FREE Celebrity Photoshoot for Sydney and Melbourne

If you live in Sydney and Melbourne, you will have the opportunity to have your photo taken by a celebrity photographer. From Wikipedia, David Lachapelle has taken photos for celebrities such as Whitney Houston, Naomi Campbell, Gisele Bündchen, David Bowie, David Beckham, Björk, Shakira, Drew Barrymore, Courtney Love, Lil' Kim, Lance Armstrong, Angelina Jolie, Pamela Anderson, Britney Spears, Cameron Diaz, Uma Thurman, Brook Shields, Leonardo Dicaprio, Amanda Lepore, Cher, Christina Aguilera,Mariah Carey, P!nk, Olga Rodionova, Rihanna, Kylie Minogue and this month, you will be next! 


David Lachapelle will be using the Nokia N8 for the photoshoots to show the world what can be done with a N8 and no photoshopping. Check out the details at http://www.facebook.com/NokiaAustralia and have a look at some of these photos taken on the Nokia N8 at the Sydney event. More photos can be found at the Nokia Australia Facebook group.

Swype Coming to N8 soon

With the Nokia N8 bringing in the on-screen keyboard many people wanted to know how long they needed to wait until Swype would be launched for the Nokia N8. Swype is an application which enables you to run your finger across the keyboard instead of typing the words, which is apparently the fastest way to input words onto the phone. 

Nokia Betalabs had this to say yesterday: 

As many have noticed, the beta period of Swype for Symbian will soon be wrapping up as it becomes available from Ovi Store for certain devices.

The current version of Swype on the Ovi Store supports Nokia C7 only with the following languages: English, Spanish, Canadian French, and Brazilian Portuguese.

Active development and testing are under way to support Nokia N8, other devices, and other languages. We hope to have an update available in the next couple of weeks. 

Thanks for your patience.

Australian Advertising Campaign on Cards

Channel News reports today that Nokia Australia is looking at a large TV advertising campaign for the Nokia N8, with all the carriers, Optus, Telstra, Vodafone (and therefore, Three) selling the Nokia N8. Cap plans including the N8 have not been announced yet but the phone is expected to be available from the 1st of November.

Compared: Nokia N8 v Galaxy S

Here is a video of a 20min+ comparison between the Samsung Galaxy S and the Nokia N8. Check it out, thanks to Phone Arena. Not sure why the guy sounded a little nervous though...

Nokia N8 Launches in Australia - Twitter #n8au

Today in Sydney, Nokia launched the Nokia N8 with celebrity photographer David LaChapelle for the first time holding public shoots in Sydney and Melbourne. The phone takes phone camera technology to new territory with the ability to take photos at 12MP with a Carl Zeiss lens and Xenon flash as well as shoot HD-quality videos. The phone is also a FM transmitter, external hard drive, video/photo editting hub, GPS navigator and a portable media player compatible with HDMI TVs. 

In Australia, the RRP will be AUD$749 with the Nokia N8 being available on all networks and various plans to be announced. . Nokia Australia’s managing director, Emile Baak, said: “The Nokia N8 is a first step in our aggressive renewal of our smartphone range."

“We decided to stretch the boundaries of what consumers can do with a smartphone and at the same time, make it accessible to everyone at a price point that won’t break the bank,” Baak said.

A number of Australian developed applications have been specially created for the Nokia N8 such as Coastalwatch, SMH/Brisbane Times/The Age/WA Today, Corkscore, SkyNews.com.au and the Weather Channel. Built by local developers, these apps were created using Web Runtime, a software development environment that simplifies development and makes it possible to build one application that can be deployed across Symbian and other platforms.

N8 Pre-orders in Malaysia

Pre orders of the Nokia N8 from Malaysia's Nokia website will come with an extra 12 months warranty. Check it out here

Bluetooth Keyboards SU-8W and Adobe Flash

We can confirm that bluetooth keyboards will work with the Nokia N8 so if you have a Nokia Su-8W from ages ago for example, that will still work with the Nokia N8. Bear in mind though that from what we know, the N8 does not come with QuickOffice editting for free so all you can do is view documents, not edit them.

Five years later, the SU-8W has outlasted all Nokia Devices!

Also, in terms of browsing Flash on the internet, yes it does load flash enabled websites and at Nokia World, we used http://www.whatismyflash.com/ to confirm that N8 does support the most recent Flash Version 10.1.85.

Why N8 Camera? Autofocus for Video

When you buy a phone that has a mechanical shutter built in, you can do cool things like this. There is a continuous auto-focus mode within the video settings. Enable the following settings on your Nokia N8 to make your next video production look like it was shot by a handycam.

Looking for the N8 User Manual?

It may seem like a very strange post but you will be surprised how many people will be looking for quick access to their Nokia N8 manual. Most of us don't like reading the manual but if you take some time to get through it, you may discover some tips and tricks that you didn't realise the phone could do. You can download the manual here.

When you are using  your phone, you can also get to the user guide by going to
Select Menu > Applications > User guide

How to Unlock the N8

If you have bought your Nokia N8 with a contract, there is a chance that your mobile service provider (eg Vodafone or Three) will unlock it without any cost. This is the case in Australia but otherwise, I am not sure about your country.

They will ask your for your IMEI number which can be found by entering the code *#06# and giving them the Serial Number that appears. They will then tell you a code number which you need to enter in your phone in the following way:

#pw+YOURCODE+1#

How do you know it is successful? It will say SIM CARD RESTRICTION OFF

Be sure that you do not try to unlock your phone more than two times because after the third attempt, your phone will be permanently locked.

If your service provider does not allow you to unlock your phone for free, you can get unlocking services from the internet for around $5.

VIDEO: N8 shipping discussed by Nokia EVP

Keep the N8 Forum?

We've been toying with the idea of a Nokia N8 forum on this blog. If you have been casually passing through this blog and you are likely to be hanging around more, please leave a comment below about this suggestion or if you do support the forum idea, click on "Your Comments" at the top and join the forum. If there are at least a few of you, we'll keep it but until November, we'll see what your response is like to the idea. Forum yay or nay?

Pros and Cons from Real N8 Owners

Well if you have been eagle eyeing the Nokia N8 online, you will notice a few unboxing videos and photo comparisons between the Iphone 4 and the Nokia N8. Online discussions have mainly centred on the veracity of these comparisons and discussion about when the N8 will be shipped. This blog will be where you can find out interesting little things about the Nokia N8 and we'll try to save you from drowning in the number of press releases. If you are a Nokia N8 owner, or hope to be one, we encourage you to share your thoughts about the Nokia N8. For now, maybe let us know when you have received your N8?