Nokia, Microsoft impress with Lumia 900 smartphone showing at CES
One of the most talked-about smartphones on display at CES could give Android and iPhone a run for its money.
It didn’t seem there were too many smartphones at last week’s 2012 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, but the ones that were there were pretty darn impressive, including Samsung’s Galaxy Note and Motorola’s Droid 4 – both of which are based on the popular Android platform.
But one that garnered the most nods from critics is the Nokia Lumia 900, the first smartphone born out of the worldwide partnership between Microsoft and Nokia, and the first to ship with the much-improved Microsoft Windows 7.5-Mango operating system out of the box.
The first thing you’ll notice when holding the Lumia 900 is its 4.3-inch AMOLED touchscreen – with a Clear Black Display made of durable Corning Gorilla glass. While bigger than previous Windows Phone devices, it’s not too big or heavy, with overall dimensions of 127.8 x 68.5 x 11.5 millimetres and weight of about 160 grams. While the back is straight, the edges are curved slightly, making it easy to wrap your hand around.
Powered by 1.4 GHz Scorpion processor and 512MB of system memory (RAM), the phone seemed speedy as you tap and swipe through the Metro interface to access content. While it doesn’t have an external card slot, the phone is said to ship with 16GB of data plus direct access to cloud storage via Windows Live SkyDrive (you get 25GB for free). The Lumia 900 will have 4G/LTE speeds, which will fall back to HSPA+ in areas without support for high-speed Long Term Evolution networks.
Other hardware observations: an 8-megapixel rear camera that can record 720p video (at 30 frames per second) with LED light, 1.3-megapixel front camera, 3.5 mm audio jack, speaker grill at the base of the phone and a micro USB port. Under the hood, the phone is said to have a few sensors (gyroscope, accelerometer and compass), Wi-Fi (including a hotspot feature) and Bluetooth 2.1 connectivity.
No word yet on Canadian availability, price or carrier (though AT&T was announced as a partner in the U.S.), but Nokia says it’ll be available in black or cyan (pictured here), to start.
