Way to crush people’s dreams Craig. Just over a week ago I live blogged the Intel-Nokia (NYSE: NOK) conference call where they announced they’ll be working together to create a new class of devices and usher in an era of unprecedented connectivity. Former Intel CEO Craig Barrett was in Helsinki yesterday and he told Retuers that “we will have to wait a few years to see if the deal is successful.”

Not one, not a couple, but a few. I’m not surprised really, an Intel Atom processor still consumes an order of magnitude more than the equivalent ARM processor, just keep your expectations in check. Don’t expect to see Intel based smartphones for a long, long time. 2011 we may see high end models, but 2012 is more likely.

[Via: The Inquirer]

The Nokia (NYSE: NOK) E75 is the first Nokia to feature a slide out QWERTY keyboard, it is also the first Eseries device to run S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 2 and feature a 3.5 mm headphone jack. It has WiFi, GPS, a 2.4 inch 320 x 240 resolution screen, 3.2 megapixel camera and if you want to know more check out the product page. When it launched it came in black, and now they’ve added a red version. There should be more colors coming out, when I was testing the device it came in … wait I don’t think I can tell you that

Don’t mind the fancy suit case, you’re not going to get that. It’s all a part of Nokia’s blogger out reach program to stir buzz. It’s on Amazon.com for $450 by the way, the USA version.

[Via: The Nokia Guide]

Nokia (NYSE: NOK)’s Ovi Maps 3.0 just launched, and I’d love to tell you what it’s like, but I’m such a huge fan of Google (NSDQ: GOOG) Maps that I see no compelling reason to switch. For those of you living in nations that have expensive data plans, Nokia Maps is for you since you can preload maps. For those of you who need turn by turn navigation, Nokia Maps is for you. For the rest of you, the majority of you, just go to google.com/gmm on your phone, download, and enjoy.

Why all the negativity? You need to download a file on your computer, to install an application on your phone. How silly is that? Even more silly, the file you need to download to get Maps 3.0 on your device will only work with a PC. Sure Google Maps may not have “3D landmarks for over 200 cities, rotation, tilting, night view, and fly-overs and fly-throughs” or “enriched POI information by Lonely Planet, Michelin and Wcities, as well as a weather service that provides 24 hour and 5-day forecasts”, but the search works remarkably well and when I’m trying to find a bodega at 4 in the morning in a rough neighborhood, I want to see accurate results and fast.

[More screenshots here]

It’s fair to guess Nokia (NYSE: NOK) will launch a new Internet tablet device later this year. We’ve already posted an article with the rumored specs, but we haven’t said — cause we don’t know — whether the touchscreen used will be capacitive or resistive. The point of this article is to make the case for the use of capacitive touchscreen as well as a chance to add my 2 cents to the table.

First of all, I must say that I’m a big fan of the Maemo platform. Though I haven’t used the original Nokia 770, I relied on the N800 a lot. Coupled with a Bluetooth keyboard, it was my mobile office, and I wrote hundreds (yes hundreds) of articles for IntoMobile on it. Later on, I ordered the N810 from the U.S. — because it was significantly cheaper due to a weak dollar — but it got lost in the transport to Europe. Boy was I pissed…

Anyway, I continued using my N800 until I bought the Dell Mini 9, which is the cornerstone of my current mobile office. This is not to say I’m not using the N800 any more, it’s just that I’m not using it as often as I used to.

As a matter of fact, I brought the Nokia tablet with me to Barcelona. And there’s the part where my plead for the capacitive touchscreen comes in. It was very hard, almost impossible to see anything on the N800’s screen under the Sun in Spain. At the same time I had my iPhone with me, which touchscreen hasn’t bothered me at all. Now you could argue the capacitive touchscreen is no good for some markets in Asia where handwriting recognition is a must have feature, to which I say - fine, make two versions of the device, one with capacitive and the other one with resistive touchscreen. I’m sure, actually quite confident, the capacitive version will outsell the resistive one even if it ends up costing $50 more. And having a choice could prove beneficial to the platform, or at least me thinks so.

To summarize - capacitive touchscreen is a must. Otherwise I don’t see a reason why would someone (mainstream user, not a Linux fan) would go for Maemo rather than Windows Mobile. The rumored specs we’ve seen go in line some of the existing WinMo smartphones such as some HTC and Acer models, which rely on the “classic” resistive touchscreen technology. This is not to say this is the only reason for selecting one platform over another, it’s just something pretty visible/tangible to the end user.

You could argue an AMOLED screen could do the trick, but i don’t buy it.

As for the rest of my wishes, I hope Nokia will use the same or at least very similar keyboard as the one the N810 has. I like the D-pad on the left, but I don’t like the new-look keyboard of the N97. To be fair, the N810’s keyboard could slide a bit more down to leave little more space for the first row of the keys.

Moreover I’m looking forward to see a decent CPU running the show, and from what we’ve heard, that will be the case. Will Intel jump in as a supplier? I think that may happen, though Nokia could opt for some other chip maker for the first Maemo 5 device — some of their existing semiconductor suppliers.

Finally, to further spur the adoption of the Maemo platform, Nokia should offer the new Maemo device(s) to developers either for free or with a significant discount. The same should go for journalists and bloggers. Speaking of latter, have I mentioned I’m a big fan of Maemo?

Update: Video has been taken down. He probably got an angry call from Nokia (NYSE: NOK) or AT&T (NYSE: T). This happens. No I did not back it up, but you really are not missing anything.

Quick recap of the specs of the Nokia 6790, which will launch on AT&T in July under the name “Surge”, pricing unknown at this time: S60 3.2, 2.4 inch 320 x 240 resolution screen, 2 megapixel camera, quadband GSM/EDGE, dual band 3G (850/1900 MHz), GPS, 94 x 56 x 15 mm, 125 grams and a boat load of ugly:

If you can make it through to the end of this video, congratulations, because I can’t.

[Via: Boy Genius Report]

J2ME is the most highly deployed application platform that exists today. Any mobile phone with a color screen and two soft keys, even the one that has been living in that back of your desk drawer since Clinton’s second term, probably has support for J2ME applications. Some of the best J2ME apps are Google (NSDQ: GOOG) Maps, Google Mail and Opera Mini and … well that’s all. Making money off writing J2ME applications is close to impossible, just ask any developer. Smart phone operating systems are where the cash money is, but don’t tell that to Nokia (NYSE: NOK), who just released version 2.0 of their Java runtime for S60.

It’s beta, so excuse the bugs, but it only runs on S60 5th Edition, and from the first two comments from Tommi Vilkamo’s blog post, people are complaining about the large amount of internal memory the installation requires. This new version is supposed to allow one click installs, reduced application load times, and increased performance. Fascinating, but what about making those engineers work on something important like the next version of Symbian or making Ovi suck less?

Is there something wrong with today’s J2ME engine? Not really!

Scott Weiss, User Interface Technology Manager for The Symbian Foundation, recently said that S60 5th edition, the version that you see on current touch devices shipping from Nokia (NYSE: NOK) such as the N97 and 5800, is a temporary solution and things will change rather soon.

Back in April, the Symbian foundation blog said these two things will be included in Symbian^4 which is supposed to be feature complete this time next year, and be final by the end of 2010:

• A new “Orbit” extension library for Qt, which contains more than 50 widgets tailored for mobile user experience, and which will provide a replacement for the existing “Avkon” widget set.
• A new “Direct UI” interaction and navigation logic, combined with finger-optimised layouts offering excellent touch and hybrid-device user experience.

Krzysztof Choma, who is now unemployed, but used to be a Senior Software Engineer at Nokia for 3 months, and before that a Senior Software Engineer for Symbian for 2 years, confirms that the decision to kill Avkon, which is the codename for Nokia’s flavor of S60, has not yet been made and goes through the pros and cons of switching to Direct UI. The pros for taking Avkon behind the barn and putting a bullet in it’s brain are many: it’s old, maintaining it is costly and starting from scratch to compete with Palm (NSDQ: PALM) and Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) is tempting. The cons: developers would have to rewrite their applications. Well boo hoo!

Direct UI, the replacement for Avkon, is built on top of Qt from what I can tell, and creating a Hello World application in Qt on Symbian takes 10 lines of code, where as for Avkon you have to import multiple classes and create several files.

Conclusion after all that technomumbojumbo: Touch versions of S60 are still going to look like the same S60 from 2002 when the Nokia 7650 came out, and Symbian is not going to be competitive, in the UI/UX department, until the end of 2010. Expect devices with the new UI to probably hit in 2011. When Steve Jobs said the iPhone was 5 years ahead of it’s time, he was not kidding.

[Screenshot above via SlashGear]

The proof is in the tweet from Nokia (NYSE: NOK) Conversations:

Will the keyboard still suck? Yes.

Will the UI reach closer to iPhone parity? Hell no.

Will Nokia issue a press release saying how awesome it is that new software can be downloaded wirelessly to expand the features of their flagship multimedia computer? Maybe.

[Via: Nokia Experts]

The Nokia (NYSE: NOK) 7510 has been sitting pretty on T-Mobile (NYSE: DT) south of the border for awhile now, but here in Canada, Rogers (NYSE: RCI) has just picked it up. I played with one briefly at CES when it was first announced, and though it’s just a simple little flip at its core, there are a few cool features. For one, the the outer casing is interchangeable, so you fashion plates out there can have a phone that matches your wardrobe; it comes packaged with red and teal, but there’s also a brown one available for the less flamboyant users. The LED screen is cool in that it shines through that outer casing, so when it’s off, the surface just looks like a solid colour. On the more practical side of things, the Nokia 7510 offers Wi-Fi support, and as such Rogers is plugging it into their UMA TalkSpot service, so you can make calls over your local Wi-Fi connection. With the right plan, you can make unlimited Wi-Fi calls, but even without it, you’ll never have any signal issues in a connected house. You’ll be able to nab your own 7510 shortly for $49.99 on the customarily painful three-year contract.

[via CNW]

Now that the dust has settled with the announcement of the Nokia (NYSE: NOK)/Intel tie-up, here comes some industry analysis from IMS Research - in case you don’t know who they are:

IMS Research is a supplier of market research and consultancy services on a wide range of global electronics markets. The company is supported by headquarters in Wellingborough, UK and offices in Austin, Texas and Shanghai, China. IMS Research regularly publishes detailed research on consumer electronics, mobile technologies and handsets, and semiconductor markets.    www.imsresearch.com

So on to the commentary - highlights are er… highlighted:

The recent announcement of a collaborative partnership between Intel and Nokia further illustrates the trend of convergence between the mobile, PC and CE industries. The alliance could provide both Intel and Nokia with important entry points to new markets, namely smartphones and netbooks/smartbooks, respectively, although the lines between the two segments are becoming increasingly blurry.

For Intel, the move is viewed as a way to further expand its business into smaller form factor devices, such as Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) and smartphones, which are typically powered by ARM-based solutions. Tom Hackenberg, analyst in IMS Research’s Semiconductor group, comments, “Intel has been promoting the MID platform ever since they began developing the Atom microprocessor. The challenge for Intel has been providing mobile connectivity and power/battery performance that allows for MIDs to compete with current smartphone form factors with regards to talk time. This move should provide them with a foothold in mobile connectivity, and we can reasonably assume that they have the expertise to further refine the Atom’s power performance in new generations.”

A leader in the mobile handset business, Nokia has not aggressively pursued the netbook market, although it is openly considering this as a possibility. Bill Morelli, Research Director of IMS Research’s Mobile Technologies group, states, “Some of Nokia’s motivation behind the partnership with Intel is likely a concern about losing share in the handset markets, more than being aggressive about moving into the other ultra-mobile device segments.” Morelli adds, “Historically Nokia has been very cautious in developing new products. They have a definite approach to new product development with a focus on quality first. The partnership with Intel could provide Nokia with a meaningful differentiator for a netbook/smartbook device.”

Based on a recent study Emerging Ultra-mobile Device Markets, IMS Research estimates that over 50 million ultra-mobile devices (UMDs) will ship in 2009, in addition to over 150 million 3G smartphones and nearly 120 million notebooks. In five years, UMD shipments are forecast to reach 212 million. Anna Hunt, report author and principal analyst at IMS Research, comments, “Companies are rapidly creating new categories for the next-generation of devices, be it media phone, smartbook, Internet tablet, or MID, yet the underlying concept is the same: to provide consumers with new mobility platforms. Ultimately, as Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) taught us, the user interface will have a strong impact on who is the most successful.”

So there you have it - that’s what some of the industry people think. What exactly is going to come from the Nokia/Intel collabo, only time will tell.