Flashback: Symbian Belle almost caught up to Android, but it was too late
- atichko
- M{V
- 14 Mar 2024
Minu, 06 Mar 2024Especially Symbian is extremely capable of making the most ... moreIf HMD really want's to make a splash then I would say, bring back Symbian OS, but then as it should have been. That will only be a dream as it takes a whole lot of people and money to (re)design an OS, bring it up to standards (or have it exceeding these standards) and most of all, having an app store worthy of the name with sufficient backing from the app designer's community. Don't see that happen any time soon but it should happen if we want to be less dependant from the dominant OS's, all US based. I would not opt for China based OS's either and the only one I know of, being Harmony OS, is not really an own OS as it is heavily based on Android, even if they claim it isn't anymore.
- M
- Minu
- IWU
- 06 Mar 2024
atichko, 04 Dec 2023I was very fond of the Symbian Belle OS. They should never ... moreEspecially Symbian is extremely capable of making the most out of threshold specs, when the other popular OSs chase after larger hardware requirements, plus it's a real-time OS too!!!
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- SizN80
- ru1
- 09 Dec 2023
I do wish Symbians had been further developed, Nokia fell far too hard to pressure and I guess hindsight is 20/20.
Developers were really not into Symbian unfortunately. I wish they had transitioned earlier to Android rather than allowing themselves to be be bought out by Microsoft.
Nokia could have transitioned their Symbian + Maemo plans under Android umbrella, unfortunately a lot of the Nokia executives and board were incredibly arrogant and stubborn.
- C
- Carol
- nUJ
- 07 Dec 2023
Anonymous, 04 Dec 2023Indeed. The management then took some bad decisions that ca... moreSemi-smartphones? Symbian was smarter then android is now, the h are you talking about? If Symbian would have been further developt, android would be catching up big times, ios would be a leftover. And if nokia would have not go down the market, as planned by the bigger corporations (yeah the three americans that would have stand no chance against nokia in the smartphone field if NOKIA stakeholders would have not be so dumb and fall into the trapp). If not Symbian, then MeeGo would have killed android by now for sure. Or well, let it and it's huge hardware feeding frenzy be forgotten the it ever existed. Don't get me wrong, i use android (well cause there is nothing else) and is ok'ish, def8netly better then being the money bank for apple, but i would jump on MeeGo tomorrow if their would be any to revive it, sailfish OS is a fork, but not there where it should have been...
- C
- Carol
- nUJ
- 07 Dec 2023
More like Android almost cought up but never did, not even today...Only beacause a lot more advertisement and manipulation strategies came with android, and people that started using android or ios, were ignorant to smartphones before 2007(most of them still thinking that smartphones started with the first iphone that was actually mearly a 2G feature phone in an LTE to come era), does not mean that symbian had to play catch up, more like stay put, do absolutly nothing just review the GUI. Symbian was a real smartphone os, yeah symbian apps that were written in c++ were much harder to develop in comparison to ios and android, but theis apps were made by experienced devs not by some kids that know nothing about Developement, this is also one of the reasons android had and has many apps, but also the reason why 90 percent of them are pure garbage. Symbian had way lesser but 80 percent were very good. You do the math.... and all this not to mention running Asphalt game on an N8 with 256MB RAM using a HD TV for screen, connected via hdmi in 2010...yeah the game is that old, angry birds too...
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- Akyra
- pha
- 06 Dec 2023
I'm probably the only one here who used this system. Nokia 808. It was fast and functional, I don't know anything that Android has in addition to functionality. E.g. rotating the main screen or the alarm clock when the phone is off, Android doesn't have it until today. I would like the return of this system, it was the best. Many people don't even realize what makes the system popular, in Android it was easier to pirate applications and thus it won, in Symbian there were various problems with certification, etc. That was and is the reality, free applications win.
- H
- Hector
- LIK
- 05 Dec 2023
AmeerFPS, 05 Dec 2023Nobody is talking about Maemo from N810. It was ahead of an... moreI actually loved my N900, it was so nice at launch, the only downsides being the resistive display and thickness.
- hannor
- 3yN
- 05 Dec 2023
skoda9635, 03 Dec 2023Was it that difficult to get a Hungarian keyboard layout? A... moreYes! :) Sony Ericsson Xperia Pro came out in the same year (2011) as the Nokia E7, and it not only lacked our unique Hungarian characters (áéíóöőúüű), but fundamentally clashed with our layout, since we have QWERTZ, not QWERTY. So Nokia E7 was THE sliding keyboard phone for Hungary from 2011 to 2018, but then along came the Gemini PDA from Planet Computers with Hungarian layout keyboard including our unique, laser-engraved characters! :)
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- Sam N8 808 owner
- rJ{
- 05 Dec 2023
""However, there’s no escaping that Symbian was playing catch-up to its rivals.""
And iOS is doing what different?
And why GSMArena mentions nothing on a person from USA becoming the director of a Finland company overnight, and cancelling all of their OS'es and plans?
Symbian could've been a success, and it can still be, if we only let USA know everything that's happening on the phone.
- A
- AmeerFPS
- XTm
- 05 Dec 2023
Nobody is talking about Maemo from N810. It was ahead of any mobile operating system but was orphaned in the name of progress.
- SuuperBaka
- xDb
- 04 Dec 2023
Anonymous, 04 Dec 2023This article is about symbian belleWhich is still Symbian
- ?
- Anonymous
- pWD
- 04 Dec 2023
Tref82, 04 Dec 2023Windows phone is the best, for me, but people don't un... moreI never liked the UI of mobile Windows, and after using some Lumias at work, easy to see why it didn't have the staying power. Rivalry is always great, but this OS felt unnecessary. I wanted a great mobile Windows as I still really like using desktop Windows. Should've been a slam dunk for me, but it wasn't.
- ?
- Anonymous
- gJt
- 04 Dec 2023
Tref82, 04 Dec 2023Windows phone is the best, for me, but people don't un... moreHad it windows phone , it was a disaster. Everything took ages to complete. Even added a language took 5+ mins.
- ?
- Anonymous
- 7j{
- 04 Dec 2023
Anon40, 04 Dec 2023GsmArena forgot that when Symbian was rocking Android wasn&... moreThis article is about symbian belle
- N
- Ng
- tVt
- 04 Dec 2023
Symbian phone, that i use is C6-01, about 5 years i use
- T
- Tref82
- snP
- 04 Dec 2023
Windows phone is the best, for me, but people don't understand simplicity of windows phone. Today software IOS and Android steal light or dark mode, live title-live vidgets, Bing search today Google page, camera app and pro mode, android have after 5 years, IOS never...
- ?
- Anonymous
- fCE
- 04 Dec 2023
Swaraj7, 04 Dec 2023Softwares aside , if nokia technologies still made phone , ... moreThat's true. Even today no one has the durability on phones that Nokia phones used to have
Even the Nokia phones these days are average. The legendary Nokia durability is now things of the past
- ?
- Anonymous
- fCE
- 04 Dec 2023
Ervin, 04 Dec 2023Nokia could survive but MIcrosoft had Troyan hourse inside ... moreIndeed. The management then took some bad decisions that caused total downfall of Nokia
They could've adopted Android and kept Symbian running for semi smart phones. The whole Asha program was dumb because all they had to do was implement symbian for that purpose. Going all in on windows phone was their worst decision
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- Anon40
- pqC
- 04 Dec 2023
GsmArena forgot that when Symbian was rocking Android wasn't out yet and 2nd of all that OS from Original Nokia was stolen by Apple after the Symbian OS. Was a huge trial about it. Was good Gsmarena but seems they go after companies which are paying more just like others. I used Nokia phones since 93 till they got Microsoft Windows than i stopped using Nokias. FYI just to refresh some memories.
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- Fabiana
- Jq4
- 04 Dec 2023
I remember all the harsh and biased criticism from the media back then, like telling iPhone 4S camera was better than the 808 or that Symbian apps were more prone to crash than Android apps. It was like one had to be insane to stick with Symbian so in the end all left...