Nokia’s new phone, the N9, has been taking up most of our attention the last few weeks but the N5 is trying to get some show time today. A batch of shots of the prototype Symbian device give us a good idea of what to expect.
The phone is destined to be a low-end version of the N9, with pretty descent specs and a different OS. The phone will run on Nokia’s updated Symbian OS called Anna, which has some similarities to MeeGo but is much lower-end software both visually and structurally. The phone hardware is also more modest compared to that of the N9. It has a 3.2-inch screen, a 5 megapixel camera with an LED flash. It’ll run purely on Symbian S60 5th Edition, which is a questionable choice for an OS considering it’s almost at the end of its lifetime.
The design is pretty cool, especially for a shopper looking for a good phone but doesn’t want to spend too much. On the other hand, the entry-level smartphone market is now flooded with Android handsets like the LG Optimus S that seem to have better stuff than this Nokia phone, not to mention they all have a bottomless pit of features and a rapidly-growing app market. If a phone like the N5 wants to be successful it’ll need a lot more work. As it is, I doubt we’ll be seeing this on our top ten must-have list anytime soon.
[ExCellular via GSMArena]