In less than 24 hours, Nokia World 2011 is expected to start in London with Nokia CEO Stephen Elop taking the floor for the opening keynote. At the event it is widely expected that Nokia will be unveiling and detailing their very first Windows Phone; possibly even two as the schedule has two separate “options” to get to know their latest mobile devices.
Rumor currently has it that the first of the Windows Phones Nokia will release will be the device codenamed “SeaRay”, expected to be officially named the 800. This device has been leaked several times since June, and very closely resembles Nokia’s N9 smartphone running MeeGo, with a curved design and a choice of colors. Some more device shots leaked today, as seen below.
The device is expected to have a 3.7-inch AMOLED display, a 1.4 GHz single-core Qualcomm processor, 16 GB of on-board user storage and an eight megapixel rear camera with flash. Images of the device make it hard to tell whether a front-facing camera is included, however due to the support for this type of camera getting included in Mango it’s highly likely.
Update: More information about this device suggests it will be called the Nokia Lumia 800, will have dimensions of 116.5 x 61.2 x 12.1mm and 512 MB of RAM on top of the specifications we already know. Benchmarks of the device have also leaked, showing it coming in a close second to the HTC Titan.
The second device has not seen any image leaks as far as we can tell, however it is rumoured that it will be a smaller version of the N800 and is codenamed the “Sabre” or “Saber”. It is expected to also have a 3.7-inch display, however this time it will be of the LCD type. It will contain a 1.4 GHz processor, just 8 GB of internal storage and a 5 MP rear camera.
Update: This device will most likely be called the Nokia Lumia 710 and will be the smaller brother of the Lumia 800. It will be 12.5mm thick and also include 512 MB of RAM.
The combination of the two devices might indicate Nokia’s attempts to target both the mid-range (800) and lower-end (“Sabre”) in the one hit. Nokia is expected to launch at least one of these devices in Europe by the end of 2011; however today it was revealed that Nokia will most likely not launch any Windows Phones in the United States before 2012.
A third device is currently also rumoured as the Nokia Ace: a 4.3-inch device with similar specs to the N800 but also with LTE 4G network speeds. The device is not expected to be shown at the event and a loose launch date of Q1 2012 on AT&T has been speculated.
Also at the event, Nokia will possibly detail some Nokia-specific Windows Phone apps that the company has rumoured to have been developing. It’s unlikely these apps would change the visual style of WP7 due to Microsoft’s policies; however it is possible that Nokia will be aiming to include a set of applications similar to what HTC offers on their devices (eg. the HTC Hub, Photo Enhancer, YouTube, etc.).
Other speakers on the day include Joe Belfiore, the corporate VP of Windows Phone; Marko Ahtisaari, the senior VP of design at Nokia; Colin Giles, the executive VP of sales at Nokia and many more. Many of these talks will be detailing specifics of Nokia’s strategies and other more technical details, but we will be on the lookout for any interesting information.
Apart from the Windows Phone announcement, nothing else is expect to spring from the event on Wednesday, with the sole purpose of the event related to Windows Phone.