Smart and innovative smartphone design

MANILA, Philippines - People are always after the latest and greatest technology that powers smartphones. Each year, millions of purchases are made to upgrade to the latest smartphones.

However, technology is just a part of the reason that fuels the mobile crowd to upgrade their gadgets. Design is also an important factor. It’s not just the design of looking good but design being functional for everyday use.

Who gets to judge the greatest designs in the world? One of the prestigious awarding bodies is the International Forum (iF) Design based in Hannover, Germany. For the last 60 years, it has assembled an authoritative body composed of experts to judge a slew of products to recognize design excellence and award merit for design functionality.

In 2012, Nokia bagged seven awards for outstanding achievements in design on its products and associated accessories. Here is a list of what iF Design judged to be creative and bold and wowed the jury:


 Lumia 800, Lumia 920

 Despite its launch two years ago, the Nokia Lumia 800 still resonates a visually stunning look to this day with its sleek form and curved 3.7-inch AMOLED screen.

relevant Windows Phone 7.5 OS and is powered by a 1.4 Ghz processor. The classy design is not just a visual delight; it also provides comfort when using the phone due to its thin form factor and solid engineering.

An improvement over its predecessor, the Nokia Lumia 920 continues to dazzle consumers and the iF alike. The use of vibrant colors and a slight curved back plate is both easy on the eyes and in the users hands. The comfort in design is both functional and attractive. It gives each phone a personality with the best innovative technology that measures up to how it is perceived.

The Lumia 920 has a slightly bigger screen at 4.5 inches and runs on a 1.5 Ghz processor that backs the design with the latest and greatest on mobile technology.

Wireless charging plate

If science fiction authors H.G. Wells and Jules Verne were alive today they would certainly be amazed by how far technology has progressed. These days, it is certainly obvious if a device is left alone near a wall socket — it requires charging among a mess of cables.

With the advent of wireless charging, Nokia has paired color, function and design with these wireless charging plates. Mobile users do not have to worry about where to place their mobile phones for charging. Nowadays, one can just simply place the device on the wireless charging plate and your phone starts charging.


 Bluetooth headsets


For the better part of the last decade, wireless is no longer a buzzword. Connections made sans the wire make mobile lifestyles easier and untangled.

The iF awarded Nokia’s Bluetooth Headset BH-118 for its colorful and subtle design. Listening to music or having a conversation without worrying about the cables that may strangle you is no longer a concern. Absolute clarity is essential when listening and talking on your mobile device with crystal clear signal without interruption. The BH-118 makes it seem effortless with color and design that match your phone.

 JBL PlayUp, JBL PowerUp


Portability and convenience is one of the core design goals of a mobile device. JBL recognizes what Nokia brings to the world of design and its no wonder this great accessory bagged another award from the iF Design awarding body.

Form and functionality are very important for both companies so they have come up with two stylish products that seamlessly integrate with their surroundings. The JBL PlayUp is a portable speaker that has several colors to match the color of your phone.

Additionally, the design echoes the best sound quality that JBL is known for and includes wireless transmission of music from phones to speakers. Great tonality, a solid bass and balanced treble make Nokia phones a great music device you can easily bring around.

JBL PowerUp for Nokia is another result when great minds think alike. Besides piping music from a mobile phone, it also features a tap-play option when you place your phone on the speaker surface.

Taking its cue from JBL PlayUp, it also features wireless charging while playing music. Simply placing the phone on the top surface charges the phone and the ability to play music continuously without cables is a very innovative idea that merges design and function in one product.

These seven innovative products from Nokia certainly made an impact on the International Forum Design 2012 jury. For more products that aim to inspire design and functionality, visit Nokia’s webpage at http: / /www.nokia.com.ph.

source: philstar.com

 

Nokia unveils new Windows Phone 8-powered Lumia phones

MANILA, Philippines — Finnish phone manufacturer Nokia on Wednesday unveiled its latest bid at regaining smartphone market share bannered by the Lumia 920, one of the two phones powered by Microsoft’s Windows Phone 8 mobile operating system.
In unveiling its latest flagship phone, Nokia underscored its need to differentiate in a quickly saturating smartphone market worldwide, as it pins its future on two key areas: photography and navigation.
The new Lumia 920, which features a Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor and 4.5-inch display, will come packed with an 8-megapixel camera sporting Nokia’s proprietary PureView technology, which Nokia claims takes better photos and videos than any competitor smartphone.
PureView, which debuted along with the Symbian Belle-powered Nokia 808 PureView this year, is a technology developed in-house by Nokia that purportedly takes better images, even in low-light conditions.
Nokia is claiming the PureView image sensor included in the Lumia 920 captures “between five to ten times” of light than any other smartphone, comparable to most dSLRs today.
On the navigation front, Nokia announced the availability of City Lens, an augmented-reality application that shows overlaid details on places as viewed through the phone’s camera.
The augmented reality feature extends to the popular Nokia Maps application, where the user would simply hold up the phone at eye level to see an overlay of map directions.
The new phones also come with wireless charging capabilities.
The Lumia 920 will come pre-packed with Windows Phone 8 (WP8), which is a re-worked version of WP7 that ties in the core development kernels of Microsoft’s next-generation PC operating system, Windows 8, set to be launched in late October.

Meanwhile, Nokia’s Lumia 820 features a 4-inch display encased in a polycarbonate body, and a first for Nokia’s Lumia devices, a removable back cover that gives access to the 1,650mAh battery and optional microSD storage.
It will be powered by a capable 1.5GHz dual-core processor paired with 1GB of RAM. It also comes with an 8-megapixel Carl Zeiss optics and a VGA front-facing camera.
The new phones come with wireless charging capabilities, although the feature is available on the Lumia 820 only via an optional detachable shell accessory.
They will come pre-packed with Windows Phone 8 (WP8), which is a re-worked version of WP7 that ties in the core development kernels of Microsoft’s next-generation PC operating system, Windows 8, set to be launched in late October.
The new Lumia phones will reportedly enter the market by the last quarter of the year, in time for Microsoft’s launch of Windows 8. Pricing details, meanwhile, have yet to be announced.

Nokia reportedly sold 7 million Lumia phones in 54 countries since it launched last year, with more than half of it being sold in the last quarter.

source: interaksyon.com