Nokia N78 Hands on

Hands ons, actually.

Certain luckier than me folks have got their hands on the N78 and luckily for us unlucky folks (this pun might prove to be headache-inducing, I realize now), posted great walkthrough videos of their experience with the device.

To name names, the first two videos come from Zach over at SiMo and Boy Genius Report, and the third one is courtesy of Jonathan Greene, of atmaspheric | endeavors.

I know this might come as a surprise for some, but I'm drooling over the N78's looks. Yes, the keys look like a compromise but I'm a sucker for the fact that when the key lights are off, it almost appears to have no keys at all (thanks to the extremely flush design) except for the d-pad and those 4 'bars'. Very, very sexy if you ask me. Can't wait to get my hands on an N78 myself! Let's hope the WOM World chaps might help with this.

Enjoy the videos!

Hands on with the Nokia N78 from Zach Epstein on Vimeo.

Hands on with the Nokia N78, Again from Zach Epstein on Vimeo.

Shake controlled music player: finally!

I've always been a fan of accelerometer-based apps, but with every such release I was as excited as disappointed. Because in spite of touting new and innovative features each time (well, almost each time), none of them introduced a feature certain Sony Ericsson phones have had for quite a while, namely shake control for the music player.

So I'm naturally anxious to see this concept by Daniel Rocha turn into an actual app. What's more baffling is that it took him 2 (two!) hours to write the code for this concept in Python.

The idea is simple right now: shake the phone in one direction to advance to the next track and in the opposite direction to go back to the previous track. Hopefully Daniel will continue his work on this and add a decent UI.

In the mean time, check out the concept video:

[Source: Symbian Freak]

Firefox Mobile browser concept

Boy, is the mobile browser scene getting crowded! Mobile Safari (as seen on the iPhone) definitely started this, the S60 Browser followed suit, but now concept after concept shows up. There's Opera Mobile 9.5 (as seen on the HTC Touch Diamond, though not yet available for download for the rest of us), the much hailed Skyfire, and who knows how many others! (I haven't included Opera Mini since my focus here is on native solutions). I wonder who will still be around in a year or so...

Anyway, here's the latest preview/demo video of Firefox Mobile. Big brand, surely. We'll have to wait and see if it will produce a 'big' browser for the mobile world. They are kinda late to the game. [EDIT: Stacey Higginbotham from GigaOM has similar thoughts]

Firefox Mobile Concept Video from Aza Raskin on Vimeo.

[Source: IntoMobile]

Nokia N79, N85, 6260 leaked? PLUS: New Nokia 5800 XpressMedia pictures and updated S60 Touch video

It's been all over the internets (I think I'll miss George W.Bush when he's gone). Interestingly, these 'leaks' showed up the exact same day Apple was announcing the 3G iPhone. Some say this is hardly a coincidence. If it actually isn't, all I have to say is "Way to go Nokia!". It was a smart move, even if at first glance it might not seem that way. One might argue that more attention would have been paid to this, especially by the 'mainstream' blogs, if it came on another day. The investors, however, might not agree. Nokia showed the world the fact that it has interesting things up its sleeve. And anyway, these were only leaks, not announcements. Announcing phones on the same day as Apple would have been a disaster. Samsung did exactly that with its i900. That was stupid.

Back to the leaks.

Problem is, in a way, deep down, I hope that these are not actual leaks. They don't seem to be Photoshop renders, so I can only hope that they were early prototype stages of other devices (like this N85 may have been to the N96). Because if they are leaks ...yawn... let's just say I'm not impressed (the 6260 is different, not that I'm overwhelmed by it or anything, but I see where that's going - more in the dedicated paragraph).

The N79

Um...This has got to be the ugliest Nseries I've ever seen! Seems cheap, overly cheap and has a design that is probably appealing to those in their early teens only. The screen doesn't seem to be bigger than the 2.4 inch ones found in both the N82 and the N78. I can only hope that this handset will bring something revolutionary (or at least interesting) spec-wise. Otherwise, it is sad in a way that Nokia appears to be going the Motorola and, more recently, Sony Ericsson way, as in releasing dozens of phones which are more or less the same thing. Again, here's hoping that's not the case...


The N85



Now...what is this? A while ago Eldar from Mobile Review posted some interesting information on their forums (no link for that, sorry). He said that the N85 will probably be the next video flagship device from Nokia, following on the footsteps of the currently aging N93. Expectations were therefore set high. But this... This looks like an N96 without all the gloss. Seriously. It apparently features a 5 Megapixel camera (soon to be dethroned in the megapixel race) with Dual LED flash. Sound familiar? I'm having real issues picturing this phone as a video flagship, and certainly hope this is nothing more than a very-early-stage rendering of the N96.


The 6260



As I said above, I see where this is going (or rather, aiming). It appears to be a slider version of the 6220 classic, has the same design language and presumably the same camera. Good move this, as it will further help pushing smartphones into the mainstream. Now a leak of such a phone may not be as exciting as that of, say, the N95 (back in the day), and surely devices like this will not get the blogosphere and media attention that the likes of the N96 and N82 get now, but that is a pity, really. For Nokia, the mass adoption of S60, made more and more likely by the 6120, 6220 classic and now the 6260, is more important in terms of prospective sales than any one flagship device. I know, it's the stuff no 'early adopter' wants to hear, but it makes perfect (business) sense. I can only wish for more 6220s instead of more N79s.


More pictures of the 5800 XpressMedia show up as well



First of all, people, please, pretty please, let's not call this the Tube anymore? That sounds disgusting. Kthx.

The first touchscreen device from Nokia (expected release: Q4) also popped up (again) during the infamous WWDC-day leaks. This time it sports Vodafone branding, which instantly leads to the question of whether or not it will be a Vodafone exclusive, like the 6124 Classic, for example.

Personally I look forward to the 5800's release. Even if a 'true touchscreen flagship' is yet to come (in 2009), this will undoubtedly be an interesting first-effort from Nokia in the touch scene.

However there is a certain element in the pictures above that I find very disturbing. I'm all for choice when it comes to input methods, but the stylus in both these pics just makes it look like it's 1999 all over again. If a stylus is there just to have a choice of input, fine. But stop picturing it! No one in their right mind (mind!) figures a stylus is a competitive edge anymore!

I obviously keep hoping that the stylus is not there because the interface is stylus-optimized, that, now that, would be a true catastrophe for Nokia. Luckily, judging from this updated video previewing the S60 Touch interface, that doesn't seem to be the case. Whew.

[Image source: MobileCrunch]

Sign and install unsigned S60 apps! No hacking, no OpenSigned, no developer certificate required!

After (finally) updating my N95-1's firmware to v21 (previously had v20 and was very happy with it, but anyway, I digress), a very nasty thing occurred. My developer certificate (this will be referred to as devcert from now on) expired, turns out. Now there are a lot of freeware apps ready for OpenSigned, some even (thankfully) Symbian Signed (it only took ages, Symbian, we really appreciate it!). But some are still as they used to be, plain-old unsigned apps. So. What to do, what to do?

Well I proceeded to OpenSigned Online, only to waste about an hour since it returned error after error after error. And by the way, the CAPTCHA implementation there is surely one of the least readable I've ever seen!

So I set myself out on a quest for a solution to this issue. I've had a developer certificate, as I said, courtesy of P@sco, but since it expired, I found myself in the exact position anyone who buys an S60 phone right now is in. No devcert, no OpenSigned capability of the app, no game. Or?

Well there is a rather simple solution to all this available courtesy of BiNPDA. Now, you might have heard of them in a, erm, less than legal context, but this has nothing to do with that. They have developed a tool that lets you sign and install any unsigned app.

Before I go into details, be advised that this is not a hack. Even if some people use that word incredibly loosely nowadays, this is not a hack by any standard. I have previously stated that I don't encourage anyone to "hack" their S60 phone. This, however, I strongly encourage you to do.

So...without further ado...


How to

First, a one-time procedure.

Download this package.

-Transfer to your phone and install "s60_3_0_app_trk_2_8_6.sisx" for NON FP1 devices (a.k.a. S60v3, S60 rel.3.0), or "s60_3_1_app_trk_2_8_6.sisx" for FP1 devices (a.k.a. S60v3 FP1, S60 rel.3.1).

-Make sure you have the latest Nokia PC Suite installed (get it from here) and Bluetooth on your phone is NOT active.

-Connect your phone to your computer via USB in "PC Suite" mode (NOT Mass storage).

-Start the TRK app on your phone (which you have just installed in step 1 - look for it in the Applications folder). It will first try to connect via Bluetooth, and therefore a prompt will show up asking you if you wish to activate Bluetooth. Choose NO.

-Then, in the TRK app, go to Options-Settings and change the first line to USB instead of Bluetooth. Also, remember the Port number listed in line 2. Now choose Options-Connect. If all is well, the app will show Status:Connected.

-On your computer, run SecMan.exe (included in the package above). Do NOT let it automatically pick the port, just enter COM1 for Port 1 (the appropriate number is according to the number for the Port field in the TRK app on the phone - see the previous step, above), COM2 for Port 2, and so on. Click OK. If SecMan on your computer returns an error, try again, perhaps changing the Port number on the phone and then in SecMan on your computer.

-Now disconnect your phone from your computer, go to the Applications folder on your phone and run SecMan. Choose Options-Install Root Certificate.

When you come across an unsigned app...

Download the app to your computer, run RootSign.exe (included in the package) and sign the app using this tool. Then transfer the RootSigned app to your phone, install and...voila!


Thoughts

This proves, yet again, that people hate the Symbian Signed situation. Furthermore, if Symbian itself doesn't fix the signing process (or continues to improve it in such a painfully slow manner), people will find 'alternative' solutions.

This is taking longer than usual...

Just had to quote Google on this one. Well, time has passed, and days turned into weeks and then weeks turned into months.

Now everything is slowly returning to normal.

You might have noticed the domain change, I don't think anyone would say that ssixty.info was better than s60online.com, so here it is! There are also a few 'cosmetic' changes, and more ads (of which the Chitika ones seem to be broken right now - I'll take care of that later).

More details about what's changed and what's not in the next post. So, if anyone is still here, following this blog (FeedBurner seems to think so!), hello again!