Symbian^3 to launch on non-Nokia handset, courtesy of 'Asian vendor'
By Vlad Savov 
posted May 27th 2010 5:53AM
posted May 27th 2010 5:53AM
Well, here's a bit of thunder theft for you. Nokia's N8 launch is still firmly wedged in Q3 2010, but according to Symbian Foundation Executive Director Lee Williams, other handset makers are not going to hang around and wait for it to be the vanguard Symbian^3 device. Instead, says Lee, the first phone with the overhauled software will be provided by an unnamed Asian vendor -- we're thinking LG or Samsung, with the latter being more likely as it has more history with Symbian. This seems to be mostly on account of the new OS being pretty much ready for market right now, so whoever's bringing the goods should be doing so in the very near future.
YEAH! GO ASIANS!
@brrip HTC?
@Billy if only my friend. if only. it'll probably be samsung, which makes me kinda sad. their support after purchase sucks. but they'll still tempt people like us with amazing specs and super amoled :C
@Billy
Symbian usually powers devices considered multimedia beasts. HTC can't spell multimedia. Until they make a decent cameraphone, I don't give them much hope for Symbian. No one would buy their hardware running Symbian as they do things today.
@christexaport i would. i'm sure there are other symbian users that don't care about multimedia.i want good hardware, which nokia has systematically refused to deliver since the N95. The N96, N97 have been a bloody joke as far as flagships go.
Getting HTC in on symbian^3 might actually let it enter the xda-developer community, which is the best damned thing that can happen to symbian^3.
@brrip
XDA would be a welcome addition, but it is not like there is no dev community for Symbian...
Y halo thar Samsung.
Interesting. Hope they don't cock it up with that Touch Wiz UI.
@MarkAnderson Indeed, I also hate that UI
Why don't they just use Android...
@immortal clone and why would they? Androind is NOT better then Symbian sooo...
@nk Android* -.- we need that edit option
@immortal clone While I want an Android phone, let me make this simple for you...because this would give them a chance to get onto the largest smartphone OS in the world? Seems dumb to rule it out as an option...
@immortal clone
Because currently Symbian is a better OS than Android.
There, I said it.
@MarkAnderson It's about time. Have an upvote.
@immortal clone
Sorry mate. I'd rather take VM free OS and hardware accelerated UI over Android.
------------------------
@immortal clone Because Symbian is more completed OS and what is even better is that it requires less specs to run on (Thats cost less=more profit). I remember 2 years ago. Someone tried to benchmark s60v3 with Windows mobile. I think Symbian was running at 330mhz and WM at 500mhz (less or more). What I remember for sure WM CPU was faster by more than 100mhz and guess what. Symbian in the benchmark smoked WM and took the lead. The moral story here is Symbian architecture is much more advanced than others. The only drawback with current Symbian phones is that most of them running on crippled hardware. I won't be shocked if HTC phones were running Symbian^5 or 4 in future. Anyway - enough talking for me
@Sp4mer
Well, I would be really surprised if HTC was running Symbian^4 or 5.
@ everyone else
The problem is that I think Android IS a better OS then Symbian.
@MarkAnderson
+1
@immortal clone
Why? Specifically.
@immortal clone
Best thing about Symbian is you don't need to pay a small fortune to get a smartphone. Most of Nokia's customers are from markets that carriers don't do contracts (say Turkey)
In these markets iPhone or Nexus One costs more than a PS3. I don't expect N8 to be a budget phone but I'm sure Symbian^3 will be seen on C series as well.
@MarkAnderson because Engadget says so :)
@MarkAnderson Yeah but developing for Symbian is a b***h.
would be nice to see non Nokia Symbian phones, like in the old days :)
@nk I would like to see them deliver something else than Symbian phones... :]
@UX
Then you'll have to wait for a MeeGo device to be announced at Nokia World 2010 event which will be held at London between 14.09-15.09 just like me ;)
@UX
I would like to see them killing their design team and get a new one, atm I dont like the design of most Nokia phones and I really hate Symbian UI design
@nk edit: hiring a new team -.-
@nk
What do you mean old days? Just yesterday the Sony Ericsson Vivaz Pro went on sale.
"Asian vendor"? Sounds like Chinese KIRF. I don't know if anybody (eg. Sony, Samsung) would re-commit themselves to Symbian at this point. Is it free like Android?
@pika2000 "Is it free like Android?"
Symbian is free as much as Android is, besides it's open for contributions from everyone unlike Android where Google is the only contributor; which makes Symbian "really" open.
@pika2000 I've actually read on a Korean blog (I've been searching for the Galaxy S for a month hoping to hear it'd drop in Korea in May) that Samsung is planning on getting a phone to launch with Symbian, I think a Samsung exec had actually said this in an interview. I'll search, probably unsuccessfully.
@pika2000
I'm shocked you say that after reading the list of companies supporting Symbian and Qt. Take a look for yourself.
http://www.symbian.org/members/member-directory
I think its really a situation of who ISN'T behind Symbian at this point. Most are waiting for Symbian^4 and the new UI and OS architecture before making a significant leap into the platform, but there are already tons of apps waiting to be released in a few months.
I think the Apple and Google following will be caught off guard, since they mostly believe they have the largest mobile following, and nothing could ever approach their level of buzz. Symbian has the same buzz, on a quieter, more confident, experienced level. They bring something others can't replicate or stop.
Oh.....but why? : /
Sony has shown some interest in symbian lately, so it could be them. Samsung could also be into doing this, they said they're dropping symbian in the future, but I know all of that is BS. They just can't resist not releasing shitloads of phones on every possible OS.
Hopefully they don't screw it up with any part of their software except for the camera UI.
@I like things
Samsung already has a successor to the i8910 HD called the i8920 Omnia HD coming soon. So they haven't dumped Symbian so far.
Most likely it's a Japanese operation. MOAP-S is based on Symbian, and is one of the two big software platforms for NTT DoCoMo. The other's MOAP-L, based on Linux.
@sockatume
Actually, good shout. Could be a Japanese phone.
Call me crazy, but I would love to see a Symbian 3 powered Slate!
@user47alpha You're not crazy. Why hasn't this been tried yet?
@The Madman Just couldn't help it.. But "The Madman" declares that someone ain't crazy.. That's funny..
Sticking on topic: Symbian^3 tablets sound interesting for sure
@JQuB3
not as interesting as Maemo/MeeGo tablets.
Symbian is for smartphones and limited hardware. MeeGo will be for tablets, netbooks, and premium hardware. Stick to the script...
@christexaport The thing is: If I look at my 5800 with it's 128 mb of ram and it's 434 MHz CPU: Why do all those chinaguys try to put Android on their only slightly better spect tablets? Why not use Symbian^3 which would have a better performance (thanks to hardwareacceleration)?
It's going to be Sharp or Fujitsu. They make incredible HW, this is going to be interesting. It looks like Symbian has really bright future ahead, things are moving fast and into right direction.
I've seen plenty of evidence online that suggests asians enjoy the Sybian, but what does any of that have to do with cell phones?
For all the pro symbian people, what features does Symbian provide that iphone/Android/webos don't have?
@Johnny Rockets
That is a strange Question to be honest, since those three OS's are not the same, by a long shot. I think only WebOS has better Multitasking, Iphone has better out of the box experience, and Android, well Android had widgets etc, which were better. Now with S^3, that benefit is gone. Also, Symbian is Hardware accelerated in the UI (now) and is not a VM. I understand the VM concept is a way to ensure a stable environment for apps on different hardware, I just think the Qt solution is better.
What is better about Symbian is that it is more nimble, uses less resources, requires a lesser CPU, and thus give you better battery life. I do not have all the necessary links available to me, so bear with me here, but Symbian has more functionality than the other os's around basic things such as sending vcards over bluetooth, etc. Also, there is a reason why multimedia phones tend to have Symbian (See Vivaz, 8910, etc) which is because they handle that very well.
Of course, the competing OS's are nearing the feature richness of Symbian, while Symbian is polishing up the UI and making progress.
Some more stuff:
It is not owned by a company, like Iphone OS, webOS or Android.
It is free and real open source
It has the most feature rich and mature code base
It is not a Virtual Machine
You can use a plethora of languages to write in.
It requires lesser specs
It supports HW accelerated UI
Best in class dealing with bandwidth, latency and jitter
4G ready
A9 Dual Core ready
Ill try and find you a proper link, I read an interesting piece on the topic a few days ago.
Peace.
@JFH
Interesting. It sounds like it's a much "better OS" but I'd still love to see the actual (*consumer-usable) features it does better than the other OS's or that the others don't do at all. (ie Flash, widgets etc). For example, not relying on a virtual machine is definitely nice, but that makes no difference to the average smartphone user.
I just hope that Nokia subsidizes the N8 in the US, as that's basically their barrier to entry here.
Didn't DoCoMo says they're working on a unified OS for all their phones regardless of the manufacturer? I think this is it...