Nokia N8 - Simply a great phone
26.01.2012
Photo edited in a photo editor. I made fun of my dog a little ☺:
Maps app for navigation
Unfortunately, this application is unlikely to be suitable for navigation in Astrakhan. The maps are too uninformative, many streets are missing, detail is almost zero, there are no 3D objects, etc. Although, judging by the reviews, in some regions the situation is much better. I have not yet traveled outside the Astrakhan region with the Nokia N8 phone, so there is no way to check it yet. But one of the advantages is that navigation is absolutely free throughout the entire life of the phone. You only pay for traffic when A-GPS is connected (you can turn it off). The program interface is clear and beautiful, everything you need is there. For example, information about nearby shops, restaurants, attractions, etc. Well, information about traffic jams, etc. and so on. You can use both pedestrian and car navigation. The latest versions of the Maps app have multi-touch support.
But again, I repeat, in some cities there is no point in using Ovi (Nokia) cards. For Astrakhan, I would advise installing the 2gis program, it definitely has almost everything you need. All houses are numbered, there is information about any organizations. You can view the map in 2D and 3D mode. In addition to Astrakhan, you can download the databases of about 50 more cities.
Maps app:
Standard browser (version 7.3)
The browser has become more convenient compared to earlier versions and more pleasant to look at. But the loading speed of heavy pages is still far from ideal. Added the function of opening 2 or more pages. There is FlashLite 4.0, support for video on Flash 10.0, if you wish, you can watch streaming and online video. Symbian Belle promised to further improve the browser. But Opera, in most cases, seems to be a better option for Internet surfing.
Internet TV
There are 5 applications installed at once - CNN Video, National Geographic, E!, Vesti and Movie Teasers. When starting the program, they warn that it will require a large amount of traffic to work. Therefore, I have not yet had the opportunity to enjoy Internet TV.
Other
Ovi Social Center application with access to Facebook and Twitter communities. You can add other social networks.
Labels "Here and Now" and "Youtube". We can say that these are ordinary links to sites that open through a standard browser. "Here and Now" is information about the weather, temperature and wind speed in your city. Well, the nearest restaurants and the distance to them are also shown. Perhaps some cities have information about other establishments. The “Youtube” shortcut simply directs you to the mobile version of the site.
Shazam - identifying a song based on a recorded excerpt.
"Tools" - various applications for setting up your phone. Main functions: allows you to define connection settings for free; transferring contacts, calendar entries, etc. between compatible Nokia phones; setting up email; saving important information on Ovi.com and more.
Available Widgets
There aren't that many of them. Here is their list:
You can install other widgets, for example "VKontakte". It is impossible to remove unnecessary standard widgets, even through the application manager. But on the forums they write that if you put widgets on top of existing ones, then they can be deleted in the future.
It is clear that the standard set of programs is not enough for everyone, so I offer a list of the most interesting third-party applications.
By the way, the Nokia store has applications that can be downloaded completely free of charge, both from your phone and from your computer, in order to save traffic.
Jbak Taskman - the program is a task manager combined with quick program launch. An excellent replacement for the standard task manager. Allows you not only to close, but also to “kill” processes hanging in the system and compress RAM in case of shortage.
Spb Weather is a program for receiving and displaying weather conditions for 5 days on the desktop.
As a navigator you can use, for example, Navitel, 2gis, Cityguide, Garmin, Yandex Maps, Mail Agent with maps and another program that you like.
Magic Brush is a functional drawing tool. I think it will also be useful.
Joikuspot - distribution of Internet traffic received from the operator via Wi-Fi. Your phone turns into a Wi-Fi hotspot.
Zxreader is a functional reader.
Skype, Mobile Agent, Qip Pda 3000, "Bayanicq", "VKontakte" and others upon request.
Swype is a convenient input method and replacement for the standard keyboard.
SPB TV - a large selection of TV channels for viewing via the Internet.
“Screenshot” - well, it’s clear. A program for taking screenshots from the display by pressing the camera button.
It is not recommended to install Kaspersky anti-virus; the smartphone may not work stable. And there are practically no viruses on Symbian^3. As a safety net, you can use the already mentioned SafeManager. You should also not install Fontrouter (for OS9.x) on Nokia N8. This will result in the phone not turning on. Restoring a phone is relatively simple, but I think no one needs extra problems.
The phone also comes with Java applications and games. But playing games that require a keyboard is not very convenient; it would all look much better on a mechanical keyboard. Using the "All rights for java in Symbian^3" mod, you can set any rights for Java through the application manager (such as connecting to the network, disabling and enabling the on-screen keyboard, security warning, network access, sending messages, autorun, etc. ).
If you install a lot of applications and especially HD games in one folder, the phone will start to slow down when entering this folder. Therefore, it is better to distribute everything into several folders and preferably no more than 10 heavy games in one folder.
What phone features do you use frequently?
Internet via Opera Mini, SMS, calls, camera, player, various applications and games, watching videos, navigation via 2GIS, Bluetooth, alarm clock.
What phone features do you use occasionally?
Wi-Fi, video calls, calendar, standard navigation application, “here and now”, standard browser, calculator.
What functions do you not use at all?
Standard Internet TV applications, intranet, Communicator, dictionary, notes, message reading with a voice engine, Lingvo - voice, Ovi store (Nokia).
What glitches were noticed?
Glitches mainly occur when running certain applications. I can’t say for sure whether it’s the software or the phone. Some applications may slow down or freeze. Once the screen started flickering due to several games being accidentally launched, I had to restart the phone. And they started because the phone starts to slow down when entering folders with a large number of HD games. Because of this, you start tapping on the screen to check if the download is in progress, and accidentally launch the wrong thing. If you receive an SMS message while playing the game, then terrible slowdowns also begin. First, the light indicator for missed events lights up (it is located on the menu button), and only then, after about five seconds, the sound signal of an incoming SMS appears. Maybe it was the game's fault, I don't know.
Another glitch was noticed in the MP3 player. At first the album covers did not want to be displayed, then, after 30 seconds, they still appeared, but they were somehow blurry and in poor quality. And only after another 30 seconds did they begin to display normally. But this only happened when viewed in horizontal orientation. In vertical mode, covers were displayed normally. Although of all the albums, I only have covers for three. So far this is an isolated case. In the MP3 player itself, sometimes, for a fraction of a second, the sound is interrupted when you press the menu button when the phone is in a locked state. But this glitch is also rare.
Conclusion
You can scold Nokia as much as you like, but the fact remains a fact. Despite the fact that the device was released in 2010 and was not very reliable at first, its production continues to this day. Firmware updates are rare, but they come out. And although now it is not a super-powerful phone with a good processor (it was not one at the start of sales), it will always have its buyer. It’s not for nothing that people recognized him as the best based on the results of previous years. Yes, various voting on sites are not always objective, but still. Many have already forgotten that in addition to a powerful processor, a large display and a functional operating system, there are other parameters in which it looks no worse than its competitors. And in some ways he is still the best. We can assume that the price for it now is not adequate, but you always have to pay extra for good case materials, and I understand those who are willing to pay extra.
I like Android devices, but, as I already wrote, most of them do not have the same build quality, good sound from headphones and an excellent camera. But the operating system is still very interesting, Symbian is not that good, although it completely suits me. Many phone problems can already be solved, and after the release of the official Bella the situation will improve even more.
In the end, we can say that the phone is very good, and if it had an updated operating system, sales would be even higher. After all, as I understand, many people are disgusted by the word “Symbian”. And, of course, the marriage in the first batches did not inspire confidence. Otherwise, the device is close to ideal and remains one of the best to this day. I'm not going to recommend it to anyone. Based on what you need from your phone. I think that Nokia fans will be happy with this device. I consider it the best of its kind (if we take Symbian devices), but N8-01 is due out soon, let's see what it offers. I give the phone a score of 9 out of 10; minor flaws for me do not spoil the overall picture.
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Probably everyone knows that the Nokia N8 camera is capable of shooting video in HD resolution (1280x720), but few people know about the video editing capabilities that are available to the owner of this device. We will talk about it today along with examples of video shooting that the Nokia N8 camera is capable of. The video camera interface can be called ascetic. This can be explained by the fact that we shoot video with our phones in cases where the shooting is not planned, but something interesting happens suddenly, as they say, here and now. And all you have at hand is your phone, which simply doesn’t have time to set anything up; you need to take it out and start shooting right away. However, in addition to the HD shooting mode, Nokia N8 has the ability to record geotags using the built-in GPS module. And there is a built-in video stabilizer.
Probably everyone knows that the Nokia N8 camera is capable of shooting video in HD resolution (1280x720), but few people know about the video editing capabilities that are available to the owner of this device. We will talk about it today along with examples of video shooting that the Nokia N8 camera is capable of. The video camera interface can be called ascetic. This can be explained by the fact that we shoot video with our phones in cases where the shooting is not planned, but something interesting happens suddenly, as they say, here and now. And all you have at hand is your phone, which simply doesn’t have time to set anything up; you need to take it out and start shooting right away. However, in addition to the HD shooting mode, Nokia N8 has the ability to record geotags using the built-in GPS module. And there is a built-in video stabilizer. Evaluating video capabilities based on a YouTube video is a thankless task, the main thing is that the resolution is 1280x720. This means that you will be able to comfortably watch videos shot by Nokia N8 in the future, when all TVs and televisions will work in this high definition standard.
An example of shooting video indoors
An example of shooting a video on the street
The video editor built into the Nokia N8 works in two modes, similar in their capabilities, but different in purpose. In the first case, we are talking about video editing. In the second - creating a beautiful slide show with music from your own photographs located in the memory of Nokia N8 and made with your own hands. The first thing the user sees after selecting a mode is the storyboard. All that remains is to add a video and/or photo from the gallery, add a soundtrack from the music library, add captions with text if necessary, and choose a beautiful option for animation of transitions between video blocks.
Creating a slide show is fundamentally no different, except that there is no need to cut out the necessary parts of the video during editing (this option is available in the video editing mode). The process of adding photos and sound materials is quick. And as a result, the user receives a slide show with beautiful animation, when the next photo appears effectively against a beautiful background. There is more than enough room for creativity. This means that you can do such operations on the plane on the way home from vacation and return with an impressive “how I spent my vacation” show ready to show to friends (certainly on a large TV).
Quiz question
You have the opportunity to win a Nokia N8 smartphone. To do this, you need to correctly answer the questions of our quiz published during the Nokia N8 marathon. 5. Nokia N8 features include:- Studying the theory and practice of film directing
- Nomination for Oscar 2011
- High definition video recording
- Publishing the filmed video on MTV
- None of the above
The day before, HMD Global released an updated camera application for the Nokia 8 smartphone. This update was highly anticipated by many G8 owners. I was one of them. And although I can’t call the Nokia 8 camera downright bad or downright good, I was at least interested. What will they offer us? And now the long-awaited update is out.
https://twitter.com/serenitatis/status/1002145544448495616
Before this, the “chamber” problem was solved in different ways. For example, using camera ports from Google Pixel. It's really not bad, but you can't use it fully due to the extremely poor quality of sound recording in videos. As a result, I personally began to use only my original camera, even with a slight loss in quality. But enough of the lyrics, let’s take a closer look at the updated application.
Its interface largely uses developments from the application in Lumia smartphones. We are talking about the so-called “Pro” mode, which gives significant freedom in terms of manual shooting settings. You can adjust white balance, focus, ISO, shutter speed, and control exposure compensation. This allows you, if you have direct hands, to gain full control over photography and squeeze all the juice out of the Nokia 8 cameras. However, the automatic mode remains. By the way, in addition to the Bothie mode, it now has the ability to take pictures in picture-in-picture mode. Naturally, there are other modes like blur or panorama. For those who cannot live without selfies, the “Retouch” mode has also been retained, which improves selfies by adding gloss and shine to the subject of the photo.
I did a little research on the reviews about the new application, and of course I also tested the update myself. Here are some reviews from the 4PDA forum.
In general, users are satisfied, this is confirmed by my tests. The picture clearly became more vibrant and less noisy in low light conditions. I liked the work of the HDR mode; it seemed to me that the final result was softer. However, there are also some unpleasant moments. For example, you can activate professional mode only in portrait orientation. The activation gesture occurs in the album, but for some reason it does not work. Another reason why photos are not saved in picture-in-picture mode. I also sometimes have errors when activating the front camera, and judging by the reviews, I’m not the only one, and they appeared on the May firmware on the old application.
- Use the cameras' Both mode instead of Color mode to capture low-light images in Photo mode.
- In Pro mode, you can play with the shutter speed to freeze motion by setting it high (1/500 or so).
- Set your shutter speed low to collect more light, although you'll then want to minimize the movement of your smartphone (by placing it on a tripod, for example).
- Using low ISO helps reduce noise, but then you need to set the shutter speed higher.
- By long pressing the shutter button you can take a series of pictures.
Overall, I'm pleased with the update. Despite some problems, a lot of work has clearly been done to improve the quality of shooting and the application interface. Of course, this should have been done from the very beginning, but what can you do? Better late than never. And finally, some examples of shooting, which can be found below in the album on Yandex.Disk.
Today I will tell you about a very interesting program CameraPro N8. As the name already suggests, it is aimed at working with the camera of the Nokia N8 camera phone. In theory, it can work with the entire range of Symbian devices, but CameraPro shows itself to the fullest on the Nokia N8. The 12-megapixel camera is the highlight of the Nokia N8, and to this day, there are no devices on the market that can surpass the camera capabilities of the Finnish smartphone.
There are several ways to expand the capabilities of the Nokia N8 camera. These are various patches that reduce the compression of photos, increase the number of frames in video recordings, etc. But these patches have a big disadvantage - they make changes to the system settings, and it is very difficult to predict the consequences of these interventions. For example, an early version of one of these patches made macro mode inoperable. CameraPro N8 is a much more reliable option in this regard. All settings changes occur in the program itself; it does not affect system components in any way. CameraPro is much more flexible in configuration than a patch and you can apply settings without reinstalling mods, signing with certificates, etc. fiddling around. The application is available in the Ovi Store and costs 140 rubles.
I think I’ve said all the lyrics, now let’s move on to the program itself. Everything written below is true for Nokia N8.
The first thing we see when we launch the program is ten buttons, five on the right and left. The right block is responsible (from top to bottom) for: setting white balance (auto, daylight, cloudy, incandescent, fluorescent), picture settings (brightness, contrast, gamma, sharpness, exposure), ISO sensitivity (auto, 100, 200 , 400, 800), selecting a shooting mode and its additional settings (regular photo, video, timer photo, photo with anti-shake function, bracketing, serial photography and time interval shooting), calling up program settings.
The left set of buttons is responsible (from top to bottom) for: flash (off, auto mode, forced mode, red-eye reduction mode), effects (no effects, negative, black and white, sepia, vivid colors, natural colors), exposure mode (auto, night, backlight, center light, sports mode and long exposure mode), focus mode (auto, macro, normal, hyperfocal, infinity) and finer AF settings (off, single, continuous).
A little to the left of the buttons described above we will see the engine responsible for zooming in and out (zoom). You can also control it using the volume control, just like in a standard camera. By the way, CameraPro has much more zoom capabilities than the standard tool. The quality, of course, is far from ideal, because... The zoom is software, but since it is there, it’s worth noting. Next, at the top we have something like a status line, which briefly shows the settings of the current mode, and at the bottom in the middle there is a shutter button, which duplicates it on the end of the smartphone.
The program offers a very large set of settings, and I want to focus on certain points. Let's start with the most delicious thing - the video. With CameraPro you can get full 720p HD at 30 frames per second. True, for this you will have to adjust something. So, to get our 30 frames per second you need:
1. Go to the “video” mode settings
2. Scroll to the very bottom and set the Expert mode setting to On
3. Next Options - Expert Video Settings and set everything up like this:
Preset: none
. Video type: H264; prof.=42801F
. Frame size: 1280x720
. Do not touch Custom width and custom height (leave them equal to zero)
. Set the Framerate slider to the max position (to the very right)
. Video bitrate: 14000000 (the author of the program recommends 30000000, but after that my video recording started to slow down)
. Audio type: AAC
. Audio bit rate: 128000
4. After this, click Back twice and enjoy the excellent quality of the video recording.
Separately, it is worth noting another feature of CameraPro - the ability to take macro photography in video mode. To do this, you need to enable macro mode and switch autofocus to continuous mode. The video below clearly demonstrates video shooting in macro mode (unfortunately, Sony Vegas and Youtube ruined the quality).
True, a side effect of continuous autofocus will be the noise of its operation, but it is not so loud that you would pay attention to it. In my memory, it’s a rare phone that allows you to shoot video in macro mode. To be fair, it is worth noting that the standard camera interface does not allow this either.
Now let's go over the photo mode. Before using CameraPro to take photos, there are a few things to note. First, in the settings you need to change the location of saving the footage from drive C (built-in system memory of the phone) to drive E (built-in memory of 16 GB). The second thing you should pay attention to is the size of the resulting frame. For widescreen shooting, set the resolution to 4000x2248. The third point is the compression ratio. The maximum value means that the resulting jpg file will be minimally compressed, but its volume will be around 12 MB. I also recommend setting up a demonstration of the footage, this makes it easier to filter out bad shots and avoid unnecessary waste of disk space. I won’t focus on obvious things like shooting with a timer; I’d rather talk about the anti-shake and bracketing modes. The first allows you to take pictures in conditions where stabilization of the captured image is necessary (for example, in low light conditions). In some cases, a very useful thing. Bracketing allows you to take three pictures with different shutter speed steps (the step is adjustable in the range from +2 to -2). This mode can be useful for shooting when you are not sure how best to shoot a frame and at what shutter speed. You can also take HDR pictures using bracketing and special software (for example, qtpfsgui).
That's probably all I wanted to tell you about CameraPro. With the help of this program, even without it, the gorgeous N8 camera becomes simply unsurpassed. And it makes the N8 not just a camera phone, but an almost complete replacement for a conventional digital camera.
The famous company Nokia, along with its revolutionary Symbian operating system, can be considered a legend of its time. But time has passed and practically nothing remains of the mighty Finnish brand.
Support for Symbian has ceased, which means that millions of owners of mobile gadgets are left captive of time…………….
How are things really going with YouTube on old gadgets and is there a chance for users to see their favorite videos on their gadgets again - we will try to answer these and other questions in the review ↓↓↓
Problems with Symbian
Error messages appear on the forms one after another about errors in the operation of the YouTube application on Symbian: ↓ ↓ ↓
- The most common message is “Connection error”;
- Applications may not launch correctly;
- Some functions do not work.
A few months ago, YouTube management explained this problem ↓
→ It is clarified that the famous hosting application will no longer be supported on outdated devices, the list of which includes Blue-Ray set-top boxes and Apple TV (last generation).
→ Due to the API update, owners of Symbian devices will also not be able to view videos.
This is due to the fact that YouTube regularly introduces new technologies and for them to work correctly, appropriate modifications are required on the part of the operating systems. As you know, no work has been done on Symbian for a long time, so users of the iconic smartphones of the previous generation should look for alternative ways to watch videos.
Errors can be seen in applications such as YouTube Downloader (connection problem).
Support for the Pocket YouTube and Downloader Pro applications on Symbian 3, etc. has also been discontinued.
Thus, you don’t have to waste time and download installation sis files of various YouTube applications, since most of them no longer work.
There is a solution - view it through a browser
Owners of mobile gadgets running Symbian have no more options but to watch their favorite videos directly in the browser window.
In this case, everything is also extremely simple: ↓ ↓ ↓
In general, this method is not so bad, because most videos work without freezing or other problems. There's only one significant drawback– image quality is lower than through the YouTube application for Symbian !!!
There is another way to watch videos in good quality through an outdated gadget: ↓↓↓
- Open the video you like on YouTube through a browser;
- Add “ss” in the address bar before the YouTube name;
- We go to the online assistant service, with which you can download the video;
- Now the video can be viewed offline through the same Real Player or another application.
Note!
If the address was originally like this " http://youtube.com/watch?v=code»
Then after making changes it should take the form “ http://ssyoutube.com/watch?v=code».
Using this method, you can download almost any video in original quality and watch it at any time on your mobile gadget.
And finally, there is one more left dubious option– download the YouTube HD application on Symbian.
This method is suitable for owners of smartphones running Symbian 3.
YouTube HD is a completely ordinary application that is practically no different from a standard utility. With its help you can download and watch videos on YouTube.
You can download the utility from a free source - http://allnokia.ru/symbsoft/moreinfo-7344.htm
This is done like this: ↓
- place the .sis file on the smartphone;
- go through the file manager;
- install the application.
And even if the formidable management of YouTube decided to disown support for Symbian as an unwanted child, users still have enough methods in their arsenal to watch videos through old smartphones.
