Nokia recently announced the entry-level Nokia 110 and Nokia 112 phones. Both the devices comes with dual-SIM capabilities and Nokia’s unique Easy Swap technology. The Nokia 110 and Nokia 112 have been designed to appeal young, urban consumers who want to experience a fast, affordable online experience.

Mary T. McDowell, executive vice president, Mobile Phones, Nokia, said,
“Today’s mobile phone users want a quick internet experience that allows them to discover great content and share it with their friends – but without being held back by high data costs. The new Nokia 110 and Nokia 112 devices combine browsing, social media, apps, world-class entertainment and long battery life to create a great package for young, urban consumers who want to do it all.”

Nokia 110 and Nokia 112 features a 1.8-inch TFT LCD display, sporting a resolution of 128 x 160 pixels, Symbian Series 40 Operating System, Dual-SIM capability, FM Radio, Media player, VGA digital camera, GPRS/EDGE, 2.0 mm charger connector, Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR, 3.5 mm headset jack, 32 GB expandable memory, Nokia Browser and much more. Nokia 110 offers 10.5 hours of talk-time and 26.5 days of stand-by time, while the Nokia 112 offers 14 hours of talk-time and 35 days of stand-by time.

Nokia 110 measures 110 x 46 x 14.8mm and weighs 80g. On the other hand, Nokia 112 measures 110.4 x 46.9 x 15.4mm and weighs 85.5g. These handsets offer direct access to Twitter, Facebook and other social networks from the home page. Nokia 110 will be available for just EUR 35, while the Nokia 112 will be available for EUR 38. These devices will go on sale from the Q3 of 2012.

This afternoon, I noticed that my Nokia Lumia 800 prompted me for a voicemail password out of nowhere. Thinking that there was some connectivity glitch, I entered the password and guess what, it took me to a visual voicemail screen! I have not seen that screen on my Lumia before, and as I was made to understand, Visual Voicemail for Windows Phone was only available if you added a 4G LTE plan with AT&T.

Before everyone gets excited, I should provide a few disclaimers: I am on my company’s corporate plan, so I don’t know what plan I am on. However, knowing that my plan is actually an “iPhone data” plan, I know it could not be a 4G LTE plan, since there is no such plan. The other thing is that the screen stays at “syncing voicemail” and does not actually show me my voicemails. At some point this afternoon, I did get a message that it was not able to connect and that I could call the traditional voicemail. I restarted the phone to see if this disappeared, and it has not, so I suppose this functionality may actually be rolling out slowly. I sure hope so.

Could this be another move by Nokia (and AT&T) to further the Windows Phone cause? We have seen that Nokia has been able to get a few exclusives and are making quite a splash in bringing the Windows Phone platform on par with iOS and Android. Could this be another move in that plan?

I am unable to confirm if this is true with other non-Lumia or non-LTE devices. If anyone has a Windows Phone (Lumia or otherwise) and is with AT&T but *not* on a 4G LTE plan, let me know. Let’s hope things are changing at AT&T with regard to their love of Windows Phone.

Update: I never saw it on my AT&T Samsung Focus, but here’s a response I saw on twitter:

@TheRomit I dont think so. I’ve had this on my Focus for over a month ever since I forced the 8107 update. It’s stuck on ‘syncing voicemail’

— karelj (@karelj) May 11, 2012

 

More, from twitter:

@TheRomit @wpcentral @wmpoweruser Samsung Focus here, no go.

— Brett Lemoine (@bremic9188) May 11, 2012

It appears that sales of the Nokia Lumia are continuing to be rather strong, with sales of the device “outpacing” supply, according to Nokia U.S. President Chris Weber.

Demand has been outstripping supply for the first couple of weeks, and we’ve been working hard to rectify that,” he said. “The demand for cyan [phones] is significantly outpacing supply. When you give people something different from a design perspective—colors, etc. —it really stands out, and consumers want that.”

Like you may expect on an episode of Undercover Boss, Weber has personally visited many AT&T stores over the past few weekends to monitor how the salespeople take to and promote the Lumia. The verdict? Support has been generally “very good”, but it’s overall still a “work in progress”, he said. Whatever the case, the Lumia does seem to be selling out quite rapidly at many AT&T stores; my Twitter timeline can attest to this, with people all over the country saying that their local store was either running low on or completely out of the Lumia.

“Selling out” is definitely a refreshingly new thing to hear with the Windows Phone, platform, however. But despite these not-too-shabby sales — Lumia sales topped 2 million in the first quarter of this year — the launch wasn’t without problem. A data connectivity bug plagued the device initially, resulting in Nokia/AT&T offering a $100 credit to those who purchased defective devices. This in turn prompted Nokia’s share price to hit a 16-year low, unfortunately. Some other quirks seem to also effect the device, such as a purple tint on the screen (as Mr. Rafael Rivera has encountered with two Lumias already.)

It’s also far too early to deem the platform a complete success; Windows Phone still has ways to go before it can catch up to iOS and Android in the marketshare leaderboard. And to help the platform grow and find its way into the hands of more users, Weber commented saying that the company is working hard to join forces with the CDMA carrier:

“We’re not making any announcements, but we understand the importance of Verizon and we’re working hard to make that a reality.”

Verizon did recently admit that it too had a crush on Windows Phone during an earning’s call late last month. Hopefully the two can proceed to copulate and put more Windows Phones in the hands of consumers

On May 8, at the CTIA Wireless 2012 show in New Orleans, Nokia announced that they are partnering with a bunch of top-tier brands to bring their various apps and games to Windows Phone, with a lot of those apps and games being exclusive to Nokia’s Lumia line of Windows Phones.

Some of the highlights from their press release:

PGA Tour (exclusive to Lumia for 12 months)

In addition to live tournament scoring, highlights and player information, the app provides interactive, augmented coverage of select events and holes, showing each player’s exact position and scoring information. This allows fans to “get inside the ropes” and follow all players competing on the PGA TOUR.

ESPN (exclusive to Lumia until May 2013)

This app already exists on the Lumia devices, and is in addition to the ESPN ScoreCenter app that is available to all Windows Phones. The Lumia app will see some functionality updates and in addition, the ESPN Fantasy Football app (another Lumia exclusive) will be made available later in the Fall to align with the NFL season.

Rovio

After a back-and-forth on whether they are going to build Angry Birds Space for Windows Phone or not, Rovio is now building a dedicated design and development team to create games for Lumia and other Windows Phone devices. That’s quite a scoop for Nokia from the rather negative start that the game maker had with Microsoft and Windows Phone.

Nokia and Rovio will partner to develop innovative new consumer products and content exclusively for Nokia Lumia smartphones, alongside cross platform multi-channel integrated marketing initiatives.

EA

EA will be bringing some of their most popular titles to Lumia and other Windows Phones, including FIFA, Madden NFL, NBA Jam, Tiger Woods PGA TOUR®, Mirror’s Edge and Yahtzee to add to the several titles they already have in the Windows Phone Marketplace.

Groupon (exclusive to Lumia for 6 months)

There is already an official Groupon app which is going to get some major updates, including a cool and innovative augmented reality feature to find deals near you.

Tripdots (exclusive to Lumia for 3 months)

Tripdots helps vehicle owners optimize their driving behaviors while connecting with other vehicle owners and sharing driving efficiency achievements via social networks. The app lets users monitor the operation of their vehicles to enable cost savings through better understanding fuel economy.

PayPal

Yet another “key” app missing in the Windows Phone ecosystem is for the popular PayPal service. PayPal is going to work with Nokia to not only bring their app to Windows Phone, but also use functionality like Live Tiles to enhance the user experience.

AOL Entertainment Hub (exclusive to Lumia for 3 months)

Whether you want to listen to one of 55,000 radio stations via SHOUTcast, stream free music albums with AOL’s Listening Party or view Trailers and Movie listings, the AOL Entertainment Hub delivers everything you need.

Yet another app where Live Tiles are going to be used to enhance the user experience:

“The live tiles on Nokia Lumia helped us create an awesome app that makes it easy to stay in the know on what’s happening in Film, TV, Radio, Concerts and Music right from your home screen,” said Sol Lipman, Director of Mobile First products at AOL.

TIME magazine

Utilizing the stunning Windows Phone UI, the app will enable users to view TIME.com content, receive breaking news alerts, watch rich media content including video and share stories via the Windows Phone People Hub, while delivering the latest news and stories to users first via Live Tiles.

Newsweek – The Daily Beast

The Daily Beast app delivers the latest content through Live Tiles and combines the unique style of The Daily Beast with the Windows Phone UI to deliver a stunning experience. For users who only have minutes to digest the latest news, the app also delivers The Cheat Sheet – your one stop must have reads from across the world – uniquely designed for Windows Phone.

Box app for Windows Phone

Box, another oft-requested app, will finally come to Windows Phone with support for nine languages.

Nokia has started rolling out a new “Quality Improvement” software update for its Belle powered handsets. While Nokia has not released any specific change-log, reports from users suggests that the update mainly fixes some bugs and makes some under the hood Qt files related changes.

The update is only 8KB in size, which indicates that the changes brought about from this update is minor in nature. The update can only be installed using the ‘Software Update’ application found in nearly all the Nokia Belle powered handsets.

In other Nokia related news, the company has confirmed that its latest camera flagship – the Pure View 808 – will be available in select markets, including Russia and India, sometime in May. Below is the official press release from Nokia -:

Nokia today confirmed that the Nokia 808 PureView will start rolling out in select markets in May. The first markets to begin selling the Nokia 808 PureView include Russia and India.

While Nokia has not mentioned anything, the Pure View 808 should soon be available in some other regions of the world as well where Nokia has a pretty decent market share and lots of fan boys including U.K and Finland, its home country.

Whenever asked whether or not there are plans to develop a Windows RT tablet, Nokia has generally beat around the bush and strayed from issuing any definitive answers. However, Jorma Ollila, the Chairman of the Board of Directors of Nokia — who will be departing the company after a 27-year run this week — has told the Financial Times on Wednesday that the company does plan to launch both tablet and “hybrid” (smartphone + tablet) devices in the future.

He said this in particular referring to tablets:

“Tablets are an important one, so that is being looked into, and there will be different hybrids, different form factors [handset designs] in the future.”

Nothing was said about specific device plans, or whether or not these devices will run Microsoft software at all. But, I think that it’s pretty much a given at this point that if Nokia indeed develops a tablet, it will be an ARM-based Windows RT device. It will be quite the challenge if they do go this route to get their foot in the door of an iPad and Android-dominated market. This will be yet another market where the company is an underdog that will have to go above and beyond to succeed.

Another interesting thing here though is Ollila’s mention of “hybrids” and other form factors. Is Nokia considering entering the market defined by the Galaxy Note, which is a very bizarre market segment to say the least? Perhaps Nokia may feel that, instead of trying to overtake a market that has largely been created and dominated by the iPad, they want to be the pioneers who “do things right” in the hybrid space. Still, I am a bit biased as I’m not a fan of the Note, or that breed of device.

I am, however, extremely excited at the prospect of a Windows 8 tablet from the company.

Nokia announced on Wednesday that it has extended its partnership with infamous optical instrument company Carl Zeiss to continue producing quality cameras in future Nokia devices. Carl Zeiss technology can already be found in the Nokia N9 and 808 PureView smartphones, along with the Lumia collection of Windows Phone devices.

“Carl Zeiss was a crucial partner in the creation of the first PureView experience,” said Jo Harlow, executive vice president of Nokia Smart Devices. “The benefits of our ongoing collaboration will be more PureView innovation and further advancements in smartphone imaging in the coming months and years.”

Now, not to go too offtopic here, but Carl Zeiss — the person who founded the company — was born in 1816. I find this fact to be fascinating; he was born when the world was hardly industrialized, and now, nearly 200 years later, his company continues to remain relevant in an era of consumer electronics. Carl Zeiss AG — the company — was itself founded in 1846.

The company also offered a comment on the continued partnership with Nokia:

“When joining forces with Nokia in 2005, we wanted to push the boundaries of mobile photography. Looking back at seven years of successful partnership, we are proud of the innovations and outstanding products created in this shared journey. Today we are celebrating the extension of our collaboration with a new technology that sets another real benchmark in this sector.”

For an introduction and background to this series, please refer to my first post on the topic: New Series: iPhone 4S Used by a Windows Phone User.

After looking at the setup experience, the first thing I wanted to look at is the much talked about Retina display of the iPhone 4S. I had heard a lot about how fantastic it is, and read a lot about the technical stuff like pixel density on that screen, but hadn’t experienced it outside of using my friends’ phones for a few minutes. The few minutes I spent with my friends’ phones did not impress me much but I attributed it to the fact that I had spent so little time with the display.

So, having used it constantly for a few days, what was the verdict? Frankly, I don’t see what the big deal is. Yes, it is clear and crisp. It is very, very clear and crisp. However, the Super AMOLED screen of my Focus and the ClearBlack AMOLED on my Lumia are both equally clear and crisp. In fact, I love the deeper colors on the base Lumia screen much more than what the iPhone 4S produces. It could be a result of bigger tiles on my Lumia compared to the many folders (with tinier icons) on my iPhone, but in “real world” use, the Lumia comes off as being as clear and crisp as the iPhone and the colors richer/deeper than the iPhone.

Yes, I could zoom into a specific icon and see how there is virtually no pixelation, but I never zoom to that level with my normal eyesight. Under normal circumstances, I look at the Lumia screen (with the dark theme enabled), and I look at the iPhone 4S with the normal brightness, and I must say, the Lumia screen comes out looking better.

(Please excuse my screenshots – I tried to make sure the brightness levels on both the phones were similar, and also, it looks like screenshot tools on *both* the phones seem to be just average?)

The other area where the Retina display is supposed to do better is reading. The claim — web pages, books, etc. are much better to read on that display compared to the Lumia? Here too, I did not see a tremendous difference.

Perhaps my expectations were raised really high? Maybe. Perhaps I should have tested it with long periods of reading? Maybe, but I don’t read pages and pages of books on the phone. The most I read is a multi-page web article, some part of books/magazines, and of course emails. I have provided some samples of the same above, and the Retina does not come off as being vastly different from the Lumia.

I would like to state emphatically, the iPhone screen is fantastic. However, in comparison to the Lumia, it does not seem to be dramatically superior. The Lumia holds its own despite “lower specs” across the board. The ClearBlack AMOLED on the Lumia “pops” the colors very well and the text renders quite well too. Oh, and a completely personal takeaway: when I turn on the Lumia, there is an immediate “wow” factor; maybe because of the colors, the brightness, the curved glass screen, or a combination of these and other factors that I can’t really pinpoint. Whatever it is, it makes the Lumia screen feel better than the iPhone screen, to me. Some friends on Twitter said that I need to give the Retina display some time and I will realize the beauty of it. I have seen it is a good screen, but after 4-5 days of extensive use, I really don’t see a huge upside in that screen.

Also, since I promised to talk about size as well, let me say that strictly speaking, the Lumia 800 that I am using now and the iPhone are not too different in size. However, my previous phone, the Samsung Focus, was 4″ diagonally and I really, really like that size. When I started using the Lumia after the Focus, I felt that the Lumia itself was a bit small (it is 3.7″ diagonally) and the iPhone is even smaller. So, compared to my ideal screen size of 4″, the iPhone seems smaller. However, for this experiment, I will not bring it up since the Lumia 800 and the iPhone are comparable in size.

Do you have any feedback on this comparison? Have you seen something I did not? I would love to hear from you!

Earlier this year, Nokia announced the new Nokia Asha 202 and Nokia Asha 203 Touch and Type phones at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2012 in Barcelona. Today, Nokia finally launched the Nokia Asha 202 dual-SIM phone in India. This entry-level handset allows you to access your Facebook and Twitter networks from the pre-loaded social application.

Mr. Viral Oza, Director Marketing, Nokia India said,

“The introduction of Asha 202 takes us another step closer to connecting the next billion people to the internet. We are constantly innovating and finding newer ways to feed the ever increasing appetite for digital consumption for young consumers. Towards this, Nokia Asha 202 is the first mobile phone to come bundled with data offers from five leading operators of the country. Nokia Asha 202 is the new face of smarter feature phones that comes packed with compelling, innovative services and entertainment options.”

Nokia Asha 202 features a 2.4 inch QVGA, resistive touchscreen display, Symbian S40 OS, dual-SIM (GSM + GSM), 2 megapixel camera, social networking apps, Bluetooth 2.1 with EDR, 10 MB internal memory, microSD card slot, 32 GB expandable memory, MicroUSB, dedicated SIM manager and much more.

Other features include a 3.5 mm headset jack, music player, enhanced stereo FM radio, up to 16.5 days of stand-by time, up to 5 hours of talk-time, and a 1020 mAh battery. This handset measures 114.8 mm x 49.8 mm x 13.85 mm and weighs just 90g. The Nokia Asha 202 comes in four exciting colors – black and gold, silver white, dark grey and dark red.

The Nokia Asha 202 is packed with exciting features such as EA games pack and Nimbuzz chat client for young and social consumers. It is the first 40 device to offer exclusive EA games in India. As a 60-day promotion at Nokia Store, the consumers can get 40 EA games pack worth Rs.4,000 for free. The offer includes popular and classic titles like Tetris, Need for Speed, The Run and Bejeweled.

The Nokia Asha 202 comes with a price tag of just Rs.4,149. Nokia has also tied up with five leading operators – Aircel, Airtel, Reliance, Tata Docomo and Vodafone to offer 100 MB of data per month for six months.

A couple of months ago, Nokia rolled out a pretty big update for its first-ever MeeGo powered handset, the N9. The PR 1.2 update added a bunch of new features and enhancements including the ability to make video calls via the in-built Google Talk IM client, continuous auto-focus while recording videos and much more. Readers can find the full change-log of the update here.

Now, it looks like Nokia is again going to roll out a new software update for the N9 once again. Unlike the PR 1.2 software update, the PR 1.3 update will only include some performance and stability improvements along with bug-fixes. N9 users should not really get their hopes up of Nokia bringing in more features with the PR 1.3 update, as it will just be a minor update. Rumors suggest that Nokia will start rolling out the PR 1.3 update sometime at the end of May.

Meego/Harmattan developers can check out the PR 1.3 commit from Nokia over here to get an idea of what all changes the update will include.