexibility of many Symbian-based applications, in addition to AT&T’s most popular services, including AT&T Navigator. The Nokia E71x is just 10 millimeters thin and will turn heads when you text friends, or check your corporate or personal email. Customers can learn more at http://www.att.com/nokiaE71x.

AllAboutSymbian claims that the device will indeed run S60v3 FP2 rather than the now-aging FP1 found on E71 devices peddled by other carriers. Unfortunately, this has neither been confirmed nor denied as of this writing.

Further information can be had here:
http://www.wireless.att.com/businesscenter/NokiaE71x/index.jsp

Seeing Nokia release a firmware update is nothing newsworthy for most of you – after all, the folks do it about once every two weeks. However, seeing them announce a firmware update via a press release (!!!) is more than just newsworthy…the full text of the release is below (emphasis by me):

Nokia releases a new software update for Nokia 5800 XpressMusic

Update includes a wide range of new features and improvements

Espoo, Finland – Nokia has announced a software update to the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic to further improve the performance and add new functionalities to the device. The software update is immediately available for download on Nokia Software Update website (http://www.nokia.com/softwareupdate) free of charge (data charges may apply).

Improvements in the new software version include faster data download from Internet, improved e-mail experience, better search experience with in-device search. Many additional features are also included in the software update:

- Faster user interface and faster download times
- New camcorder features: second camera support for still image capture in addition to video calls, burst mode that allows people to take multiple pictures one after another without needing to repress the picture taking button
- Mobile Dictionary: built-in dictionary functionality with voice playback of words utilizing text-to-speech technology, support for 38 languages
- Application Update: with Application Update people can check for available updates for applications and update them directly in the device. Applications can also be kept up-to-date by setting the checking to automatic.

“The update includes great improvements in the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic. As mobile devices become more and more advanced, additional features and new functionalities are easy to install to the existing device. We recommend people to take advantage of the new features and upgrade their Nokia 5800 XpressMusic, and get more from their existing device,” said Soren Petersen, Senior Vice President, Devices, Nokia.

Nokia regularly releases firmware updates for many device models and improves the overall experience by adding new functionality and improving performance.

From my personal point of view, this can be considered an “acknowledgment” of the huge quality issues found in early firmwares (my v10-based XM5800 was almost unusable).

On the other hand: Nokia apparently has some kind of issue with old firmwares (could it be a security eeker?). Apple has done something similar with one crucial firmware update for the iPhone 3G, which means that your guess is as good as mine.

Nevertheless: Nokia wants us all to update. I’ll give it a pop tonight – when will you?

N-Gage heads will soon be able to get their hands onto two new games – Nokia has just updated the official N-Gage web site to include Age of Empires III along with the long-awaited Worms World Party.

As of now, no further information is available about pricing or release dates – stay tuned for further info as we get it!

I guess that reporting Nokia’s top-5 list every week is pointless nowadays…as the top three places haven’t changed for more than 14 days.

Nevertheless, the full list is as follows:

1. MONOPOLY HERE & NOW: THE WORLD EDITION
2. Tetris®
3. World Series of Poker® Pro Challenge
4. Need for Speed™ Undercover
5. Hooked On: Creatures of the Deep

Users of Carbide’s user interface designer probably know about the – um – lackluster quality of this particular Nokia product. Nevertheless, a group of people have contributed bug reports and feature requests to the Carbide team…which have now led to a new release.

The update can be installed via Carbide.c++’s integrated updating tool (Help -> Software Updates -> Find and Install). I have attempted to install it on my Wind with in and succeeded…but had to wait over half an hour as dependencies were checked at minimal CPU load.

Cutting a long story short: don’t do this if you are in a hurry…but do hit that update button before you go and check your email…

P.S. The image on the left is from an iGoogle plug-in called Carbide Update Manager. Click this link to use it…

This is NOT an April Fool’s joke!
Dear Readers,
Our recent growth has caused major issues for our host Brainsware: there are now so many of you that our server architrcture needs to be changed in order to allow us to serve all of you as good as we aspire to do.

In order to do this, a maintenance downtime will take place on the 1st of April, from 22h to 23h local time. This translates to 13h00 in San Francisco or 16h in New York. During this time span, the following web sites may not be accessible:

• TamsPalm – the Palm OS / Web OS blog
• TamsPPC – the PocketPC blog
• TamsS60 – the S60 blog
• TamsWMS – the Windows Mobile Smartphone blog
• TamsIJungle – the iPhone / iPod touch blog
• TamsBlackBerry – the BlackBerry blog
• TamsPalm Germany

Afterwards, the Tamoggemon Content team will be honoured to welcome you again on our news services!

All the best
Tam Hanna for the Tamoggemon Content Team

I have no idea why handset designers keep playing around with their handset’s keyboards…the latest victim is a device designed by Samsung for Verizon (who will peddle it as Alias2):

The image above hits us via PhoneArena, with Engadget Mobile claiming that the keys are “identified” via an underlying E-Ink display.

As of now, no tests have been performed to determine the usability of this new input method. While I personally fear that the usability will be bad due to sub-par materials (this is said to be a cheap handset), I dare to say that this is the first keyboard idea which has impressed me.

Future devices using this technology could allow customers to dynamically adapt the keyboard layout of their devices, for example by replacing unpopular special characters with others he needs more often (I’d love to ditch some weird chars on my XPERIA’s keyboard for < and >, for example).

What do you think?

Even though Krusell does not have the strong online presence of other case manufacturers, they can easily be considered one of the largest case makers currently on the market.

As their products are mainly sold in brick-and-mortar stores, I am a fan of their monthly sales stats as they provide an insight into what “normal customers” (aka folks who don’t read pages such as this one ) buy.

Enjoy:

• 1. (1) Samsung SGH-i900/i910 Omnia
• 2. (7) Nokia 3109
• 3. (3) Nokia 6300
• 4. (2) HTC Touch HD
• 5. (8) Nokia E71
• 6. (4) Nokia E51
• 7. (10) Nokia 3120
• 8. (8) Nokia 5800
• 9. (5) Blackberry Storm
• 10. (-) Samsung M8800
   () = Last month’s position.

The top selling list for March reflects the growing trend where we see an increased demand for a well designed protection for smart phones, says Ulf Sandberg CEO at Krusell. The Omnia as well as Touch HD and the E-series from Nokia are good examples of precious devices that the user is anxious to protect, and to do it with style. The consumers are becoming more demanding and they don’t except solutions that doesn’t combine protection, user-friendliness and good design.
 
The Swedish manufacturer of carrying cases for portable electronics, Krusell, releases its “Top 10″-list for March 2009. The list is based on number of pieces of model specific mobile and smart phone cases ordered from Krusell during March 2009. Krusell’s list is unique due to the fact that it reflects the sales of phones on six continents and in more than 50 countries around the globe.

I always wondered why the red and blue versions of the XM5800 were significantly cheaper than their black brethren. However, it seems to have something to do with support: while black XM5800’s have had no issues getting firmware updates, customers owning a re XM5800 bought in the UK seem to have all kinds of problem.

AllAboutSymbian reports that the (incredibly important) v20 update has just been made available to devices with UK software: but is said to be incompatible with devices still running firmware version v10 for various reasons.

Customers on version 10 are said to be forced to get the update done by customer care – hit the link above for further information.

The BBC reports that the rumored plans for a next mandatory price cut will be decided upon in a full session of the EU Parliament April 24th the latest. Should the legislation pass, roaming mobile phone users can look forward to the following benefits:

by July 2009
Roaming costs, outgoing call: 43 cents/minute
Data: 1Euro/MB

by July 2010
Roaming costs, outgoing call: 39 cents/minute
Data: 0.80 Euro/MB

by July 2011
Roaming costs, outgoing call: 35 cents/minute
Data: 0.50 Euro/MB

Furthermore, SMS costs will be capped at just 11 cents for a single SMS transmitted all over Europe. Call billing will be per second, with an initial 30sec charge permitted.

Image: Wikimedia Commons / Lars Aronsson

Sony Ericsson’s XPERIA X1 was originally shown off in silver livery, with a black version being shown off some time later. As time progressed, analysts doubted if SE would really release both versions…but they did so in the end.

The picture on the left hits us via SEMCblog, who have no further information themselves:

…
Yet I don’t know it’s cancelled colour or just not announced. Hope it’s not cancelled, because it looks so nice! Isn’t it?
…

I personally think that the idou will be made available in both colors in a fashion similar to the XPERIA. The reason for this is carriers: in Austria, A1 peddles the silver version while Hutchison sells the black one only…

The folks at Reuters recently interviewed a Nokia spokesperson who stated the following:

Nokia has not unveiled user numbers for its gaming service, but the spokesman said almost 1 million players have created personal profiles on the N-Gage community pages.

In late-October Nokia said players had created 400,000 personal profiles.

The folks at AdMob’s have just released this month’s Mobile Metrics report, which can be downloaded here (PDF file). Unfortunately, the downward trend for the Symbian platform becomes painfully obvious:

When looking at the operating systems in more detail, we see that there still are loads and loads of FP2 devices around. S60 touch is catching up very slowly:

Looking at the top Symbian handsets world-wide, we see two v2 devices on top, closely followed by the Nokia N73. No recent handset made it into the top-20: