Symbian-Guru site owner in Symbian/Nokia rant :D

Janesy B

Janesy B

Janesy B

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Symbian-Guru.com Is Over

By The Guru on July 1, 2010

As of today, I will no longer be updating Symbian-Guru.com, and will be purchasing an Android-powered smartphone – my new Nexus One should arrive tomorrow. I’ve been a Nokia fanboy since 1999, and a Symbian fanboy since I got my Nokia 6620 in summer of 2004. Since then, I’ve personally owned 10+ different Symbian-powered smartphones, and have reviewed nearly every Symbian-powered smartphone that’s been released in the past 3 years or so. I’ve tried to use all of Nokia’s various products and services to the best of my ability, and I just can’t do it anymore.

I can’t continue to support a manufacturer who puts out such craptastic ‘flagships’ as the N97, and who expects me to use services that even most of Nokia’s own employees don’t use. I also can’t continue to support a mobile operating system platform that continually buries itself into oblivion by focusing on ‘openness’ while keeping a blind eye towards the obvious improvements that other open platforms have had for several iterations.

When I received my HTC Eris, I was 100% convinced that using Android would ruin Symbian for me. Ironically, the Eris showed me the ugly side of Android – the side that reveals itself on crappy processors paired with ****-poor amounts of RAM. In fact, it was the Nokia N97 – the company’s last real “flagship” Symbian device – that has completely and utterly killed Symbian for me. The Nokia N97, when announced, was supposed to be the epitome of Nokia’s high-end smartphone offerings. Nokia is the largest cellphone manufacturer in the world, with the largest worldwide marketshare on the planet. The Nseries was originally conceived to be the company’s top-notch smartphones – the best of the best, if you will. The N9x devices have always been the best of the Nseries, as well – the cream of the crop of the best of the best, and yet the N97 is quite possibly one of the most embarrassing devices ever to come out of the Finnish monster.

You may be saying, ‘well, sure, but the N8 is set to come out any month now, shouldn’t you give it a fighting chance?’ Yes, of course I *should*, but I won’t. When the Nokia N8 was first announced, I was dead convinced I would purchase one out of my own pocket. I started putting money aside, ready to even pre-order the N8 as soon as I could. However, the more I use the Nokia N97 as my primary device, the less I’ve been convinced that the N8 is going to be better. Time and time again, Nokia’s high-end smartphones have arrived with pathetic processors, stingy amounts of RAM, and small batteries – why should I put up another $500 of my own money ‘just to see’?
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sauce: http://www.symbian-guru.com/welcome/2010/07/symbian-guru-com-is-over.html

No idea how influential this site is, but it has to be quite a big blow for Nokia/Symbian?
 
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Thread title needs fixing, it's a little x-rated.

Also, thought the eris was well specced... =/
 
Nokia are just getting swallowed up by iPhone and Android.

MeeGo has to save them, otherwise they'll have to cave and start making hardware with Android on :p

Never liked Symbian myself, and Maemo isn't really commercially viable.
 
Quite a rant huh, goes on and on. I'm glad I got the E71 and will probably be sticking to it, as was rightly said, there's certainly been a decline in quality and originality from Nokia since then, they don't seem to be keeping up, all because they're dragging the dead horse of symbian along with them.

However, for someone who's invested that much time in setting up his website and reviewing phones, he left a lot behind fairly quickly, especially with a few interesting Nokia developments on the horizon. I can't help but feel there must be more going on, like he got bored of Nokia phones or something else. Tempted away by Android at least though, it would have been a dark, dark day if he said he got an iphone.
 
It's quite ironic. The N97 was the dream spec Symbian phone that the Nokia fanboys always wanted them to make.

Then Nokia makes it and it's so bad that it ruins their reputation.

Thankfully for Nokia they've admitted it and they're working on not repeating the same mistake. For the sake of competition, let's hope that things have improved.
 
I guess once you go android thats it.

even if its in the form of a wildfire
 
I've just actually read a good chunk of that post, I did not realise the N97 was that terrible, in this day and age I just don't see why Nokia are sticking so vehemently with Symbian which has not been fit for purpose for a while, aren't Nokia the only large company not to have released an Android phone? Do they think they can beat it? lol

The more I think about it, the more I come to laugh at them, if they're not going to adopt android then they need to release handsets with a dedicated, contemporary operating system.

I almost laughed out loud that Nokia's "flagship" phone has barely enough memory to install a few apps and that it's technically inferior to many budget android phones. How did Nokia let it get this bad and what is their issue with Android?
 
Skyfall said:
I've just actually read a good chunk of that post, I did not realise the N97 was that terrible, in this day and age I just don't see why Nokia are sticking so vehemently with Symbian which has not been fit for purpose for a while, aren't Nokia the only large company not to have released an Android phone? Do they think they can beat it? lol

The more I think about it, the more I come to laugh at them, if they're not going to adopt android then they need to release handsets with a dedicated, contemporary operating system.

I almost laughed out loud that Nokia's "flagship" phone has barely enough memory to install a few apps and that it's technically inferior to many budget android phones. How did Nokia let it get this bad and what is their issue with Android?
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Symbian to all intensive purposes = Nokia. They wont go with a google OS.

The problem is they just havent sorted out their OS, nor do I see them fixing it in the near future. In addition they seem to be treating their customers with disdain (See N900/N97). I just dont understand why they dont get it and have taken so long to fix their OS's. S60 may well be the best non touchscreen OS, but for touchscreen they are way behind and lagging. Unbelievable.
 
For as long as Nokia stick with symbian, and possibly Meego if it's not something special (which I don't see it being), they're doomed to fail. Symbian phones are just a bad user experience once you've used an android or iphone system. The lack of a central app store is a killing blow, I know nokia has the Ovi store, but it hardly competes with Android's, or Apple's stores.

I hope Meego has a good uptake, but personally, with Nokia's current trends, I just don't see it happening. It's a shame, I've always liked Nokias, and had (and still have) a lot of symbian phones, but they just can't compete any more.
 
If nokia believe they can carry on their business based on brand perception and former performance, they are very very wrong. I actually can't remember the last time I saw a Nokia phone, and the last one I had, which is still less than a year old (E72) was so bad, it was practically unfit for purpose.
 
I used a family member's E71 at the weekend and it looks nice but the screen was poor, the keyboard was well seduced but the keys themselves were to small even for my delicate fingers to type fast on :S

Nokia SHOULD make a handset running Android, their N8 has a fantastic camera, a phone with that kind of imaging power needs to be Android powered.

It will sell especially with Nokia's marketing department onboard.
 
Khaaan! said:
I used a family member's E71 at the weekend and it looks nice but the screen was poor, the keyboard was well seduced but the keys themselves were to small even for my delicate fingers to type fast on :S

Nokia SHOULD make a handset running Android, their N8 has a fantastic camera, a phone with that kind of imaging power needs to be Android powered.

It will sell especially with Nokia's marketing department onboard.
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If Nokia released the N8 on Android (preferably with RAM/Processor to match similar high end anroid speeds), it would be my next phone for sure.
 
Nokia moving to Android would be an admission of guilt of sorts, it would be them admitting that Symbian isn't up to the task and I don't think they're willing to do this. Yet.

Android has saved Motorola, it could do the same for Nokia if they weren't so stubborn.
 
Skyfall said:
I've just actually read a good chunk of that post, I did not realise the N97 was that terrible, in this day and age I just don't see why Nokia are sticking so vehemently with Symbian which has not been fit for purpose for a while, aren't Nokia the only large company not to have released an Android phone? Do they think they can beat it? lol
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The problem isn't Symbian, it's the UI layer and application framework on top of it. S60 has been a mess for a long time, with broken APIs and poor documentation. I've developed for it and it's a nightmare.

The smartest move that Nokia has made in the past few years has been to buy Trolltech (the creators of the Qt application framework). Qt is included for the first time in Symbian^3 and MeeGo. Compared to S60 current framework, and even Dalvik on Android, Qt is very powerful yet easy to use. Add this to the recent liberalisation of the Nokia Ovi store rules and we should see the 3rd party app situation on Symbian improving rapidly.

What's more, Symbian^4 will include a re-write of the entire S60 UI in Qt. Hopefully Nokia's developers can take advantage of Qt in the same way as I'm sure that 3rd party developers will do. And hopefully they can get Symbian^4 out the door before the last Nokia fanboys lose interest.

I also doubt that going with Android would help Nokia. Android, like Windows did for PC manufacturers, is going to be a race to the bottom. Consumers will benefit but there's not going to be very much profit in it for the manufacturers as differentiation becomes harder. That's fine if you're Samsung and have other wings of your business to prop you up, less so for a mobile phone-centric company like Nokia.
 
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I don't like Nokia anyways, always heard of them breaking in someway, and looking at reviews they seem very laggy (touch screen onces)

also SE only have one phone that uses symbain( and had a lot of problems)....I wonder why... I do hear that the statio is sorted out now through.


samsungs new OS looks interesting
 
Well Nokia need to do something. they have craploads of phones but are not making craploads of sales.

HTC on the other hand have exceeded projected sales figures and have totalled $1.88billion since last april (1.6 projected) and that's all down to Android's growth.

Get on the Droidwagon TBH!
 
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