Nokia BetaLabs has released Nokia Maps 3.0 with some major updates as part of the package. The release is supported by a wide range of handsets and offers better maps than ever before, enhanced Drive and Walk navigation and even delivers improved synchronisation using Ovi Maps.
This is the lead story affecting our Nokia community in the last 24 hours. Other apps stories to hit the headlines include Mail on Ovi goes live, while the BBC releases a standalone BBC iPlayer for the Nokia 5800. Also, the recurring theme of who owns the future of smartphones?
Get the full story on all these and on Nokia Maps 3.0 major update after the jump…
Nokia Maps 3.0 gets major update
Nokia Maps is a fantastic way to plan a journey on your laptop or PC before you leave the house, sync it with your Nok and away you go. Nokia Maps 3.0 comes with a host of new features, such as the start-up sequence takes you to your current position, to little things like 3D map rotation on key landmarks.
This update is still in the Beta phase but it solves many of the problems offered up by Nokia users, so offers a major update to the software. Support and synchronistaion issues have also been dealt with, as in addition to the synchronisation of Favourites and Collections with Ovi Maps and vice versa (use in online mode, enable internet connection), you can now plan routings on Ovi Maps and synchronise to your device with ease.
Maps 3.0 Beta works with Nokia devices based on:
S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 1 (E71, E66, 6110 Navigator, N95, N95 8GB, N82)
S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 2 (N96, N85, N79, 6650, 6210 Navigator, 6220 Classic, N78)
While we’re looking at the latest apps to come out of Nokia-central, the Symbian Guru has a nice piece about Mail on Ovi slipping into the world will little or no fanfare. The guys point out that ‘Mail on Ovi is certainly not designed to compete with the likes of Gmail, Hotmail, or similar webmail services. Rather, it’s designed to offer folks who have no email address (believe it or not, they *do* exist) a way to get an email address’, making this one of the easiest ways for people to get and stay connected. Check out the full facts on Mail on Ovi.
Nokia 5800 gets standalone BBC iPlayer
The guys over at All About Symbian have managed to get their hands on an exclusive bit of news concerning the BBC iPlayer. Well, it seem the Beeb has listened to our plea and released a full standalone version for for S60 5th Edition, more specifically for the Nokia 5800 and Nokia N97 phones. As the guys say ‘This runs slickly and includes the 'Download' feature first seen on the likes of the N96, where you can grab DRM-ed programmes for watching in the next month or so, offline.’ The question is, if this was coming just two weeks after the rather basic version popped into the Download section of our Nok, why didn’t Auntie Beeb just wait?
Who will dominate the smartphone business?
A couple of weeks ago we looked at possible smartphone futures following a report from Generator Research’s rather Apple flavoured view of the future. Well, it seems IT World is having a similar look into the crystal ball and while it claims the Nokia N97 may be over priced it’s biggest gaff is in thinking the ‘N97 device designed to compete against the iPhone’. Sure, they’re both phones but the Nokia N97 addresses the needs of the modern user looking to make the most of a touchscreen and a QWERTY keyboard, while the iPhone is simply a touchscreen device for watching video clips.
IT World tends to think the big winner will be whoever can produce the lowest cost handset, see if they are right in their thinking of the smartphone market.