At a media event in Turkey today, Nokia introduced its latest Symbian Belle smartphone, the Nokia 603. It?s a colourful and affordable smartphone, loaded with the latest technology and apps.
The Symbian Belle interface is modern and customisable, offering up to six home screens and an extended range of widgets that can be placed in any combination the user chooses. The browser is four times faster than that found on previous Symbian versions, and offers compatibility with modern web standards. The latest version of Maps allows free, turn-by-turn navigation in both standard and Drive views for in-car use.
Powered by a 1GHz processor, the Nokia 603 is responsive even while multitasking many apps, but this power doesn't mean you have to worry about your battery all the time. It's rated to last for seven hours talktime and 460 hours in standby, considerably longer than other phones with this sort of feature set. The phone measures 113.5 x 57.1 x 12.7mm and weighs 106.9g. It offers Pentaband reception (WCDMA 850/900/1700/1900/2100, GSM/EDGE 850/900/1800/1900), Bluetooth 3.0, WiFi and the latest HSDPA 3G - offering downloads up to 14.4Mbps
With a 3.5-inch ClearBlack display under toughened glass to make sure your screen is visible even in bright sunlight, the Nokia 603 is versatile under any circumstances. The screen offers nHD resolution (640 x 360 pixels) and 16 million colours. The phone comes preloaded with Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, Shazam and YouTube to cater to your entertainment needs. On a more serious level, there?s Microsoft Office Communicator, Quick Office, Adobe PDF reader and Vlingo.
On the back, there's a five-megapixel camera with digital zoom. The latest version of the camera software means you can now shoot 720p video at 30fps. And on-board photo and video editing software means that you can update your social networks with pictures and movies easily while you?re on the move.
The Nokia 603 is also the seventh Nokia phone to offer NFC (near-field communications). This technology allows easy sharing of pictures, videos and contact details; the use of a location-based services and simple, one-tap pairing with compatible accessories.
The phone comes in black and white varieties, but six swappable rear covers will help owners express their individual personalities. It will ship in Q4 2011 and is expected to cost around €200 before any local taxes or operator subsidies.
Alongside the Nokia 603 launched today, Nokia also introduced the Nokia Luna Bluetooth Headset. As you can see, it's a brighter offering than the sober silver units you?re probably used to. The second thing that makes it a bit special is that it's NFC enabled.
The Nokia Luna headset is a two-piece design. There's the base and the part that you put in your ear. Taking the earpiece out of the base automatically fires up the Bluetooth connection to your phone and answers incoming calls. Putting it back hangs up the call and powers down the Bluetooth connection.
Like the recent Nokia J headset, there are voice prompts to assist you with pairing, and also to tell you when the battery is low. So pairing is pretty simple. It's even simpler if you've got one of our phones with NFC built in (Currently, the Nokia C7, Oro, 600, 603, 700, 701 and N9). In that case, you can just bump the two things together and the job's done.
The earpiece weighs a mere 5g, while the holder is 18.3g. On the technical front, it supports Bluetooth specification 2.1 + EDR, Handsfree profile 1.5 and Headset Profile 1.1 advanced multipoint. Battery life is pretty special, too: up to eight hours talktime or sixty days standby (providing you pop it back in the holder).
The Nokia Luna Bluetooth Headset will be available from Q4 2011 and should cost around €69 before any local taxes.