We are expecting the Nokia Lumia 900 to get released sometime next year in the US. The device will be the third handset from Nokia running Windows Phone. We used to have only a few details about the device, and now the list is slightly enhanced. At the moment we are almost sure the novelty will be sporting a larger display (4.3 inch) than the current WP models: the Nokia Lumia 800 and the Nokia Lumia 710. The reason is the device will come with the Windows Phone Tango, which solves the problem of large displays.

The rest of the specs include a 1.4 GHz processor and a great 8 megapixel camera. The design of the device is expected to be the same as for the Nokia Lumia 800, which in its turn resembles the Nokia N9. Is this actually realistic? I mean it doesn’t make sense to offer three identical handsets, only with different screen resolutions. I bet Nokia will at least offer a few details to differentiate the novelty, just like for the Nokia Lumia 710 (read more in Nokia Lumia 710 design review) .

Another change touches upon the microSIM technology of the device. From now on the users will not have problems while changing the SIM card of the device as it will be rather easy — with a simple push. This technique is adapted from the iPhone 4.

The Nokia Lumia 900 is so cool, that I just can’t wait to see it on the shelves of US carriers.

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The Nokia N9 is getting so popular that it can even be compared with the Nokia N8 in terms of popularity. Moreover, it’s been compared with a device like the iPhone 4. The Nokia N9 is good, but not perfect. The smartphone’s evidently conquering more areas (it’s available even in the U.S.), so  Nokia decided not to delay the promised update and push it out… right now.

The Finnish company has powered the white version of the Nokia N9 with the updated MeeGo, and now all the other colored devices will get it, too. The update is 218MB, which means you must go for this deal when not in hurry. It’ll bring your phone to version 20.2011.40-4 of the software. The update includes:

• Music controls on the lockscreen
• Improved multitasking with better memory handling
• NFC tag reading capabilities
• Shooting photos and videos with color filters (black & white, sepia, vivid, negative, solarize)
• Preinstalled Swype
• Faster Mail for Exchange sync
• Noise cancellation
• Swiping down to close apps is now on by default
• New indicators for charging and calendar are shown on the standby screen.

There are also a number of apps received updates:

• Twitter app supports picture uploads to Twitpic
• Facebook app
• Nokia Store
• Ovi Music
• Galaxy on Fire 2
• Nokia Drive
• Angry Birds
• AccuWeather
• NFS Shift
• Real Golf 2011
• User Guide.

The update is welcomed by Nokia N9 owners. If you haven’t been notified about it, do it yourself by going to Settings > Manage Applications > Updates.

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The Nokia N9 has started shipping and in the near future it’ll appear in all anticipated countries. Unlike the Nokia N950, this phone is made for large-scale sales, but unfortunately, the list lacks such countries as the U.S., the UK, France and other desirable ones. Anyway, now it’s available and we can test it in different terms. GSMArena decided to test its battery, and I have to say the results are rather good.

Though the Nokia N9 is the successor of the well-known N8, it’s quite different from Nokia’s cameraphone. The difference is obvious even in terms of battery — the N8 is packed with a 1200mAh standard battery, while the N9 features a 1450mAh battery. At first sight it seems the Nokia N9’s battery mustn’t provide long life time, because N9’s screen is larger and as you know larger displays spend more energy. But it only seems so. Thanks to this test we can clearly see the Nokia N9 doesn’t yield other handsets. Moreover, it is in the second place after the iPhone 4. The test results are shown in the picture below.

For this deal geeks set some rules:

• Handset charged fully.
• Looped standard definition Xvid video.
• Brightness at 50%.
• Stopped when battery was at 10% (so it could have done a little more). They note that some phones turn off video player and don’t allow restarting. I’m not sure if N9 has this ‘feature’.

I guess you’re really impressed by the 8 hour 40 minutes video playback duration, aren’t you?

The Nokia N9’s geography is wide — from Mexico to Australia. By saying geography I mean its availability, of course. But this doesn’t mean each country located between these two geographical regions will have a chance to get the Nokia N9, on the contrary — only chosen countries are in the list…

Many countries have already left that list one after another, now it’s France’s turn. Though many users were sure France can’t be removed from it because there was an indication from the FCC ID sticker that the smartphone would come to France and we saw one of the main networks advertising accessories for it… But anyway, the country of love and beauty won’t offer this MeeGo-based smartphone to its consumers. Too bad…

I think the Nokia N9 would become very popular in France if it was launched there. After all, the developers have worked hard on it, and as a result we have a gentle, confident, elegant, rugged, new and secure handset. It was even compared with the iPhone 4, and no matter you like Nokia or not, the Nokia N9 will attract you. Unfortunately, French consumers won’t have a chance to get closer look at it…

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Several days ago I read a post comparing the HTC Thunderbolt and Apple’s iPhone 4 and thought it would be interesting to try to compare the iPhone 4 with the upcoming Nokia N9.

Display

The Nokia N9 has a 3.9-inch Amoled capacitive touchscreen the resolution of which is 480 x 854 pixels (238 pixels-per-inch (ppi)). The iPhone 4’s display is smaller – 3.5-inch (LED-backlit IPS TFT capacitive touchscreen) – but it has a higher resolution – 640×960 (with 326ppi pixel density), so it should be cleared and probably brighter.

Both displays support the multi-touch input method, have accelerometer sensors for UI auto-rotate and proximity sensors for auto turn-off. The Nokia N9, however, used the Gorilla Glass technology to protect its touchscreen from scratches and has an anti-glare polarizer. The iPhone 4 has a scratch-resistant oleophobic surface on its screen.

Gorilla Glass is great, of course, but iPhone’s screen is not too vulnerable, too. Besides, it has a higher resolution, as I mentioned above, so it seems to be even a bit better than the display of the Nokia N9. But let’s not hurry to jump to conclusions and have a look at the other features of these two smartphones.

Hardware

Both devices have single-core 1GHz processors (Cortex A8 CPU with PowerVR SGX530 GPU and TI OMAP 3630 chipset will be found in the Nokia N9, and ARM Cortex-A8 processor with PowerVR SGX535 GPU and Apple A4 chipset make Apple’s iPhone 4 work).

The hardware features of the Nokia N9 and the iPhone 4 are equal overall, with only a few differences: Nokia’s chipset is slightly better, but the iPhone’s PowerVR SGX535GPU seems to be a bit more powerful.

So none of these smartphones is a winner in the hardware aspect – both are equal.

Storage

The Nokia N9 comes in two versions with different storage capacities — 16GB and 64GB. The iPhone also comes in two versions, but while the lower-end version is 16GB, as its rival phone, the version with the biggest storage is only 32GB – twice less than Nokia’s 64GB version.

Both versions of the Nokia N9 have 1GB of RAM and 512MP of ROM. Apple’s iPhone 4 comes with 512MB of RAM. Well, it’s not that bad, too, but still it’s behind the N9.

The N9 and the iPhone 4 don’t have microSD (or any other) card slots, which is very bad for both. But since the Nokia N9 has a higher maximum storage capacity and twice a bigger RAM, its advantage in relation to the iPhone 4 is obvious.

Platform

The iPhone 4 runs iOS 4.3, and the Nokia N9 runs a very “original,” if I can say so, operating system known as MeeGo. Let’s try to understand the main differences between them and find out which is better.

First of all, I have to mention what everyone first says when hearing about the iOS – it’s easy to learn, you can understand how it works without reading the User Manual even if the iPhone 4 is your first smartphone ever. It has many useful apps and features that are also easy to use.

Several changes were made in the new version of iOS, including the following: the Safari browser has become much faster, some multimedia utilities were upgraded and improved (Airplay and iTunes, for example) and much more.

As for apps, you can find many of them (more than 350,000) in the App Store. All those apps are verified by Apple, so you can download them without being afraid of infecting your smartphone with viruses or malware that usually come with downloadable apps.

As I said above, the Nokia N9 runs the MeeGo 1.2 ‘Harmattan’ build, thanks to which the device doesn’t have any hardware buttons – you’ll use the special gesture-based control and input method to go to Home, Menu or Back.

There are three homescreens in this OS – “Events,” “Applications” and “Open Apps.” The first one shows you different system notifications and social networking alerts. Maybe SMSs and mails will also find a corner on this screen, but I’m not sure about this yet. The “Applications” screen will give you the chance to organize your apps. There is a separate homescreen for open apps, but I can’t understand why they didn’t place the functions from this screen in “Applications.”

By the way, several social networking apps (Facebook, Skype, GoogleTalk, Gmail and Twitter apps) are coming pre-installed in MeeGo.

I don’t want to write too much about the differences between these platforms – or it will take the whole post. Soon I’ll try to write another post only about these two operating systems.

And from what I said above we can make the following conclusions. MeeGo seems to be rather good, but we must admit we don’t know much about it yet. Will it function well? Will it be easy to use? Will it have many bugs or problems? We’ll be able to find the answers to all these questions only after the N9 with its MeeGo is released. And before then, Apple’s iOS seems to be the winner, since it’s more “complete,” it’s tested and proven.

Camera

Nokia has always been famous with its good smartphone cameras (remember the Nokia N8!). The Nokia N9 is no exception – it’s going to get a cool 8MP camera with auto-focus, dual LED flash and Carl Zeiss optics. The camera of Apple’s iPhone 4 is much more modest – it’s only 5MP, with auto-focus and LED flash. Of course, the pictures it takes are smaller – 2592 x 1944 pixels against the N9’s 3264×2448 pixels.

Both cameras can capture video at 720p. As for the rest of the features, both cameras have geo-tagging and the option of choosing touch-focus. Nokia’s camera has face detection as well.

Both smartphone have secondary VGA cameras supporting video-calling (the iPhone 4 supports video-calling only via Wi-Fi, and nothing is known for sure about the N9).

The camera of Apple’s iPhone 4 is good. It takes good bright pics and decent videos. But the camera of the Nokia N9 is way better anyway.

Design

The design isn’t the most important feature in a smartphone, of course, but many people pay much attention to it when choosing one. So let’s try to compare the designs of the Nokia N9 and the iPhone 4, too.

The iPhone 4 is designed in the same style as all the older versions of Apple’s smartphones. It has rounded edges, and it’s slightly more compact than the Nokia N9, which comes in different colors, has a nice curved glass screen and is more “edgy.”

Design is a matter of taste anyway, so no comparison in this area can be objective. I personally like the appearance of none of them. However, there are many people who like how the iPhone 4 looks. And the Nokia N9 has its fans, too.

Prices

The retail price of iPhone 4’s 16GB version is $649.99 from Verizon, but you can also pay $199.99 to get it with a two-year contract. The 32GB version of the iPhone 4 costs $749.99 without a contract and $299.99 with a two-year one.

As for the Nokia N9, no exact prices are yet known. But there are several guesses: it can cost $869 (16GB) and $941 (64GB) in Russia and $686 in Khazakstan. But remember that these are just guesses – we’ll find out the real retail price of the smartphone only after it’s released, and I don’t think it will cost that much.

Conclusion

So what do we have here…

The Nokia N9 and the iPhone 4 have much in common, however, each of them has its own advantages and disadvantages.

The iPhone 4 has a better (though smaller) display with a higher resolution and a better-developed, a more “complete” platform – iOS. The Nokia N9 has more storage space, more RAM and a stronger camera. And it comes in different colors, which is very good for those who are tired of dull black smartphones.

Apple’s iPhone 4 seems to be more reliable, since it was released long ago and it’s tested. However, the Nokia N9 is also a great choice, especially for those who like testing new devices. The only minus of the N9 seems to be its OS, but if Nokia supports it the way it has promised, the N9 will turn into a great phone.

Nokia is considered to be the best manufacturer in terms of creating durable devices, since they use high-quality materials when making their handsets.

Some enthusiasts decided to check out if the Nokia devices are really that durable or if it’s just a stereotype. They created a high-survival test for the Nokia C7 and for the iPhone 4 — they decided just to drop the smartphones and see what will happen to them. The test was just a one time trial, so there are no guarantees that you will come up with the same results if you choose to repeat it.

The chosen height was 7 foot. The results of the test were shocking: the Nokia C7 survived the fall-down getting away with a few scratches. In comparison, the iPhone 4 next to the minor scratches also ended up getting an injured touchscreen, so the display had to be replaced… However, both handsets could be turned on and were working properly after the “test.”

The visual details of the testing are available in the video! Check it out!

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Nokia launched its new flagship after Apple had released the iPhone 4 to make a competition to this handset. N8’s launch symbolizes the return of the Finnish company showing Nokia is still close to the wheel.

The Nokia N8 is packed with such awesome features like 12MP camera allowing the users to record HD videos, HDMI port, AMOLED display and much more. But this was not enough for the mobile giant, and it tries to promote the handset in every possible way.

This time the company decided to trust its device to a French artist SO-ME to direct a fun-oriented ad campaign demonstrating what the “SuperFun House Party” will look like.

The short video also includes a “virtual joystick” allowing the watcher to switch between Nokia N8 and iPhone 4 in determining the better resolution.

Watch the video below and ascertain the N8 is a hard die, and the victory won’t be given to the iPhone 4 so easily.

There is no doubt that the most awaited smartphones of this year are Nokia N8 and Apple Iphone 4. As these two “titans” have already been launched, we can compare their cameras.  So, below we introduce the characteristics of these smartphones’ cameras:

iPhone 4

• 5 megapixel CMOS sensor
• LED flash
• 4:3 aspect ratio
• Focal length: 3.85mm (equivalent to lens of 29.4mm)
• F number/Aperture: F2.8
• Autofocus
• Zoom : Digital 5x

Nokia N8

• 12 megapixel Carl Zeiss lens
• Xenon flash
• 16:9 aspect ratio (wide screen)
• Focal length: 5.9mm (equivalent to 28mm wide angle lens)
• F number/Aperture: F2.8
• Zoom : Digital 2x

At first sight there must be no doubt of Nokia N8′s privilege, but let’s study deeper.

Differences between cameras:

1. The first difference is the resolution: as we see iPhone 4 has a 5 Mpx camera, while Nokia N8 captures with a 12 Mpx camera. The difference is more than evident.
2. Nokia N8 could take pictures in a wider angle. Below is a picture which clearly explains the advantages of wide angle.



3. The picture clarity is the third significant feature of cameras, which discovers how clear could be the pictures no matter when they have been taken – on the bright sunlight or on a gloomy day.
4. The colors of both cameras are of a very high quality: there is nothing to compare.
5. And finally the flashes, to know what flash is better, we must learn more  about both handsets.

So, take pictures by both smartphones and decide for yourself which of them is more powerful.

Earlier we had some info that the upcoming Symbian^3 device is going to be equipped with a typical 3.5-inch touchscreen. But judging from the photo in which iPhone4, HTC EVO4G are shot next to it, the screen is much bigger.

We see that the screen of the new model, so far known as Nokia N9, is much bigger than the one for iPhone 4, but slightly smaller than EVO 4G’s screen.

Anyways, the display of the screen is rumored to be 360X640 pixels, which is too small for the 4-inch screen! All of this will soon drive us crazy, so let’s stop here and recall the main specs of the device which are already announced.

This includes an 8 megapixel camera with LED Flash, 3G, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and HDMI port.

Nokia N9 from Techno Buffalo on Vimeo.

Feels like the newest device of the Apple- iPhone 4 is not as ideal as we wish it would be. The thing is that if you hold the device not at the lower left corner, you will get no reception. This is due to the fact that the user is simply covering the antenna reception point.

As pointed by Steve Jobs, the head of the Apple, this is not a typical Apple problem and thus you can always face up the problem on the rest of the device. And actually he’s right. After the announcement Nokia enthusiasts checked out the device Nokia  6230. It turned out that the device has the same exact problem with the reception.

Despite the fact that the video is not of that high quality but we still can see clearly how the antenna status goes down, while holding it not in the “most proper” way!