Its been 5 months since Nokia’s Ovi Store has launched. Bill Perry, the Sr. Services Marketing Manager for Forum Nokia, California has written about the statistics of Ovi Store so far.

Quoting from his blog mobileperry, the following stats of Ovi Store are from 26 May 2009 through the 31st October 2009:

• Available on over 100 different Nokia devices (60+ Symbian S60 devices)
• Active users from over 180 countries
• Developers from 65 countries are distributing content
• 8 countries today have local content, local language support and mobile billing: UK, Spain, France, Germany, Singapore, Australia, Italy, Russia. By the end of Q1 2010 there will be more than 20 countries.
• Top 10 Ovi Store Markets by performance in alphabetic order: Egypt, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Spain, Saudi Arabia, Thailand, Russia & UK
• In almost all of the top 10 Ovi Store countries, 5800 XpressMusic and N97 are the #1 and  #2 devices for Ovi Store activity and consumer engagement
• Re-Download now available and search is much improved.
• Ovi Store will ship embedded on most new compatible Nokia devices including Symbian S60 and Series 40 from Q4 2009
• On average, each registered user has downloaded at least 8 items from Ovi Store
• In October, the number of content items downloaded was over 70% higher than in Sept.

Hmmm Looks like the Ovi Store is doing pretty well. Isnt it?

Also it seems like the rise in the sales of touchscreen phones like Nokia 5800 and Nokia N97 are showing on the Ovi Store as well. What do you think?

Have you used Ovi Store? What do you think about it? Pass on your views below.

• Samsung To Launch Its Own Application Store on September 14
• Nokia Widsets is now part of OVI Store
• Nokia Ovi Store vs Apple App Store – an indepth comparison
• Mobile Big Wigs to roll out their own desi application stores
• Nokia App Store is officially called as Ovi Store!

Ranesh was a Nokia fan for a long time and had owned few Nokia’s including an E70. But he made the transition to Verizon for a decent deal on a Voyager two years ago (because he likes qwerty keyboards and that was the only one he liked at the time). Ranesh couldn’t wait for a decent Nokia device to hit the market he liked, so he took the plunge. When he tested out the N97, he was terribly disappointed with the overall OS and decided to hold out for the Christmas season of this year to see what was around the corner and settled on the Motorola Droid running the Android 2.0 OS.

Nokia is readying the release of their flagship handset, the N900. Unfortunately, Nokia posted it’s first loss in 10 years.(We know Nokia Siemens Networks was to blame.) The problem wasn’t lack of phones worldwide but the Chinese “bandit” or known as “shanzhai” manufacturers eating away at Nokia’s bottom line. Several of these manufactures including Shenzhen Evien Co., Ltd., SZ Telstar Co Ltd., T-Link Industrial Development Company Limited, ZTE Corp., Lenovo and Huawei Tech have already infiltrated the Chinese market with a variety of cell phones. This doesn’t include big boys like HTC and Dell, among others that are making a splash into the worldwide market.

Nokia is the largest mobile phone manufacturer but is feeling the confined spaces of the Mobile market more than ever. RIM’s Blackberry (the business mainstay), Apple’s iPhone (of course) and Palm’s Pre (and soon to be Pixi line), have all cut into Nokia’s overall market share. Not to mention Google’s Android is having huge success with HTC building some great quality phones and across other manufacturers too. While still fighting off fierce competition in the high end cell phone range, Nokia has to contend with middle and low end all at the same time. A feat never before performed for his Helsinki, Finland company.

Step in Maemo: Nokia decided to strike back with the flagship N900 which runs its latest OS based off of Linux called Maemo. This new handset is set to change the direction for Nokia in the mid to higher end device range. Nokia began shipments on November 10^th and are expected to hit retailers shortly, for an estimated price of EUR 500 ($746.00 USD).

Will Nokia be able to break through the obstacles of intruders into its once dominant domain? The N900 comes packed with plenty of features WAY ahead of phones in its class: ARM Cortex-A8 processor, up to 1GB of total application memory. widgets, contacts and shortcuts all on the desktop,. Pictures and videos taken with the 5Mpx Carl Zeiss camera automatically are tagged where they were taken, SMS and IM, standard built-in 32 GB storage is big enough to store up to 7,000 songs or 40 hours of DVD-quality video, and it can be expanded up to 48GB with an external microSD card.

Image Courtesy of tnkgrl

The phone is amazing and packs an MMA like punch compared to other phones in the market place at this time, but Nokia will have to bring the beautiful Maemo OS down to the mid and perhaps even lower range handsets to regain what market share has already been lost. If anyone can do this, Nokia can and with the N900, where they proved that they are listening to the consumer.

• Hello Moto becomes Hello Samsung as Motorola looses global market share
• Motorola launches Made in India phone
• Ebooks coming to your nokia smartphone
• Motorola Droid Enjoys Great Sales!
• Nokia N900 Fondle Video

Earlier, we had published information and provided a leaked picture of the Sony Ericsson Kurara. Well now once again, we have some more leaked pictures of the Kurara. These are the live pictures posted by folks over at the SEMC Blog.

There has been some new information gathered:

• It runs on Symbian S60.
• It has a 3.5″AMOLED Touchscreen Display
• It has an 8.1Megapixl Camera with Portrait Mirror and it seems to lack the LED flash which we previously thought was present.
• It maybe capable of recording HD Videos.

While many rumours claim it to be an media centric device with good imaging capabilities, the lack of an LED flash causes doubt. The handset is set to be launched in 2010 at an unknown price.

• Sony Ericsson Kurara Exclusive Pictures and Information!
• Sony Ericsson Satio (Idou) Photo Gallery
• Sony Ericsson K810 Cyber-shot Cameraphone launched
• Sony Ericson Xperia X1 & HTC Touch HD Fusion
• Sony Ericsson to set R&D unit for mobile phones in Chennai

We had earlier heard about a Sony Ericsson device codenamed Kurara. Now only a day after the Sony Ericsson XPERIA X10 has been announced, we have another leak to satisfy our hunger.The Sony Ericsson Kurara (Final Model Name Might Change) is a full touchscreen phone running on Symbian S60 (Not sure if it’s 5th Edition).

The other features include:

• 3.5″ AMOLED Touchscreen Display
• 8.1 Megapixel Camera with LED Flash(The camera is almost centrally located on the device. Don’t know why but there must be a reason for placing it so)

Thats all the information we have gathered and have to offer for now. But as soon as new information comes out, we will be sure to let you know.

Source

• Sony Ericsson Kurara Live Pictures!
• Sony Ericsson Closing Facilities and Laying Off Employees!
• Sony Ericsson P1
• Sony Ericsson GreenHeart Environment Friendly Mobile Phone & Warranty
• Sony Ericsson PlayNow Arena Demo Video

Have you downloaded the app yet ? How do you like it ?

• Video : BlackBerry 8520 Optical Trackpad in action
• Nokia Money Video Demo at NokiaWorld Looks Fantastic !
• iPhone OS 3.0 hints Video Recording
• Nokia Erdos Video leaked rumored to be 8800 successor
• SE Xperia X1 Official Video

Opera Mini 5 Beta is one of the best mobile browsers out in the market and we totally love using it over a slow GPRS connection.  But the app is slow on even high-end phones because its based on Java. Now get ready for some serious mobile browsing on your Nokia or any other Symbian smartphone -  You can now Download Opera Mobile 10 beta which is a native S60 application.  We tested the app on a Nokia 5800 (touchscreen phone) and a E52 ( non touch) and the app certainly kicks ass and is a zillion times faster than the mini 5 beta. It features the same speed dial found in the desktop browser, support for multiple tabs, contextual menus and a lot more.

This product has been due for quite some time as the last version of the native Symbian app was 9.7. Jon von Tetzchner,CEO of Opera Software told us that a lot of the code has been written from scratch and a lot of work has gone into development of Opera Mobile 10 and Opera Mini 5. We will have a video of the interview coming up soon.

Press Release

Mobile browsing revolution: now available for Nokia smartphones
brings powerful features to world’s most-used smartphone platform

Oslo, Norway – November 3, 2009 – Opera Software today unveiled the beta
of Opera Mobile 10 for Nokia and other Symbian/S60 handsets. Most notable
in the new Opera Mobile 10 beta is a sleek design, which Opera first
introduced to the world in the recent release of Opera Mini 5 beta. The
crisp, new look introduces the Speed Dial, tabbed browsing and the always
convenient password manager to Opera Mobile. Opera Mobile 10 beta is
optimized for both touchscreen and keypad-style navigation and is
available for free from http://www.opera.com/mobile/next/.

Performance was prioritized in this beta. It is twice as fast as the
previous Opera Mobile released for Symbian/S60, and users will discover
significant speed improvement when downloading pages, zooming and panning.
Opera Turbo is also integrated, saving end users both time and money with
its server-side compression technology.

“Today’s powerful smartphones deserve an equally powerful browser, like
Opera,” said Jon von Tetzchner, CEO, Opera Software. “This beta continues
our work to extend the desktop Web experience to mobile phones, allowing
users to surf the Web without limitations, even while on-the-go. No matter
the device in use, Opera delivers a faster, easier and hassle-free Web
experience.”

Feature details
Fresh design – Alongside the new Opera Mini 5, Opera has revamped
the look and feel of its mobile-browser portfolio to ensure that it is
simple and intuitive, making mobile Web browsing easier than ever.

Desktop favorites on the mobile phone – Opera desktop feature favorites,
including tabbed browsing, Speed Dial and password manager, make it easier
for you to surf on the go by reducing the time and effort it takes to get
to a Web site.

Advanced compatibility – Opera Mobile 10 beta uses the very latest
generation
of the Opera browser engine, ensuring that all your favorite Web sites and
applications work exactly the way they do on a desktop computer.

Availability
Opera Mobile 10 beta is available for Nokia, Sony Ericsson and Samsung
smartphones running Symbian/S60, 3rd and 5th editions. The beta is free to
download to your computer from http://www.opera.com/mobile/next/ or
directly to your mobile phone from http://m.opera.com/mobile.

• Opera Mini 5 Beta is out. Download Now
• Opera Mini available for Blackberry and Palm Treo
• Create Bookmarklets on Opera Mini/ Nokia Default Browser/ Other Mobile Browsers
• How to copy paste from webpages in E71/E61i using Opera Mini 5
• Bolt Mobile Browser crosses 100 million pageviews

If you said “Yes” to any one of the above, here is some amazing news to you all. Google has now launched Voice Search for all the Nokia S60 Phones.

Just download the Google Mobile App onto your Mobile Phone and you are all set to search the web by Voice. An alternate way to get Voice Search onto your phone is to visit m.google.co.in from your phone’s default browser and downloading the Google Mobile application.

Downloading the Google Mobile Application places a shortcut to Google search on your Phone’s home screen which makes it very easy and very fast to search for anything on the Web. Pressing the call button for a while, activates the voice search so you can speak your query and search for that particular Query. And if you are in Bangalore or Gurgaon, you can just turn on the “My Location” feature to give you the most relevant results nearby.

Here are some screenshots of the application. Check them out.

Check out the video below to see demo of Google Voice Search and also to learn to search by voice using simple commands.

• Google Launches Mobile App for Nokia S60 smartphones
• Google Gear for Windows Mobile
• Google Adds Turn by Turn Navigation. Releases Maps Navigation for Android 2.0
• Google Navigation will come to iPhone, but only if Apple approves
• We Meet – A Location Aware, Group SMS Application

Nokia have recently announced the end of their gaming platform, the NGage. Instead, the OVI store will be used as the gaming platform.

“We’ve been busy evolving our mobile gaming service and building up the portfolio of games in OVI Store. Currently, we have more than a thousand games available in OVI Store supported by 100 Nokia device models and are growing the platform and portfolio as quickly as possible.

If you haven’t checked out OVI Store lately, we suggest you stop by store.ovi.com/games for the latest mobile games for your Nokia device.”

The NGage games can be purchased online upto 2010 and the site and NGage Arena will remain online throughout 2010. It is likely that a replacement for NGage Arena will be developed through OVI. The purchased NGage games will continue to work even after 2010 but you will not be able to use the community services.

Source

• Get your free game by joining N-Gage Gamers Gang
• Nokia’s new N-gage gaming platform
• Nokia launches much awaited N-Gage
• Ngage relaunch gets closer with pre-release downloads
• N-Gage ready – Nokia all set to say GO

FORUM NOKIA INDIA ANNOUNCES ITS ANNUAL DEVELOPER CONFERENCE

~ Invites registrations to a unique interactive platform to ‘Unlock the Star’ in you! ~

~ To feature latest in mobile application development and distribution through Ovi Store ~

Nokia today announced the Forum Nokia Developer Conference’09 to be held on the 7^th December 2009 at the Taj Residency, Bangalore. Titled ‘Unlock Star’, the conference aims at leveraging the limitless possibilities of the mobile device to drive developer success.  Mr. D Shivakumar, VP and Managing Director, Nokia India along with Ms. Purnima Kochikar, Vice President, Forum Nokia and Developer Community will deliver the opening keynotes, addressing leading software developers, network operators and content partners about Nokia business and technological development opportunities.

Registrations for the conference are now open at www.nokiadevcon.in. Aimed at bringing together attendees from across India to learn, share and explore the latest in application and content development, integration and distribution opportunities for Nokia devices and services, the forum will enable developers to utilize the potential of Nokia’s Ovi Store by ensuring easy access to publish applications and content to millions of Nokia devices. The conference will further help developers acquaint themselves with dynamic technology platforms for creating truly compelling user experiences, equipping them with new skills, new connections, and new ideas to create future technologies. The event would also have information sharing sessions by Industry, Business and Technology experts.

According to Purnima Kochikar, Vice President, Forum Nokia and Developer Community, “The Forum Nokia Developer Conference will provide in-depth information on both the technical tools required to build innovative mobile apps, and the distribution channels such as the Ovi Store required achieving commercial success for the apps.”

She further said “The convergence of mobility and the internet is creating unprecedented opportunities to create innovative mobile apps that transform the way we live and access information. The Indian developer is uniquely positioned to leverage this opportunity.  Forum Nokia is excited about partnering with and supporting this vibrant community of developers to find success not only in the Indian market but also in the markets worldwide. This conference will be the first step in creating a highly collaborative ecosystem that will grow and thrive by sharing best practices and setting a high bar for innovation.”

Developer attendees can also schedule one-on-one meetings at the Summit with Nokia technology and business experts to answer open questions. In addition, Forum Nokia’s Technology Expert would share the latest mobile technologies and platforms that promise to substantially broaden the software development and business horizons of mobile developers attending the event.

Over the last decade, Forum Nokia has been working extensively with the developer community in India, providing them all necessary support in terms of tools and distribution channels to bring them at par with the international community. Today, Forum Nokia has over 180, 000 registered developers in India and accounts for the single largest concentration of incoming web traffic on www.forum.nokia.com from any country.

• Forum Nokia Event on WRT Widgets at Chennai today

As you all know the Omnia HD is Samsung’s first S60 5th edition device and the third touch screen S60 phone to be launched. Samsung with a good experience in touch screen phones, has for some reason failed to deliver a product that sets it apart from an N97 or a 5800. Sure, in terms of the hardware and the camera performance, the Omnia HD is one helluva performer, but some downright silly niggles keep the Omnia HD from becoming a high seller. The good part of it, a firmware update can easily fix it.

So let me run you through the software or rather the OS of the phone. The Symbian based S60 5th edition is an OS designed originally for non touchscreen phones and later, adapted to touchscreen phones. This is very much evident from the manner in which the menu and options are designed. Samsung has on it’s part tried to customize it and make it more finger friendly, it has in some cases succeeded and in other areas failed.

The Omnia HD has two distinct icon sets working in tandem in a theme (Samsung LBS image and the above). This makes using the phone confusing initially and also points to a shoddy customization process. A single complete icon set should have been used instead of 2 different ones.

Our review device came with only two themes and none of them were exciting enough to have, I’m sure the Omnia HD could have been given some great themes, like the i450 had, once upon a time. The accelerometer also was programmed to work in the most vague manner I have seen. For example, when the screen was tilted to landscape mode, one would naturally, that the phone’s orientation would also change, but in the ‘Main Menu’, it refused to do so. If you were to tilt the phone in a sub-menu, it will work just fine. As silly and unimportant it may sound, this little niggle really irritated me. Every time I needed to do something with the phone, I would have to constantly rotate the phone. This made the phone an extremely impractical device to have. It also meant that taking screen shots in landscape mode was not possible and I could not get even a single screen shot in the landscape mode.

Another place where this auto rotation problem made things irritating and down right frustrating was the input via a QWERTY setup. The phone’s OS was not programmed to show a number pad which could be used to key in text. It kept on switching between a QWERTY (landscape) and the menu screen (portrait). This meant I sparingly used the keypad and relied mostly on a QWERTY device of Nokia for my typing needs.  I wonder why Samsung could not implement landscape view for the main menu, it did implement it elsewhere in the phone!

The browser is another area which disappointed me, why for the love of good things, could Samsung not implement fullscreen view as a default is beyond me. A 3.7 inch screen should have had default fullscreen view in the browser! I had to manually do it everytime for a good internet experience.

The Bluetooth option on the phone also has two distinct menus. Why did Samsung do that? I have no idea. While one involves a lot of touch input and every selection must be saved for the phone to process. This setup is simply ridiculous and makes one ponder why could this not have been automated. The other menu for bluetooth  seems to be the answer to that question. This UI execution for switching the bluetooth on and off is very simple and easy to use. It should be made mandatory in all phones. One has to tap the center of the screen, and the bluetooth is switched on, the ‘advanced’ settings are conveniently tucked away under an icon. Now why did Samsung not make this the only way to use bluetooth in this phone? Only Samsung UI designers would know.

Widget Support is another area where the Omnia HD scores really high. The TouchWIZ based widget support means that many of the options and settings are available in the form of shortcuts and you can have them either on the sidebar or on 1 of the 3 screen panes. While it is not as novel a way as N97, this kind of design for the UI makes it possible to do much more on the homescreen, and that is a good thing. I did miss a certain setting found in the Nokia devices about cycling the wallpaper, and I hope it comes to the HD soon.

Another area, where Samsung have worked is in the music player area. The music player is application in the Omnia HD has been executed really well, it is clear Samsung did not want the standard Nokiaesque music player application to ruin the music experience. So all that can be made easily accessible to the listener in terms of settings was put up front in the form of buttons onscreen. What this allowed me as a listener was to play with the music settings and choose on the go how I wanted my music to sound without having to dig deep into the menu.  The landscape mode in this application revealed an iPhone sort of browsing of the tracks on the phone. The visualizations also were absolutely wonderful. Samsung’s UI designer have really worked on this part of the UI and delivered a superior experience when compared to a Nokia N97 or even a 5800.

The music on the phone with the presence of a Dolby 5.1 setting along with many other options made for a very very interesting and fun experience. I’ve never had so much fun listening to music on my phone. The customizations possible with regard to how your music sounds is really good and far more than what any other music oriented device offers in the market today. The speakers are loud and I mean really loud, the supplied handsfree is also very nice, but when connected to a high end full cup headphones, the quality of output jumps several notches. Full marks for music to the Omnia HD, it’s not as ‘loud’ as the N82 but is certainly much more clearer and refined. I wonder how this would have translated onto a proper home theater if the HD had an FM transmitter.

Now we know that Samsung has DivX and Xvid support out of the box, this support meant that I had a PMP and a phone built into the same device. This is where the Omnia HD beats every other Nokia touchscreen phone. The large AMOLED screen coupled with DivX support gives a superior viewing experience, one that I have never witnessed in other touchscreen phones. When it comes to entertainment Samsung seems to have a much better package than a certain company based in Espoo. Oh and the Omnia HD is extremely capable of playing the files uncompressed and is also capable of full HD playback if I am not wrong.

Overall the UI on the Samsung is really good, but as mentioned earlier there are niggles which only tend to frustrate and hold the device back. Then there are other things which seem to take the device ahead in terms of user experience. But this half finished work means that one is left wanting for more. I’m sure all of this can be fixed with one major firmware update, in  fact it should be, a superior product than it’s intended rival, the Omnia HD would then become the rightful heir to being the flagship of the Symbian S60 5th edition OS.

I would rate the software a high 7/10, capable of much a higher points, let down only due to a half finished UI.

After such an exhaustive overview of the software, I’ll be brief about the accessories that come with the Omnia HD.

The Samsung Omnia HD ships with a Micro USB charger, a data cable, a 3.5mm audio plug earphone (handsfree), a TV out cable and manuals and PC suite CD. What I liked about the last bit was that everything was packaged in small things, a mini CD instead of a regular CD, smaller handheld size manual instead of a booklet. Everything else was the same but the finishing was good and the cables did have smaller rubber enclosures at the ends, meaning that it wasn’t thick. This made them look really good. The handsfree that came with the Omnia HD was also very good. The earphones are of the kind that kill any outside noise, delivering a superior audio experience in a compact package. The output was good and it did not disappoint when listening to songs with the Dolby switch on!

I would give the Omnia HD a healthy 8/10 in this department.

• Samsung Omnia HD Review Part-2: Screen and Backlighting
• Samsung Omnia HD Review Part-1: Design
• Samsung Omnia HD and Omnia Pro launched in India get a Price
• Samsung Omnia HD i8910 makes a debut
• Samsung Omnia HD Photo Gallery