In January of this year the “Ovi maps” have become free for new Nokia models. Within three months users have downloaded more than 10 million copies of the program and this is not the limit. The new version has recently been released.

According to the official statement, the new “Ovi maps”  application operates more quickly (quickly determines the position of users regardless of location), better (in collaboration with Lonely Planet, Michelin and the local “Yellow pages” new point of interest have been added, the Qype program has been included) and has become more personalized (function of recording voice commands).

Another important news concerns the completion of Nokia smartphones. A car charger and a car holder have been included in boxes with the N97, N97 mini, 6710 Navigator and X6 for already two weeks. Soon the 5800 XpressMusic, 5230, E52 and E72 will be completed with a car holder.

It was reported that the Nokia Application Ovi Store of the Finnish manufacturer, which has recently been optimized and redesigned get a load of more than 1.6 million programs downloaded on a daily basis.

Ovi Store offers content offered in over 80 countries. The most successful publisher has become the developer companyof Digital Chocolate games  – its products have shown interest in the amount of 4.5 million downloads.

It is alleged that at the moment more than 100 models of Nokia phones are compatible with the Ovi Store, while more than 60 devices are Symbian-based smartphones.

The most popular among the visitors of Nokia Ovi Store are the following models: Nokia X6, N97, N97 Mini, 5800 XpressMusic, 5530 XpressMusic, E66, E71 and E72.

There are more that 66 operators offering the integration of billing with shopping through Ovi Store in 19 countries in the world.

In mid-January Nokia announced the transfer of navigation service Ovi Maps on a free basis. However the free walking and satellite navigation became available to owners only of relatively new models – N97, N97 mini, 5800 XpressMusic, 5800 Navigation Edition, E52, E55, E72, 5230, 6710 Navigator, 6730 classic, X6, N86 8MP.

The fresh press release shows that Nokia has taken into account the desires of  the users and has developed a version of Ovi Maps, compatible with former smartphones E71 and E66. However, not all features of new Ovi Maps have been implemented – there are no Guide Michelin and Lonely Planet premium services.

Ovi Maps for E71 and E66 are already available for downloaded from the Ovi Store.

Only a year ago Nokia entered the market of touch phones, presenting the 5800 XpressMusic. Time passed and the market needed more affordable solutions optimized for finger control. One of them is Nokia 5230, presented by the Finns in August.

Touch phone Nokia 5230 will be available by the end of the year. New home screen is installed in the shell, which first appeared on Nokia 5530 XpressMusic. For the user this means a possibility of flexible configuration of interface and quick access to frequently used sources.

The indisputable advantages of Nokia 5230 is the price (in Europe – about 150 euros) and at least five colour options. Nokia 5800 XpressMusic is also sold in several color options.

Display:
The display of Nokia 5230 is similar to the one used in Nokia 5800 XpressMusic – 3.2 inch, 640 x 360 pixels, 16:9 aspect ratio, resistive. Generally, there are no differences.

Design:
The appearance of the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic can hardly be called impressive, and Nokia 5230 looks even less attractive – rugged, a lot of cheap plastic used in it. Keys of the new device are located in the same places as that of the first device, making the impression that this is the same phone. The 5230 is somehow thinner than the 5800 (16 mm and 14.5 mm respectively), although its weigh is 4 grams more (109 grams and 113 grams).

Processor:
The phone Nokia 5800 XpressMusic is equipped with ARM11 processor with a frequency of 369 MHz, while Nokia 5230 is equipped with 434-MHz ARM 11 processor. The difference of the 65 MHz is the advantage of 5230. It is assumed that due to this applications will work quicker and smarter.

Memory:
One of the serious shortcomings of the 5800 is the amount of available memory for users – 81 MB. Unfortunately, the 5230 does not have a significant amount of memory, only 70 MB. However, in both cases a microSDHC slot for cards up to 16 GB is foreseen.

Camera:
Nokia 5800 is equipped with a 3.2-megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics and dual LED-flash. Nokia 5230 comes with a 2 megapixel module without flash.

Other specs:
Both smartphones have FM-radio, wireless module for Bluetooth, GPS-navigation. Both Nokia 5230 and Nokia 5800 XpressMusic support networks of second and third generations. Nokia 5800 has a Wi-Fi module, which is not available for Nokia 5230.

Conclusion:
In this case it is not easy to recommend any particular model. Practically all current Nokia touchphones (except, perhaps, N900) are created like 5800 XpressMusic –some features have been added or removed, the corpus has been slightly retouched. Such a strategy can not be considered to be successful, because the user has to choose if he/she needs to take the base model 5800 XpressMusic or to save money, taking the 5230 without Wi-Fi or 5530 XpressMusic without GPS. A choice could be made based on the design, but the phones are too much alike. There are alternatives for bar form factor Nokia touchphones (N97 and N97 mini), but the difference in price is too much to consider it a fair competition.

There is no sense for the owners of 5800 XpressMusic to take 5230 for the sake of productivity and bold colors. Buyers should pay attention to the new Nokia 5230 if they want budget sensory decision, but they don’t like products of Samsung or LG – South Korean companies have presented very strong touch-lines in recent years.

Specifications of Nokia 5230:

• Network: GSM / GPRS / EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz), WCDMA / HSDPA (900/2100 MHz),
• Platform: Symbian OS v9.4, S60 5th Edition
• Display: touchscreen, resistive, 3.2-inch, 640 x 360 pixels, 16 million colours
• Camera: 2 MP
• RAM: 128 MB
• ROM: 256 MB
• Processor: ARM 11 434 MHz
• Expansion slot: microSDHC (up to 16 GB)
• Bluetooth 2.0 + EDR
• Accelerometer
• A-GPS
• 3.5-mm connector
• Audio: AAC, AAC +, AMR-NB, AMR-WB, AU, AWB, eAAC +, M4A, MIDI Tones (poly 64), Mobile XMF, MP3, MP4, RealAudio 7, 8, RMF, SND, SP-MIDI, True tones, WAV, WMA, WVE
• Video: 3GPP (H.263), Flash Video, H.264/AVC, MPEG-4, RealVideo 7,8
• Images: BMP, EXIF, GIF87a, GIF89a, JPEG, JPEG 2000, MBM, OTA, PNG, TIFF, WBMP, WMF
• Battery: 1320 mAh
• Hours Talk Time: Up to 7 hours
• Hours Standby time: up to 19 days
• Time running video player: up to 4.6 hours
• Time running music player: up to 33 hours
• Dimensions: 111 x 51,7 x 14,5 mm
• Weight: 113 grams
• Date of announcement: August 2009
• Release Date: Fourth quarter 2009

Specifications Nokia 5800 XpressMusic:

• Network: GSM / GPRS / EDGE (850/900/1800/1900 MHz), WCDMA / HSDPA (900/2100 MHz),
• Platform: Symbian OS v9.4, S60 5th Edition
• Display: touchscreen, resistive, 3.2-inch, 640 x 360 pixels, 16 million colors
• Camera: 3.2 megapixels, Carl Zeiss, autofocus, dual LED-flash
• Built in memory: 81 MB
• Processor: ARM 11 369 MHz
• Expansion slot: microSDHC (up to 16 GB)
• Wi-Fi (802.11 b / g)
• Bluetooth 2.0, A2DP
• 3,5 mm jack
• USB 2.0
• FM-radio
• Battery: Li-Ion, 1320 mAh
• Hours of talk time: up to 9 hours in the networks of GSM, up to 5 hours in WCDMA
• Hours Standby time: up to 17 days
• Time running playing music: up to 35 hours
• Time running video: up to 5 hours
• Dimensions: 111 x 51,7 x 15,5 mm
• Weight: 109 grams

Finnish Nokia has made its Ovi Maps service available for N97smartphone. Until now only owners of Nokia N97 mini, 5800 XpressMusic, 5800 Navigation Edition, E52, E55, E72, 5230, 6710 Navigator, 6730 classic and X6 devices could take advantage of the updated service.

We would like to remind you that the Ovi Maps offers turn-based navigation function for drivers and pedestrians completely free of charge and is available in the form of localized versions for the residents of 74 countries.
In order to work with Ovi Maps N97 users should upgrade the “firmware” of the device to the 2.0.h version. Nokia noted that the updated software platform may be temporarily unavailable in some regions.