By Nokia has just officially announced what could easily be the most important smartphone of the year. We’re talking about the new N9, Nokia’s first MeeGo device.
The phone is down right amazing, it has a new OS, a sleek unibody design, powerful hardware and an incredible 3.9” curved AMOLED of FWVGA resolution.
The device itself is made of polycarbonate, giving it a premium finish. Also it packs a curved Gorilla Glass display, which is the toughest anti-scratch display out there. There’s no mistake that this is a smartphone that will reach for the top rather than settle for anything else.
As for the size, the phone measures 116.5 x 61.2 x12.1 mm and weighs a hefty 135grams. Nothing spectacular here, the Nokia N9 is on par with the other devices available on the market.
The Nokia N9 has a 1GHz Cortex A8 CPU, PowerVR SGX530 GPU and the TI OMAP 3630 chipset. The UI manages to stay lag free thanks to the 1GB of onboard RAM. In the connectivity department we have Wi-Fi a/b/g/n, Wi-Fi hotspot, Bluetooth 2.1, a microUSB port, GPS, 3.5mm audio jack, TV-out functionality and NFC. Unfortunately there is no microSD card slot, but you’ll at least be able to hot-swap the MircoSIM.
The Clear Black AMOLED display is truly a sight to behold, with stunning colours, wide viewing angles and a curved Gorilla Glass on top. An 8 megapixel auto-focus camera with touch focus and HD video recording capabilities completes the multimedia package. Nokia says that the camera is currently the fastest one on the market. It takes only 2.6 seconds to start the camera, focus and take the actual picture.
Software is where the Nokia N9 excels. The new UI is very intuitive and responsive. It runs on the MeeGo 1.2 Harmattan platform. This version of the OS is said to be a pre-release but from the looks of it we can say the UI is nothing short than spectacular. It improves what Android and IOS have already done and it takes the touching experience to another level.
There is no need to press the power key in order to wake the phone , you can manage just that by tapping it twice. Also the back button has been removed, thanks to the swipe navigation. It basically allows you to swipe from edge to edge and go back to the app drawer or to task manager.
Check the MeeGo UI in action in the following video.
There is no word when the phone will hit the stores. A Nokia Executive VP announced that the N9 will be retailing for $600 and $749 for the 16GB and 64GB respectively, although the prices might change.
