Alex Zaharov-Reutt
Tuesday, 02 December 2008 19:29
IT Industry -
Market
Page 3 of 4
But
the N97 also sports a microSD card slot, into which you can pop a 16GB
microSD for a massive 48GB total memory, and surely when SanDisk and
others bring 32GB microSD cards to market, the N97 will support them
too, if a firmware update isn’t required first.
Nokia is also spruiking “excellent music capabilities, full
support for the Nokia Music Store and continuous playback time of up to
1.5 days” which includes playlist support and other features, but for
the love of God, Nokia, can we PLEASE ensure the N97 can support
GAPLESS PLAYBACK?
I am personally shocked the N95 has NEVER
received this update after numerous firmware updates, and was equally
shocked when the otherwise excellent N96 didn’t include this feature
either.
Nokia, it will be 2009 when you release the N97.
Gapless playback is an ancient feature – I absolutely insist you do
whatever the heck needs to be done to make this very simple thing
happen, although whether Nokia engineers in Espoo are going to listen
to me is another thing altogether.
Now one mini surprise is
Nokia’s insistence on sticking with a 5 megapixel camera. Sure, there’s
an argument that 8 megapixels with a small sensor doesn’t really
improve things, but given that 12.1 megapixel sensors for phones are on
the way, and Sony Ericsson has its 8.1 megapixel Cybershot smartphone,
5 megapixels feels very Nokia N95.
Ah well, it’s still good,
still backed up by a Carl Zeiss Tessar lens, and thankfully,
wonderfully, Nokia has had the good sense to put a sliding LENS COVER
on the back of the N97.
It’s a shame that a real Xenon flash
couldn’t make the cut as well, lumbering us with a dual-LED flash
instead – perhaps Xenon is being saved for a future N98 or N99,
although if the N82 can have a great Xenon lens why couldn’t the N97
too?
We also have Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and HSDPA/EDGE/GSM, but
interestingly, the HSDPA only currently is slated to work on
900/1900/2100MHz 3.5G. Where’s the 850MHz that Telstra, AT&T and
Rogers use? Probably on the way, but it’s still surprising not to have
had it announced now.
Talk time is 320 minutes on 3G networks
and 400 minutes on 2G, while there’s 400 hours of standby. Video
playback time is 4.5 hours, audio is 37 hours (or 1.5 days) – both in
offline mode.
Now, pricing for the N97 will be 550 euros
“before taxes or subsidies”, which at today’s exchange rate equates to
AUD $1083 or US $699.
Ok – full specs and links to video clips from Nokia are on
page 4, please read on!
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