Nokia’s new blower packs more pixels than most DSLRs, but Its Symbian operating system hails from the dawn of time. Can Its mammoth snapper make up for the lack of a modern smartphone OS?. Nokia won many fans with the N8 and its 12MP snapper, but the 808 takes camphones to a new level. It’s kitted out with a four-element Carl Zeiss lens and huge, 41MP, 1/1.2in sensor that’s more than two times the size of that in the iPhone 45. It’s only a tad smaller than the CX sensor in Nikon’s 1 series interchangeable lens cameras.
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| TECH SPECS Screen 4in, 640x360, AMOLED touchscreen OS Nokia Symbian Belle Proces5or 1.3GHz ARM 11 Photo res 41 MP (38MP erfective) Max video resolution 1080p@30fps Storage 16GB (+ up to 32GB via microSD) Connectivity 3G, Bluetooth 3.0, HDMI, microUSB, NFC Wi-Fi b/g/n |
While Nokia’s clearly chuffed with that 41MP number, the largest images the 808 can actually create are 38MP. That’s still huge: enough for larger than-A3 prints at 300dpi (standard print resolution for magazines). It also means you can select a small part of your photo and blow ft up into a crisp, printable Image, or zoom in (silently) up to 3x and capture a 5MP snap with none of digital zoom’s compromises. Images are assembled by a separate imaging processor, so they shouldn’t slow down the phone too much, but storage could become an Issue: a full- size photo will weigh about 9MB, and its l080p video will eat up as much as 180MB per minute of footage. All of which means the 16GB of onboard storage won’t go far, but you can at least add an SD card of up to 32GB.
Symbian Belle is a decent enough OS, but it’s a dead end for developers - so don’t expect to see many
exciting new apps on the 808. That sad, some photo apps will come pre-loaded, as will the excellent Nokia Drive app-nav. Meanwhile, with Dolby Headphone surround sound running its musical output, it’s no media slouch.
Sharing your photos should be pretty easy, as the 808 is well served in the connectivity department: it packs NFC for short-range linkage, HDMI and wireless streaming for viewing your pics and videos on a TV, and its gallery resizes photos before sending them to Facebook or Flickr.
Not only does the 808 capture stereo audio while filming, Nokia says it’s the first camera that can record sound ‘without distortion at audio levels beyond the capability of human hearing’. An impressive-sounding fact, but one you’ll be unable to confirm without the aid of a dog or specially trained bat.
Symbian Belle is a decent enough OS, but it’s a dead end for developers - so don’t expect to see many
exciting new apps on the 808. That sad, some photo apps will come pre-loaded, as will the excellent Nokia Drive app-nav. Meanwhile, with Dolby Headphone surround sound running its musical output, it’s no media slouch.
Sharing your photos should be pretty easy, as the 808 is well served in the connectivity department: it packs NFC for short-range linkage, HDMI and wireless streaming for viewing your pics and videos on a TV, and its gallery resizes photos before sending them to Facebook or Flickr.
Not only does the 808 capture stereo audio while filming, Nokia says it’s the first camera that can record sound ‘without distortion at audio levels beyond the capability of human hearing’. An impressive-sounding fact, but one you’ll be unable to confirm without the aid of a dog or specially trained bat.