N96 officially hits the open waves

GLOBAL – Floods of Nokia N96 handsets have begun their exodus from factory to shop floor, with shipping beginning today. Hardly in need of introduction, the newest Nseries unquestionably out-muscles the N95 8GB in face-off features stakes – it comes loaded with 16GB of storage coupled with optional microSD card slot that’ll suck up to 24GB of extra memory, supports live TV (if you’re region supports DVB-H), and my personal favourite… the kickstand!

It’s funny, as I’m writing a story about the most feature-packed phone in Nokia history, our editor Charlie is writing a piece exploring the virtues of using a handset that only enables calling and text – he’s even starting a movement (who said cult?), that he’s dubbing The 1100 Club. But retro-tinted spectacles aside, here’s more on the N96…

Earlier, Jonas Geust, Vice President of Nokia Nseries had this to say about it:

“The Nokia N96 is mobile entertainment at its best, a fitting flagship for our Nseries range. It defines convergence by blending phone and multimedia options seamlessly with the unique Nokia Nseries dual slider that makes discovering and sharing experiences easy. Watch live TV and video, take high quality photos and geotag them to specific locations or directly upload them online via the fast internet connection – it is all about taking mobile entertainment and communication to the next level”

So, today’s news of the N96 beginning to ship has been reported by heaps of sites, as you’d kind of expect, but it was interesting to see how significant some are seeing it:

CrunchGear: “To be fair, just looking at the specs sorta makes me say, “iPhone, what’s that?” Built-in 5-megapixel camera and 16GB memory (expandable to 24GB with microSD cards), live video, proper speakers, etc. It’s like, if all you’ve used is the iPhone and think that’s the pinnacle of mobile devices, interface aside, you might want to expand your horizon a bit.”

Trusted Reviews: “Nokia has had a little more time to apply some spit and polish to its flagship model and those enamoured with their N95 and N95 8GB handsets are sure to find more they will like here.”

What do you think about the N96? Is it an important handset in your opinion? Jot down your thoughts below.

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• Nokia N97 marks evolutionary milestone for Nseries and mobilekind
• Nokia 5330 XpressMusic takes music social

Tags | 1100 club, conversations, CrunchGear, N96, Nokia, Trusted Reviews