Leaked screenshots show Nokia Carla OS

The upcoming Nokia “Carla” OS update is set to roll out for the Nokia 808 Pureview, Nokia 700, Nokia 701 and Nokia 603 handsets. A new post showed up on NokiaNesia blog today containing a set of screenshots of a Nokia handset running the Nokia Carla OS.

According to the leaked screenshots of the Nokia Carla OS, we can observe that there’s a new Lock screen without Unlock button and you need to Swipe it to unlock the screen. There’s a new on-screen QWERTY keyboard, which looks like it has been adopted from Windows Phone OS and the Nokia Browser has also been updated with some new UI improvements.

The Music player has also has also got some refreshed improvements such as the New Interface for Option with Blue button, which seems to have been inspired by Meego Harmattan UI. The source has also mentioned that the Finnish mobile maker isn’t bringing the new Nokia Carla OS update for its 1st generation Symbian^3 handsets such as the Nokia N8, Nokia E7, Nokia C7 and Nokia C6-01. Hopefully, Nokia will manage to bring the update for these handsets too.

Symbian/Nokia Carla OS images LEAKS:

Amazon joins the Lumia 900 pre-order party – 1¢ for new customers

AT&T and Walmart on Nokia Lumia 900 pre-orders. Honestly, any time there are hot sales going on, Amazon usually gets itself into the mix, so it is no surprise that we just heard Amazon dropped the Lumia 900 down to a penny for new customers. Right now both the black and cyan versions can be pre-ordered from Amazon Wireless. New AT&T customers opening an individual or family account are eligible to purchase this handset for 1 cent.

Existing customers looking to extend their contract will be charged $119.99 and those looking to add a line to a family account will be charged $139.99. As we told you yesterday, Walmart is allowing existing customers to purchase the Windows Phone handset for just $49.99 with a new 2-year contract, so those of you in that category are better off with the Walmart deal. The no contract price is still $499.99, but most people can dodge sales tax by going through Amazon, so that may be an advantage for some.

CES 2012: Keynote Highlight - The Latest from Windows Phone:

Nokia Lumia 610c CDMA Windows Phone Announced For China

Nokia launched its first Windows Phone CDMA handsets in China, now the world’s biggest smartphone market. The Nokia Lumia 800C, a version of the flagship Lumia 800, and the budge Lumia 610C will represent Nokia’s WP portfolio in the world’s most populous country.

The Lumia 800C is made to work on China Telecom’s 3G network, but apart from that there is little difference from the original unibody design and hardware guts. The handset is CDMA-compatible and will be launched in April in Tianyi FlyYoung shops and Nokia’s own stores.

The first 100,000 buyers get to download Fruit Ninja and Plants vs Zombies for free from the Markeplace. The budget Lumia 610C wasn’t given an exact release date, but is still expected to come in Q2 2012. The handset is among the first to lower the bar on Windows Phone and features only 256MB of RAM, a shortcut that allows it to keep a very low price. At the same time, Microsoft has worked with Nokia to ensure the WP experience remains smooth as molasses.

Nokia To Launch Two Budget MeeGo Smartphones?

If you’ve never played around with the Nokia N9, the only MeeGo handset on the market, then you’re missing out. It’s one of those handset that geeks everywhere get a little nostalgic about because it MeeGo really was a great operating system. According to an industry insider Nokia is working on 2 new low end MeeGo handsets, and information was recieved directly from Nokia’s Next Billion Group.

Since Nokia’s partnership with Microsoft, the company has essentially been divided into two groups, one focused on Windows Phone and the Next Billion Group who is reponsible for the S40 & Asha lines. The two groups have completely different tasks, the Windows team obviously keeps Microsoft happy and the Next Billion Group is tasked with creating low costs handsets which will likely be the first place that they will access the internet. Even though Windows Phone has the budget Lumia 610, Windows Phone isn’t the capable of being a low cost handset for a few different reasons.

The big question is “Why would Nokia still care about Meego?”

The most obvious reason is that Windows Phone just can’t compete in the low end smartphone game. First there is the operating system which isn’t free, that alone drives up the price. If we take a look at the latest budget Windows phone the Lumia 610, it is a 256mb devices and some features are being disabled because the device just doesn’t have the available RAM.

Let’s keep on looking at Nokia’s other operating system options, there is also their S40 java based devices aka the new Asha line. This line up of handsets haven’t exactly received stellar sales numbers. One of the reasons the line isn’t performing as well is that the touch experience isn’t competitive. When you’re competing on price point it’s often about packing in as many features as possible and if you go up against similarly priced Android handsets there it is really no contest.

Nokia could also use Symbian, expect they can’t, Symbian is now run by Accenture so they don’t have control over the Symbian device roadmaps which is aimed at high end phones. So we’re going to see the same problems here as in Windows Phone 7 and the base cost of fully functioning feature rich handset are going to be too high.

MeeGo is also a lot more adaptable than Windows Phone, its roots are in open source. PhoneNews raises some good points around MeeGo, if we think about where the next billion handsets are coming from they are going to be in areas where solar power charging may be more important than ten-point multitouch. MeeGo can also work with monochrome or e-ink display’s and the Windows Phone platform restrictions would shoot down the innovation that Nokia will need to drop smartphone technology in places where it cannot thrive today.

Meego CE Summer Edition on Nokia N900:


Nokia N9 MeeGo Smartphone - Full Presentation with all Slides:

Nokia Drive 2.0 For Windows Phone Released

Nokia has updates its Nokia Drive turn by turn navigation application for Windows Phone, the latest version is Nokia Drive 2.0 and it comes with a range of new features. The new Nokia Drive 2.0 for Windows Phone now comes with offline navigation, which means you will still be able to use the app even if you don’t have a connection on your Windows Phone device.

With the offline navigation feature, you can download maps, and use them for navigation, which would also mean that you wont use up any of your monthly data with your carrier whilst using the app. The Nokia Drive 2.0 application is now available from the windows Phone Marketplace, and it will work with Nokia’s Lumia range of devices.

Nokia Drive 2.0 Previewed by its Product Manager Andre Kuhn:

Nokia Lumia 610 To Feature WiFi Hotspot

Nokia announced the new Nokia Lumia 610 at last months MWC, and the device is the companies first budget Windows Phone device, although it looks like it will come with a feature that some of the more expensive Nokia Windows Phone devices don’t have.

Nokia have listed the device on their website, and it looks like it will have a WiFi hotpsot feature that will let you share the handsets connection with up to five devices. As a reminder the Nokia Lumia 610 features 3.7 inch WVGA capacitive LCD touchscreen display which has a resolution of 800 x 480 pixels, plus a single core Qualcomm Snapdragon S1 800MHz processor, 256MB of RAM and 16GB of built in storage.

Other specifications on the Nokia Lumia 610 include a 5 megapixel camera with auto-focus and an LED flash, plus a 1300 mAh battery and it will be available some time this quarter.

Nokia Lumia 610 Windows Phone live demo: