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Thanks to the Nokia Blogger Relations Program, I received a Black N82. The N82 has much of the same features as the N95 including on-board GPS, WiFi capability, and a 5MP digital camera.  The wonderful thing is all this is in a candy bar type phone.  Personally, I’m partial to candy bar style versus the slider form factor that the N95 has.

In terms of initial impressions:

• The response time and general speediness of this device is fantastic
• Taking images is quick and responsive.
• Rock Solid - this device has great built quality
• Love the auto-screen rotation

I have been trying to get Qik installed on my Nokia N81 8GB ever since reading Scoble’s experience with the software last week.

For those of you unaware, Qik is software that allows you to stream live video from your Nokia NSeries’ webcam, complete with audio. Qik uses the data plan on your mobile phone for network. 3G with AT&T is probably the best way to go, but I’ll be using T-Mobile’s EDGE data access and wi-fi, when I’m in range of an access point.

Think ustream.tv, but in your pocket, making you able to do live video casts whenever the mood strikes you. This has major implications. You can do your own live video conference or shoot live video whenever you want. You can become your own live news story if per chance you see a burning building or car accident.

Eager to try Qik out, I went on the site, entered in my phone number, and waited for the introductory SMS to come to my phone. The SMS never came, so I emailed Qik support. After a while, the introductory SMS came so I fired up my mobile browser and verified my phone number through their mobile web system. I was then told I’d have to wait for another SMS with a link to the application install file. That SMS never came so again I emailed Qik support. I heard back from a Qik person and was off and running!

I fired up the Qik application and since I was at home, told Qik to use my wi-fi. Having Qik.com up on my mac, within 3 seconds I saw the video and heard the noises that I was making in the room coming through my web-connected computer. pretty freaky to think I can do a live video cast from my mobile phone and make it available to web users who go to my qik site.

The next test…how would Qik work over EDGE, considering it has only a fraction of the bandwidth as my wi-fi. Well, I reset the Qik application after specifying T-Mobile’s edge connection and again I saw my video streaming live on the web. The delay was only 5-7 seconds…not much worse than the wi-fi uplink from before.

At this point I’d say Qik is easily a disruptive technology. At any point in time I can fire up Qik and do on-the-go interviews or videocasts. How amazing!

This also speaks volumes for the Nokia Nseries hardware platform. Qik was able to use the Nokia because of it’s great built-in camera, wi-fi (or cellular data access), and open Symbian operating system as a platform for building this fantastic application.

I’m so excited!

PS: I found Qik’s tech support team, notably Bhaskar Roy to be very helpful! Thanks guys!!

There have been some very interesting tidbits of news coming out of Verizon Wireless lately.  First, they want to open up their network to allow outside hardware and software makers to add value to their network.

Then, last Friday, Verizon Wireless announced that they have chosen  LTE as their 4G wireless broadband solution.  This technology was developed within the Third Generation Partnership Project and is a significant move for Verizon Wireless.  In essence, it means they will abandon their CDMA network and adopt a GSM network.  For those unaware, CDMA is primarily used in North American while GSM is the global standard that most every other telco on earth uses.

This is great news for consumers!!!  If Verizon follows through on opening up their network, this could finally mean that consumers can use the fantastic handsets from Europe and Asia.  Up to this point, Verizon customers have been stuck with feature-less phones that have been ‘cripled’ by Verizon in order to force us to use Verizon’s expensive premium services.

This is also great news GSM handset makers, including Nokia.  Naturally, they just announced their support for Verizon’s LTE decision.  I have recently been able to trial some Nseries phones from Nokia (including the N95) and have been very impressed with Nokia’s offerings.  While Nokia has an amazing market share in Europe and Asia (they are the worlds number one handset maker in terms of sales), they have barely cracked the market in the US.  I’m hoping getting Nokia’s in the hands of Verizon’s customers will help change that because I feel very stongly about Nokia’s platform.

Wow what a great looking device!  As I mentioned before Nokia was expected to reveal a new Nseries device this week.  As it turns out, the rumors were true and behold the N82!

The specs are fabulous and similar to the N95 including:

• Assisted GPS
• European 3G
• Awesome 5 megapixel digital camera with a Carl Zeiss lens
• Zenon flash for the camera
• quad-band GSM unlocked handset
• built-in wi-fi
• the symbian s60 operating system

press release

The tech blogosphere is buzzing today about the possiblity of Nokia releasing a new N-series device sometime this week.

After being able to play around with the N95, I’m very anxious to see what else Nokia comes out with.  My N95 review is coming soon

Hat tip to Engadget

When I’ve spoken about the Skype phone before, I was operating under an assumption. I thought the skype phone would be dual mode. That is, normal cell phone calls would go out over the normal GSM network (like every other GSM phone call), and calls to skype contacts would go out over the 3G network basically as a data, VoIP driven call.

However, news comes this morning from Markus Gobel that this isn’t the case. It turns out that 3, the European cell phone company that carries the skype phone, is merely running iSkoot. iSkoot is a service that acts as a proxy between a normal phone call and the IP network that skype runs on. So basically when you make a call to your skype friends on the new phone, it’s a normal call back to the cell tower, then iSkoot carries it over to the skype network.

This is disappointing because I thought skype was finally moving ahead with making mobile headway and allowing users to use skype on the go. There’s a service I’ve been testing called Fring that works on a Nokia N95 that allows me to do skype calls and skype chats; all over the DATA network, not a GSM call. It works great on 3G and on Wi-Fi but I’ve found that over edge it’s not the greatest connection for a voice call.