Nokia 6, Nokia's first Android smartphone, made official

[Nowak]

http://www.forbes.com/sites/ewanspence/2017/01/07/nokia-6-android-smartphone-announcement/#68e697726f97

 

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The first Android-powered smartphone to carry the Nokia name from HMD Global has been announced. The Nokia 6 features 4 GB of RAM, 64 GB of on-board storage alongside microSD support, a 16 megapixel main camera, and a 3,000 mAh battery.

The form factor may not push the limits of design - the handset is a monoblock form sculpted from a single piece of aluminium - but it represents the modern design ethics of a smartphone with a 1920x1080 HD screen measuring 5.5 inches on the diagonal.

Nokia, after selling its phone business to Microsoft in 2014, licensed out its name to several Chinese manufacturers for a few years, before finally announcing late into 2016 that they intend to return to the smartphone industry, via the Finnish consortium HMD Global, composed of former Nokia employees, and Foxconn. Today, their first Android smartphone, the Nokia 6, has been officially unveiled.

 

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Launching in China opens up a number of interesting dynamics.. Unlike the markets in Europe and North America, the Chinese market is one that is still going through its growth phase. Re-establishing 'brand Nokia' is going to be easier here than it would be in the saturated citadels where Nokia once ruled. It also keeps supply lines relatively short from the production facilities, and using a single retailer reduces the demand on logistics for HMD, which is still a company in start-up mode.

 

The Nokia 6 is clearly playing in the mid-range market. Shipping with a SnapDragon 430 system-on-chip is not going to set the world alight in terms of performance but the chipset should be able to hold its own against handsets at a similar price to the Nokia 6's 1699 Yuan ($245). Leaning on the Nokia brand, pairing up with Dolby to use its Atmos sound processing, and promoting the use of an aluminium unibody all tie in with a mid-range handset that punches above its weight... all of which tie in with the values many expect from the Nokia brand name.

To summarize: the important details are that it has a Qualcomm Snapdragon 430 with a Qualcomm X6 LTE modem, 4GB RAM, 64GB expandable storage, a 5.5" 1080x1920 curved display, Dolby Atmos audio, a 16MP rear camera + 8MP front-facing camera, a fingerprint sensor, a 3000mAh battery and is running Android 7.0, making this the first Nokia-branded smartphone with Android pre-installed. Based on the specs, and the $250 price tag, it's clearly going for the mid-ranged market. Oh yeah, it's also launching in China first, followed by other markets later this year.

 

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The handset will go on sale 'early in 2017' and will be available exclusively in China through a partnership with retailer JD.com. Although a date for public availability has not been announced, HMD's CEO Arto Nummela has previously told Forbes that "it is good practice to go on sale very soon after a launch."

I have also heard somewhere that Nokia intends on launching several more Android smartphones later this year, targeting different markets and price points. That all being said, we should be getting more details at Mobile World Congress in March.

 

So, what do you think? Is this the device you thought Nokia would return on? Also, what about a phone in the $250 price range with specs like that? Well, except for the CPU, but I guess they had to cut corners to get the price point somewhere. But aside from that. And are you looking forward to Nokia's future Android phones? Let me know below  

[AlTech]

20 minutes ago, Daring said:

snip

Your title is misleading. Please change it,

 

Nokia did in fact make a few Android phones before all of the Microsoft buying them and selling them shenanigans.

 

That's what got Microsoft to buy them. They knew Nokia would ditch Windows Phone and so they bought them to keep the hardware alive whilst the OS was being developed.

[Nowak]

Just now, AluminiumTech said:

Your title is misleading. Please change it,

 

Nokia did in fact make a few Android phones before all of the Microsoft buying them and selling them shenanigans.

 

That's what got Microsoft to buy them. They knew Nokia would ditch Windows Phone and so they bought them to keep the hardware alive whilst the OS was being developed.

The Nokia X line weren't really smartphones, per se. They were feature phones running Android.

[AlTech]

I'm disappointed in what was once called Nokia.

They threw away themselves and they are to blame for all of this.

 

EDIT: Allow me to explain myself.

 

Microsoft bought Nokia because they were scared. They were scared that nobody would carry the Windows Phone OS and name with their phone. After Samsung, HTC and others betrayed them, they thought that nobody would pickup the OS. So they decided to buy Nokia so that they could continue selling phones with their OS. They fired a lot of Nokia staff because they didn't need many. They wanted to make several phones just to keep interest and market share alive.

 

Before Windows 10, Windows Phone was a different animal. It ran buttery smooth but had very little in common with Windows desktop. Microsoft knew they had to create a new version of Windows sooner or later and thus they decided to unify Windows Desktop and Windows Mobile under a single codebase.

 

This allowed them to develop the OS at their own pace without being pressured and to allow them to take the phone designs Nokia started (with the Lumia 650, Lumia 550 and Lumia 950 family) and ship it a year later with Windows 10.

 

To this day, they have ceased production of their Lumia 950, 950XL, 650 and 550 as well as all other Windows Phones they made. Since then HP and Acer, Blu and Alcatel OneTouch have helped fix the situation but Microsoft is expected to fix it themselves.

 

That is all.

[AlTech]

2 minutes ago, Daring said:

The Nokia X line weren't really smartphones, per se. They were feature phones running Android.

They were smartphones. Do I need to get a mod to change the title or are you going to?

[Nowak]

2 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

They were smartphones. Do I need to get a mod to change the title or are you going to?

Alright, fine, fine.

[ApolloFury]

It is only a true Nokia if it is indestructible.

[Aniallation]

Given that it's for the Chinese market, $245 USD is still a tad on the expensive side. It has pretty much identical specs and even very similar looks to the BLU Life One X2, which retails for only $200 stateside.

 

10 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

x

Quotes the entire news post lol

[dizmo]

Finally it's happening!!! Pretty stoked on what they're going to do with their higher end phones, if this is what they're doing with their entry level device. 4GB of RAM, 3000mAh battery, curved glass in a phone of this caliber surely means magnificent things to come for the top end. Hopefully they have a top notch camera and stellar battery life. Tick tock MWC, come soon!

 

10 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Your title is misleading. Please change it,

 

Nokia did in fact make a few Android phones before all of the Microsoft buying them and selling them shenanigans.

 

That's what got Microsoft to buy them. They knew Nokia would ditch Windows Phone and so they bought them to keep the hardware alive whilst the OS was being developed.

Shame on you. You should know better than to quote the entire OP unnecessarily.

 

5 minutes ago, Daring said:

Alright, fine, fine.

Don't bend to someone just because they mention mods. He's just an emotional member of the forum.

8 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

They were smartphones. Do I need to get a mod to change the title or are you going to?

Ooo scary! Maybe we should report you for being a dick, too?

[Nowak]

5 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Don't bend to someone just because they mention mods. He's just an emotional member of the forum.

Oh, trust me, I know. I gotta say, though, being disappointed in Nokia because they're making phones running a real mobile OS now?  That's just silly.

 

Personally, I'm excited to see what other smartphones Nokia puts out this year.

[AlTech]

7 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Finally it's happening!!! Pretty stoked on what they're going to do with their higher end phones, if this is what they're doing with their entry level device. 4GB of RAM, 3000mAh battery, curved glass in a phone of this caliber surely means magnificent things to come for the top end. Hopefully they have a top notch camera and stellar battery life. Tick tock MWC, come soon!

 

Shame on you. You should know better than to quote the entire OP unnecessarily.

Sorry for late reply. My quad core i5 is acting strangely and is making basic browsing a bit difficult.

 

I fixed the quote.

Quote

Don't bend to someone just because they mention mods. He's just an emotional member of the forum.

No more emotional than the Patrick and Lawlz.

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Ooo scary! Maybe we should report you for being a dick, too?

I was asking for clarity because some people may have forgotten that Nokia rebelled and made an Android phone despite their agreement with Microsoft.

 

5 minutes ago, Daring said:

I gotta say, though, being disappointed in Nokia because they're making phones running a real mobile OS now?  That's just silly.

Windows 10 for phones  is as real of an OS as you'll ever get. The OS is based off of a real OS that people actually use in a different type of device.

 

Does that make Android not a real OS? No. Of course not. Don't be silly.

[Nowak]

1 minute ago, AluminiumTech said:

Windows 10 for phones  is as real of an OS as you'll ever get. The OS is based off of a real OS that people actually use in a different type of device.

Could say the same thing about iOS and Android, since iOS uses the same Mach kernel as macOS and Android is based on the Linux kernel.

 

As for the "real OS" part, I was being a bit facetious. But, I'll tell ya something: Windows Phone didn't do a whole lotta favors for Nokia, especially towards the profitability of their mobile division, hence the sale to Microsoft. Because their mobile division wasn't profitable.

[dizmo]

10 minutes ago, Daring said:

Oh, trust me, I know. I gotta say, though, being disappointed in Nokia because they're making phones running a real mobile OS now?  That's just silly.

 

Personally, I'm excited to see what other smartphones Nokia puts out this year.

Same. There's rumors of a flagship level cameracentric phone. Should be pretty amazing. Perhaps we'll see the return of a xenon flash to a phone. I really hope they have a dual camera set up though, something that can stand up to what Asus seemingly has coming out.

 

I hope they did a lot of optimizing. Android can pretty easily run away and go ham on the battery.

6 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

Sorry for late reply. My quad core i5 is acting strangely and is making basic browsing a bit difficult.

 

I fixed the quote.

No more emotional than the Patrick and Lawlz.

I was asking for clarity because some people may have forgotten that Nokia rebelled and made an Android phone despite their agreement with Microsoft.

Haha, Lawlz is blunt but he's usually got valid points and he backs them up. Patrick...well...we should strive to be better than the worst, no? *shudder*

IIRC they didn't really rebel, the phones were unveiled before the take over was finalized so they were technically allowed to release it. I think they were also allowed to finish whatever was in the pipeline, but weren't allowed to start any new projects.

[Nowak]

1 minute ago, dizmo said:

Same. There's rumors of a flagship level cameracentric phone. Should be pretty amazing. Perhaps we'll see the return of a xenon flash to a phone. I really hope they have a dual camera set up though, something that can stand up to what Asus seemingly has coming out.

 

I hope they did a lot of optimizing. Android can pretty easily run away and go ham on the battery.

I hope they can do something better than PureView, since that belongs to Microsoft now.

[Monte_Carlo]

Well... looks solid enough for mid-range.  Design actually looks fairly nice, but I'm really hoping they don't try to pull any weird BS with Android.  All I want is a stock experience with no bloat or BS.  

[Nowak]

Just now, Monte_Carlo said:

Well... looks solid enough for mid-range.  Design actually looks fairly nice, but I'm really hoping they don't try to pull any weird BS with Android.  All I want is a stock experience with no bloat or BS.  

They seem to have some sort of skin on it. Probably China-specific? idk.

[dizmo]

4 minutes ago, Monte_Carlo said:

Well... looks solid enough for mid-range.  Design actually looks fairly nice, but I'm really hoping they don't try to pull any weird BS with Android.  All I want is a stock experience with no bloat or BS.  

Eh I hope they tweaked it a bit. There are some painful oversights stock Android has that make it rather annoying to use.

[captain_to_fire]

19 minutes ago, Daring said:

Could say the same thing about iOS and Android, since iOS uses the same Mach kernel as macOS and Android is based on the Linux kernel.

iOS or iPhone OS in 2007 is indeed a forked version of Mac OS X/macOS. Windows Phone 7 is unfortunately based in the antiquated Windows CE that doesn't have support for modern hardware like multi core processors and has a crappy SDK based on Silverlight. Microsoft stopped supporting WP7 and launched Windows Phone 8 which is based on the NT kernel just like Windows with the support for multi core CPUs. 

10 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Same. There's rumors of a flagship level cameracentric phone. Should be pretty amazing. Perhaps we'll see the return of a xenon flash to a phone. I really hope they have a dual camera set up though, something that can stand up to what Asus seemingly has coming out

Unfortunately, Microsoft killed the supposed successor of the Lumia 1020.

 What is Microsoft doing in its mobile platform? The Lumia 1020 back in the day was nothing like anything else. They could've focused on that.

 

 

[Aniallation]

4 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Eh I hope they tweaked it a bit. There are some painful oversights stock Android has that make it rather annoying to use.

Pure stock Android N (Pixel) still not having normally accessible battery percentage is the biggest load of BS ever

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

43 minutes ago, AluminiumTech said:

They were smartphones. Do I need to get a mod to change the title or are you going to?

 

You need to back down.

You've made a click bait title before. But no one threatened you with a mod. Do unto others as you would have them do unto you. 

 

I hope this would be your last time. Whether the mods give a shit about petty squabbles like this is another matter. 

 

[Monte_Carlo]

2 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Eh I hope they tweaked it a bit. There are some painful oversights stock Android has that make it rather annoying to use.

I can certainly understand that.  I'm currently on a Japanese specific Sharp Aquos phone, and it makes my LG G3 feel snappy and responsive.  The sheer amount of crap the Aquos has to run with really slows my experience down.  I'd much rather deal with the oversights than the unrootable painful experience that Sharp has. 

 

Long story short.  I really regret not going with a Nexus.  

[dizmo]

2 minutes ago, hey_yo_ said:

 

Unfortunately, Microsoft killed the supposed successor of the Lumia 1020.

What is Microsoft doing in its mobile platform? The Lumia 1020 back in the day was nothing like anything else. They could've focused on that.

 

 

With a struggling OS, it's foolish to release really high end phone that few people will buy. They made the smart choice and chose to release more "normal" phones.

2 minutes ago, Aniallation said:

Pure stock Android N (Pixel) still not having normally accessible battery percentage is the biggest load of BS eve

At least you can turn it on easily enough....I can't swipe notification to dismiss them from the lock screen.

How the fuck is that not a basic feature of Android?

Still enrages me. I hate the 5x.

 

[Aniallation]

3 minutes ago, dizmo said:

At least you can turn it on easily enough....I can't swipe notification to dismiss them from the lock screen.

How the fuck is that not a basic feature of Android?

Still enrages me. I hate the 5x.

Huh? My 5x could do that. 

[dizmo]

4 minutes ago, Monte_Carlo said:

I can certainly understand that.  I'm currently on a Japanese specific Sharp Aquos phone, and it makes my LG G3 feel snappy and responsive.  The sheer amount of crap the Aquos has to run with really slows my experience down.  I'd much rather deal with the oversights than the unrootable painful experience that Sharp has. 

 

Long story short.  I really regret not going with a Nexus.  

Depends on the phone. The 5x is a piece of trash.

Yeah, I could see some Japanese companies filling their phones with bloat. Most though, are perfectly fine. Just throw a different launcher on and go.

 

2 minutes ago, Aniallation said:

Huh? My 5x could do that. 

Really? Mine can't.

I can't wait to get another flagship. I bought this thing to tide me over between the Note7 (which would have been my phone) and whatever other flagship caught my eye. I had the Nexus 5. This thing is an embarrassment.

[Nowak]

1 hour ago, AluminiumTech said:

After Samsung, HTC and others betrayed them, they thought that nobody would pickup the OS.

Samsung, HTC, Huawei and the rest did not "betray" Microsoft. They dropped it because nobody cares about Windows Phone and they thought it wasn't a good use of R&D to produce phones that nobody buys.

 

1 hour ago, AluminiumTech said:

So they decided to buy Nokia so that they could continue selling phones with their OS.

They bought Nokia's phone business because Nokia's phone business was unprofitable as a direct result of them adopting Windows Phone, which never became the smash hit that Microsoft was hoping it would be. Why should they continue supporting a business that's making them bleed money when the rest of their businesses are just fine? It'd just hold everyone else back.

 

1 hour ago, AluminiumTech said:

They fired a lot of Nokia staff because they didn't need many.

They fired a lot of Nokia staff because Satya Nadella hated the Nokia deal.

 

1 hour ago, AluminiumTech said:

They wanted to make several phones just to keep interest and market share alive.

Which clearly didn't work 

 

I mean, this is a reality you and other Windows Phone fans around here are gonna have to face eventually. That nobody cares about Windows Phone. It launched with too little, too late, and a lack of apps + every Windows Phone 7 phone being literally the same aside from some minor design differences killed off any momentum the platform had before it even could take off. That, and the Apple/Google duopoly in the smartphone market was already too strong by 2010. Just look at BlackBerry. At this point, for everyone who isn't Apple it's adopt Android or die.