Nokia N97, first high-end N series touch phone unveiled

[Mayareira]

New "rival" to iPhone. It looks quite solid so far.


Hands Briefly On: Nokia N97 Unveiled, The First High-End N-Series Touch Phone

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Introducing the Nokia N97, the next generation high-end mobile phone from Nokia. Described by Nokia folks as a “handheld computer” this device is a pretty comfortable high-end phone. It has a tilting (resistive) touch-screen display, and is the first N-series phone with a QWERTY keyboard. It has 32 gigabytes of memory, expandable to 42 GB via 16 GB memory card. It has a digital compass, a 1500 milliamp battery, and DVD quality video capture. It’s extremely comfortable to hold, easy to use, and represents a solid solid evolution of the Nokia smarthphone line.

* Size: 117.2 x 55.3 x 15.9 mm* *18.25 mm at camera area
* Weight: Approx. 150 g
* Memory: Up to 48GB (32 GB on-board memory, plus 16GB expansion via microSD memory card slot)
* Display: 3.5 inch TFT with up to 16 million colors nHD 16:9 widescreen (640×360 pixels)
* Talk time: Up to 320 min (3G), 400 min (GSM)
* Standby time: Up to 400 hrs (3G), 430 hrs (GSM)
* Video playback: Up to 4.5 hours (offline mode)
* Music playback: Up to 37 hours (offline mode)
* Image capture: Up to 5 megapixels (2584 x 1938) JPEG/EXIF (16.7 million/24-bit color)

Desktop. Laptop. Pocket: The era of the personal Internet dawns with the Nokia N97

Tilting touch display, QWERTY keyboard and personalized home screen – a true mobile computer Barcelona, Spain – Nokia today unveiled the Nokia N97, the world’s most advanced mobile computer, which will transform the way people connect to the Internet and to each other. Designed for the needs of Internet-savvy consumers, the Nokia N97 combines a large 3.5” touch display with a full QWERTY keyboard, providing an ‘always open’ window to favorite social networking sites and Internet destinations. Nokia’s flagship Nseries device introduces leading technology – including multiple sensors, memory, processing power and connection
speeds – for people to create a personal Internet and share their ‘social location.’
“From the desktop to the laptop and now to your pocket, the Nokia N97 is the most powerful, multi-sensory mobile computer in existence,” said Jonas Geust, Vice President, heading Nokia Nseries. “Together with the Ovi services announced today, the Nokia N97 mobile computer adjusts to the world around us, helping stay connected to the people and things that matter most. With the Nokia N97, Nseries leads the charge in helping to transform the Internet into your Internet”.
Sensing your ‘So-Lo’

The Nokia N97 introduces the concept of ‘social location’. With integrated A-GPS sensors and an electronic compass, the Nokia N97 mobile computer intuitively understands where it is. The Nokia N97 makes it easy to update social networks automatically with real-time information, giving approved friends the ability to update their ‘status’ and share their ‘social location’ as well as related pictures or videos.

Widescreen - Internet and entertainment

The home screen of the Nokia N97 mobile computer features the people, content and media that matter the most. Friends, social networks and news are available by simply touching the home screen. The 16:9 widescreen display can be fully personalized with frequently updated widgets of favorite web services and social networking sites. The Nokia N97 is also perfectly suited for browsing the web, streaming Flash videos or playing games. Both the physical QWERTY and virtual touch input ensure efficiency in blogging, chatting, posting, sending texts or emailing.
The Nokia N97 supports up to 48 GB of storage, including 32 GB of on-board memory, expandable with a 16 GB microSD card for music, media and more. This is complemented by excellent music capabilities, full support for the Nokia Music Store and continuous playback time of up to 1.5 days. The Nokia N97 also has a 5-Megapixel camera with high-quality Carl Zeiss optics, 16:9 and DVD quality video capture, and support for services like Share on Ovi for immediate sharing over HSDPA and WLAN.

The Nokia N97 is expected to begin shipping in the first half of 2009 at an estimated retail price of EUR 550 before taxes or subsidies.

[Kiro]

Sweeeeeeeeeeet.

[Mizango]

That's pretty nice.

[Headspace]

What service provider? Does it say?

[ZarakiKujata]

what specifically sets the touch aspect of the screen apart from the Storm/iPhone/gphone?

[Mayareira]

Nokia N97 Demo:

YouTube - Nokia N97 Demo

Its screen is quite similar to iPhone's, I guess. 5 Megapixel Cam + DVD quality video recording is awesome though. Pretty solid battery life too.

[Athas]

What service provider? Does it say?

What he said.

[Mayareira]

Don't think they've announced provider information yet. Probably going to have to wait until q1-2 2009

[Clipse]

Doubt any US provider will carry this since AT&T, T-Mobile, VZW, etc. has never really offered any high-end Nokia's in the past. I personally like it better this way, since I could just buy an unlocked NAM without any carrier-branded bloatware on the phone.

[Dimmauk]

Verizon or T-mobile are my guesses.

[Gafgarionn]

And it'll only cost you 700 dollars! Anyone know how much the iPhone was when it came out?

[thestalkmore]

Looks nifty, but promotional shit always does. Meanwhile, <3 my storm.

[Blarg]

Japan had this come with the original nintendo.

[wyrmtung]

what specifically sets the touch aspect of the screen apart from the Storm/iPhone/gphone?

The screen is resistive which means you have to press hard enough for two layers of the screen to touch each other. Yes, the pressure needed might not be much but it's still more than what is needed for a capacitive touchscreen like those you mentioned which detect touches by the electricity in your skin.

Because of this you might need a stylus to do some delicate maneuvers and it looks like the phone is not capable of dual-touch like the iPhone.

But it's not all about the shininess of the hardware. I would like to see the software and how well it operates in the real world.

[Charla]

Well, the N75s I've seen have all been carried by AT&T. I'm not even sure if Nokia makes any Brew phones (which in America means Verizon/Alltel/random smaller carriers), so I'd definately assume it to be GSM only at this point.

[Bearsan]

Maybe passing up the iphone for so long was actually a good idea.

[Katlan]

I like that it has an actual mini-keyboard vs using the touch screen to type. As fluid as it can be in landscape mode, its still pretty easy to misspell stuff regularly. But it looks thick when closed, hope its just due to the pictures

[octopus]

Unless they get something equivalent to the app store for the Iphone/G1 I don't think they'll be something I want.

Whether or not the browser is good is an important factor as well.

[Fhloston]

Since I'm stuck with T-Mobile until 2010, I'm hoping they provide service for this...not sure though since they already have their G1.

[thestalkmore]

The screen is resistive which means you have to press hard enough for two layers of the screen to touch each other. Yes, the pressure needed might not be much but it's still more than what is needed for a capacitive touchscreen like those you mentioned which detect touches by the electricity in your skin.

Because of this you might need a stylus to do some delicate maneuvers and it looks like the phone is not capable of dual-touch like the iPhone.

But it's not all about the shininess of the hardware. I would like to see the software and how well it operates in the real world.

Stylus would kill it for me. Shit's archaic.