Nokia Windows Phone 7 Predictions

It's been an awfully long time since I done updating the blog. What happens is that newer devices tend to have better video support. There's less need to transcode and also people are generally better equipped to understand  what it tales to play video on their devices.

But mostly I think people use YouTube, Hulu, iPlayer, and other "free" streaming services to get to content other than downloading/converting/transferring which is a hassle.

This is not really the point of this post. I was reading about the imminent release of the Nokia Windows phones and that started me thinking about what could be expected from them.

Bear in mind that I have no insider knowledge and have frankly little experience with Windows Mango so consider this in the realm of wild speculation. This is what I think could happen:

• For starters Windows Media codecs will feature more prominently both for Video and Audio. Expect WMA/WMV to be the best supported codecs. 
• Windows Media Player (Media Center) is the main Media Hub in your computer to manage the contents on your phone. This could finally put an end to OVI Suite, NSeries Suite and PC Suite. At least for the new smartphones. This also means that if your Windows Media Player can play it then it can transfer it to your device. So if your Windows Media Player (in the PC) doesn't play nice with H264 or DIVX it may not work also to the device.
• Limited support for DIVX/XVID, H264, .MKV and others due to focus on WMA/WMV.
• Limited support for subtitles, mutlichannel sound (AC3 aka Dolby 5.1) maybe only with WMV family codecs
• 720p playback. I don't know why but from what I've seen WM7 phones don't seem to support more than 720p so I expect the Nokia phones to do the same but we'll see
• Limited app support to enhance video playback. You may be limited to use the built in media player
• XBOX Live streaming service. This is most likely coming already at launch provided you have an XBOX Live account. The thing is, do they charge for it just like they do for gaming?

I think for some the Windows Phone 7 will feel like a step backwards in terms of features and functionality. Let's see how much Nokia was able to add into the WP7 software and how much they differentiate with other WP7 competitors like HTC.

What do you think?

Dual screen Smartphones

The last couple of years we've seen an explosion of new products. We have tablets, PADs, Android Smartphones, Smart /Connected TVs, Nooks, Ereaders, etc.

And among all these gadgets we are also seeing a few dual screen devices.

The latest one I've seen is coming form Imerj Design http://imerjdesign.com/ there's also a couple of videos on youtube.

Android, Symbian, iOS or others

Hello,

It's amazing everything that's been happening since I last took some time to write. In a short span of time we went from a few devices supporting HD to a whole slew of operating systems, form factors and companies that have phones or devices that have connectivity and support HD video.

Not only that but things are accelerating.

There were a lot of new devices shown at CES that had HDMI out connection, then there are some bizarre new convergences. TVs with Google TV and other streaming services onboard. Tablets with HDMI out to connect to TVs and monitors and even the Moto Xoom and Moto Atrix that are a Pad and a note-pad-smartphone-something are creating some neat ways to not only consume video but also work. I wonder what's next.

The codec support on these devices is also making it feasible to even forget about those old days when you had to re-encode the video so it would play on your device. I can only say, amen to that.

Now if only Netflix will start using something that will work on my devices (other than Silverlight) then it would also be great.

The gap between the main OS for these convergence devices is closing, at least when it comes to Video support. Android, iOS, Symbian and even Microsoft Phone 7 are having good enough support that transcoding is becoming a thing of the past. HD video is present on many of the top end devices and audio support is also very good. Now it will be something else that I'll need to think of before I decide which device to use.

One thing that doesn't seem to go away and it seems that each year there's a product announced but I haven't seen them in the wild is the micro projector phone. I don't see the point of using your phone as a projector. Maybe I'm not the only one that doesn't get it because these devices have been around for a few years now and are not catching on. Or are there any readers out there really waiting eagerly for them?

N8 Video prowess, AVI and all rejoice

Hello again,

I got to play for a while with the N8, and it's really impressive if you're looking for a capable video/imaging device.

I really love the USB OTG functions that allows you to hook up the N8 to all sorts of external storage devices like my WesternDigital drives or USB sticks. This way I can quickly transfer files back and forth without having to put a laptop or other device in the middle.

Since it was announced there were some cryptic messages that mentioned that AVI (Divx, xVid) was going to be supported in box. Along with the fact that 720p playback and AC3 (Dolby 5.1) decoding was possible.

I can confirm that it's all TRUE!


Well mostly true at least. 720p playback is possible but not 720p AVI files or WMV files, only 720p MPEG-4 are supported it seems. I haven't tried MKV at HD quality to see if that works but at least MKV does work.
FLV files are also supported, but only half way. FLV files will not be found by the videos app. You need to browse to them using File Manager and launch them from there. They also seem to play on a different player than the normal video player. And have less options to them. But at least now they play much smoother.

Speaking of smooth. WMV support seems to have been expanded quite a bit from the N97 or N96 days. But still I found a lot of files that just will not play or play partially. You don't get the annoying message (unable to play trying to play partially) but the end result is the same :(

The screen is good, though a bit dark for my taste. You need to have a dark room in order to really appreciate it. Also because you smudge the screen all the time it's a fingerprint magnet and is not so easy to clean or keep clean (at least in my short experience with it).

There's the video editor thing in there. I played around with it. It's not super respnsive or maybe my fingers are too fat. I had a lot of problems trying to enter transitions and animations. I just did a simple 6 picture slideshow with transitions and it was fairly easy to do. I need to play more with that to see if this would be a viable option to create movies. At least it didn't crash like Muvee used to do all the time.

HDMI out is a nice touch but unless your TV can output the decoded AC3 audio or your home theater or audio equipment is at hand to decode and reproduce 5.1 sound, I found this feature to be a bit of a head scratcher. To be able to enjoy the benefits of 5.1 surround 720p video you will need all of the following:

- A video that's 720p and includes AC3 sound
- Your N8
- The HDMI adapter cable
- An HDMI cable
- An AC3 decoder (like a home theater or similar)
- A 5.1 sound system and speakers
- An HD TV
- Cables to hook up the TV to the home theater or similar. Most TVs don't output the AC3 audio out of the HDMI.


So, unless you have all those things handy, and it's not a chore to connect (your home theater has HDMI ports in the front) it seems very difficult to enjoy this feature. An optical or coax audio jack may have helped. I wonder if it's there somewhere and I just haven't figured it out.

DivX Mobile Player 1.0 for N97, 5800, Symbian now available

DivX Mobile Player 1.0 for Symbian now available

Divx has just release a version that should finally work out of the box for the N97 and other Symbian 5 products.