Nokia Announces Hard-Drive Phone

blorg writes "The new N91 features a 4gb microdrive and a 2 megapixel digital camera, and plays music in MP3, AAC and WMV formats. With this phone, Nokia reckons it has an iPod killer and aims to become the largest seller of portable MP3 players this year, having already outstripped camera manufacturers in the photography market. However, as the BBC points out, people are not necessarily buying these phones for their camera or music features."

Comments

Convergence.

[Molly Lipton]

We may not be getting the flying cars promised to us in the sixties and seventies by Hannah-Barbara and company, but the day of handheld devices that can do nearly anything is quickly approaching. As the BBC points out, this device, though not quite there yet, is a big step in that direction.

It is important, however, to reflect upon the advancements of the late twentieth century and how they've impacted our way of life. In particular, have TV, the internet, computers, and all the rest of today's modern miracles made us more virtuous? Have they made us less virtuous? What are the dangers inherent in having everything at our fingertips?

There's a great deal of social criticism these days about the so-called "Generation Now," the sense of entitlement and so forth. These matters are especially important for us, as afficianados of technology, to consider, particularly in an open forum such as this.

100 hours of video!

[mpesce]

There's been some studies in the US (sorry, no link) which show that folks will actually watch feature-length films on their phones. Until recently this was thought to be entirely ridiculous. Now, with a 4GB drive and some nice MPEG4 encoding, I could conceivably get 100 hours (!) of video content onto my mobile. (MPEG4, well compressed, uses about 40MB per hour of audiovisual content.) That's really something - more amazing than having 600-or-so songs on my mobile... And that's going to lead to some interesting content being developed for this platform... TiVo on your mobile, anyone?

Re:Jack of all trades, a master of none

[John Seminal]

At the moment, these devices that do everything don't really to anything really well. A stand-alone camera has better quality than the phone. ...but we are starting to see that change. As technology continues to develop, and manufacturers are able to pack more and more into a device, the quality of the combined unit might start to be acceptable for more and more people.

I am quite looking forward to the time when I only have to carry one device around, and it will do everything! (including allowing me to SSH into my home computer) :)

I agree. But I think they are moving in the right direction. Thank god the did away with those HUGE palm looking phones. Those were so big. Smaller is nicer when it comes to something you want to keep in the pocket.

The 2MP is a huge jump forward for cell phones. For the longest time, finding a reasonably priced 1MP phone was difficult. Even the less than 1MP phones were well over $150. I hope this new 2MP phone pushes prices down a bit.

But the huge winner is the 4 gig hard drive. It is a breakthrough for a cell phone.

I think with cell phones you will always be a couple years behind everything else because the tecnhology needs to shrink. But the days of 10 and 20 gig hard drives on phones are comming.

Since cell phones are so small, I can see new applications like voice recognition tied into the OS. You want to write a report? Talk into your cell phone.

I see so many uses here. This will be fantastic. The only worry I have is with cell phone camera's getting such high resolution, it will invade the privacy of people. Nobody will be free to walk in public anymore and protect their image. For example, say you live down south where black people and white people don't date because of social pressure. You see two kids flirting and take a picture. Post it on the web, and now two people's lives will become miserable.

Or you are in a store and some woman is trying to look at the bottom shelve. Unfortunatly she is wearing a skirt, and the kid clicks a picture. Up on the web it goes.