Nokia 808 with 41-Megapixel Camera

Nokia 808 Pureview reviews are fascinating for many. 41-megapixel super smartphone has attracted all and sundry towards it

Nokia’s MWC show had a big surprise element: a 41-megapixel camera fitted into the body of a smartphone. The incredible tech was nearly 5 years in development, and though it is now out in a smartphone, that smartphone is not the Lumia. It is packed instead into a phone called the Pureview 808, a Symbian device.

While the lens theoretically takes pictures of 41 megapixels, you won’t be able to get photos of that size, the largest photo is of 38- megapixels. The technology is less about taking large photos than about taking smaller photos – of 5- megapixels, or 8- megapixels – and putting in it the quality of a 41- megapixel photo. The technology takes data from 7 nearby pixels to enhance the resolution of each pixel. Thus it is a sort of 7-in-1 technology.

The photos meanwhile are incredibly good. But only when you take them in 5 or 8 megapixels. The larger is merely an option, and expect the photo quality to go for a toss the moment you enlarge it to that size.

The entire apparatus requires a much larger lens and sensor, so the Pureview is decidedly bulky. Yet Nokia was able to do its usual thing with design so the product is pleasant to hold and good to look at. The problems lie not on the outside, but on the inside. Apart from the fact that the Pureview has passable specs, it runs on Symbian.

While Nokia has repeatedly insisted that it would continue to support Symbian and has touted its advances, it is quite clear that Symbian is a dated technology that cannot hold its own against the big three, iOS, Android, and Windows Phone Mango.

Apparently, the company wants to test out the tech before bringing it to its flagship phones. The company promised that the camera would soon be coming to other devices.

The event also marked the global launch of the Lumia 900, Nokia’s flagship phone. This device, which was specifically designed for western markets is an improvement on Nokia’s Lumia 800. It has the same excellent polycarbonate body and smooth Windows Phone 7.5 implementation which drew wows when the 800 was first launched.

In a bid to bring the windows experience to more customers, Nokia is going after the lower end of the market too. It launched the Lumia 610, a younger sibling in the Lumia range. The phone packs nearly the same specks as the 710 but cuts the price down by about 30%. While it is a little skimpy on the innards – it packs a 1 GHz processor, and 512 MB of ram – the windows implementation was as smooth as always. It even looks better than the 710. The phone comes in at €189.

Among other things, Nokia also updated its range of Asha phones. These phones, meant specifically for markets in India and other third world countries, are the cheapest Nokia multimedia phones.