Nokia Mix Radio on Nokia Lumia 710 hands-on review

Music-streaming services have become all the rage in recent years, but they usually involve a monthly subscription fee. Did you know that Nokia Music, which comes pre-installed on every Nokia Lumia 710, offers up the ability to stream music to your phone for free?

You don’t even need to sign up for anything – the Mix Radio service is ready to go out of the box. Once selected you’ll be taken to a list of possible mixes incorporating a bunch of genres. Whether you’re into Pop, Rock, Dance or Hip Hop there’s something to suit your tastes.

It goes even further, though. Nokia understands that you can’t really sum up peoples tastes with such broad descriptions as ‘dance’ or ‘rock’. To that end, Mix Radio features loads of sub-genre mixes. Go into Dance, for example, and you’ll find mixes for dubstep, trance, house, minimal techno and more.

Check out the following video from Nokia UK to see how Mix Radio works – including how to save playlists for offline listening. It really is very easy to use indeed.

Have you used Mix Radio? What do you think of it? Let us know in the comments section below.

Nokia N8 review

Searching online, we found plenty of great deals. But do remember that there are hundreds of deals out there, so find the right one for you can take some time. To lend a helping hand, here’s a handful of great deals we found.

O2 deals
For a little more material incentive pick up a Nokia N8 deal, O2 deals involve a number of free gifts. Online you’ll find deals throwing in a Toshiba 22-inch HD TV, Nintendo 3DS, or a PlayStation Move starter pack, compatible with a PS3 games console. For a cheap Nokia N8 contract, you can pick up an N8 for £154.99 and pay just £15.50 per month on a 24-month contract. For a free Nokia N8 deal you’ll have to pay a little more on contract. For £31 per month you can get a free Nokia N8 on O2 with 600 minutes, unlimited texts.

Vodafone
Look around and you’ll find deals giving you a free Nokia N8, 500 inclusive text messages and 100 inclusive minutes when you sign up to a Vodafone tariff for £26 per month. You will also get 500MB of internet data and, a generous six months free line rental.

T-Mobile
If internet browsing is your thing many of the T-Mobile offers online offer generous amounts of internet data. Some of the cheapest pay monthly deals start from £26 per month for 100 inclusive minutes, 500 text and unlimited internet data. The internet data is the jewel there.

Orange
If you’re more inclined to Orange you can find an equally good Nokia N8 deal for the same £26 per month. For that price you’ll get 500 free minutes, unlimited texts and three months half price line rental. And of course, a free Nokia N8. You will have to sign up to a 24-month contract, but at least you’ll be tied to one of Nokia’s best ever phones, made better by the recent Nokia Belle update.

Spotted any Nokia N8 deals you think are worthy of mentioning? Let us know.

While the Nokia Lumia 710 is a fine and attractive smartphone, it couldn’t possibly hope to match the Nokia Lumia 800 for sheer style. Really, we don’t know a smartphone that could. But that’s not the case when it comes to the Nokia Lumia 710′s Windows Phone OS and bundled software – there is absolutely no compromise here whatsoever.

Nokia Lumia 710 review (hardware)

Windows Phone 7.5 has fast established itself as the slickest and most forward-thinking mobile operating systems around. It’s based around the gorgeous Metro UI, which uses boldly coloured window tiles, high res background images and large, heavily stylised (though always clear) fonts to really stand out from the crowd.

It’s built around a hub page filled with large square icons called live tiles. These represent the main functions of your phone – so there’s one for making phone calls, one for your contacts, one for text messaging and so on. The key feature is hinted at in the live tile name – they relay real-time information to you without the need to actually enter the app. If you’ve come from the static icons of Symbian, this will be a bit of a revelation.

For example, your contacts app (called People) will pull any images associated with your contacts to the fore, creating a mosaic of your friends, family and colleagues right on your Nokia Lumia 710 start page. Instant personalisation with no messing around. A rather more useful example would be the text and email live tiles that tell you how many unread messages you have. The calendar tile, meanwhile, tells you what your next appointment is at a glance. App developers can add their own live tiles, which you can choose to pin to the start menu.

No other mobile OS boasts such a unified approach, and that’s most evident when you stray into the apps themselves. Each of the default applications – and most of the third party ones found on the Windows Phone Marketplace for that matter – adopt the Metro UI aesthetic. This involves a simple system of scrolling left and right to flick between important elements, each represented by a large header that gradually scrolls into view. The email app, for example, lets you flick between all, unread, flagged and urgent messages with a left or right swipe.

Speaking of email – setting up an account is extremely easy here. Select the set-up option from the start page, or the Add an account option from the settings menu, and you’ll be able to add an account from all the usual sources – Gmail, Facebook, Twitter and more. In the case of something like Gmail, you can even choose to sync your contacts and calendar info with Windows Phone’s equivalent systems. It’s seamless.

Scrolling right from the start page brings up a list of all the apps you have on your Nokia Lumia 710, which in turn brings us to one of the few perceived weaknesses of the Windows Phone OS. While the Windows Phone Marketplace is very nicely presented (again in the Metro UI style), it doesn’t have as many apps as its major rivals. When you consider that the Windows Phone OS has been around for well under two years, though, the fact that it has more than 40,000 apps to choose from already is truly impressive. The important points to note are: the Marketplace is growing fast, most of the major players (Spotify, Flickr, eBay etc) are represented, and many of these are the best of their kind on any platform.

Gamers, too, will find an ecosystem that preaches quality over quantity – and which is quickly catching up in numbers too. Your Nokia Lumia 710 has access to a number of games that hook up to your Xbox Live account, awarding you achievements that will go towards your Xbox 360 Gamerscore. This facility alone makes the Windows Phone versions of cross-platform giants such as Angry Birds and Plants vs Zombies the best on any smartphone platform. There’s also a growing catalogue of smaller and cheaper indie games.

What sets the Nokia Lumia 710 (along with the Lumia 800) apart from other Windows Phone devices, even, is the exclusive Nokia software. Nokia Drive is the undoubted star of the show, offering a full turn-by-turn navigation system for free. With the ability to preload maps, the Nokia Lumia 710′s powerful GPS capabilities and Nokia Drive’s clear 3D view, you can genuinely consider putting your expensive sat nav system on ebay. It’s that good.

Nokia Maps, too, is a far superior alternative to the default Bing Maps, while Nokia Music adds free themed radio playlists that can be streamed or downloaded. All excellent additions, and you can bet that Nokia will have more up its sleeves.

We said in our hardware review that the Nokia Lumia 710 offers the full functionality of the Nokia Lumia 800 for less money, but in truth that’s largely defined by its software. This is the full Windows Phone OS experience, and it makes the Nokia Lumia 710 one of the most appealing and capable smartphones on the market.

Locating the best deal can take some time. It’s always important to think about how you plan to use your phone. The Nokia 700 is a great phone for listening to and streaming music, and browsing the web, so you may want to think about internet data.

It’s just one of the many considerations to take into account when buying a Nokia 700. With some of these considerations in mind, here are some deals worth checking out.

O2
O2.co.uk is offering the Nokia 700 from free to £80 on a Pay Monthly contract. The cheapest monthly tariff you can get costs just £10.50 per month, but for that price you’ll need to pay £80 for the phone, too.

Or you can get a Nokia 700 for free from £15.50 per month with 200 inclusive minutes and unlimited texts. Data allowance comes at an extra charge, starting from £3 for 100MB up to £10 for 1GB. While that is costly, you’re still getting an unlimited text supply. And everyone knows we text more than we talk nowadays.

If Pay & Go is your thing you can own the Nokia 700 outright for £250.

Vodafone
Vodafone is offering the Nokia 700 with 100MB of mobile internet data contract from £13 per month. For that you’ll get 100 free minutes and a healthy 500 free texts per month.

If you want to spend a little more, we recommend the second of Vodafone’s £20.50 per month deals. Here you get 300 minutes, unlimited texts and 250MB of data. You also get 500MB of BT Openzone Wi-Fi access, should you find yourself needing to dabble online in a cafe somewhere.

T-Mobile
For a very credible monthly, deal head over to T-Mobile. There you can grab a Nokia 700 from £26 per month in a deal. The first of these offers 600 minutes of inclusive calls, 500 texts and 100MB of internet data.

The second Nokia 700 deal has 300 minutes, and 500 texts, but 750MB of internet data -  a great package for heavier mobile internet users. Both are 24 month contracts, so it’s best to think about how you use your Nokia 700 before putting pen to paper.

Orange
The cheapest of our chosen deals is £20.50 per month on the Orange network, from online store BuyMobilePhones.net. The deal includes 100 inclusive minutes across any network, unlimited texts, 500MB of Anytime Mobile internet browsing and free BT Openzone Wi-Fi.

Have you recently spotted any bargains you’d like to share with us? Let us know in the comments section.

Nokia Lumia 800 White Edition Hands-on Preview

Our hastily reached conclusion is that the Nokia Lumia 800 is a good-looking phone in any colour. How could it not be with those sculpted looks, and that all-in-one polycarbonate shell? Its 3.7-inch ClearBlack AMOLED display helps in the swit-swoo department too, of course.

But deciding a favourite colour is tough. We use the sleek black model here on NokNok, but we can’t deny the allure of the vibrant cyan model. Magenta has to be the funnest colour in the range, but we’re simply not flamboyant enough to pull it off. Plenty of you are, no doubt!

Which leaves us with the Nokia Lumia 800 White Edition. Love it or hate it (we love it), it certainly stands apart from the rest of the range by virtue of it having a glossy finish. As such, it’s possibly even more eye-catching than the magenta model.

What do you think? Check out the following video and let us know which colour you prefer in the Comments section below.

Nokia Lumia 800 review

To celebrate reaching 200,000 fans on their Facebook account, Nokia UK is giving away a Nokia Lumia 800 to four lucky winners. These aren’t just any Nokia Lumia 800s though – they’ll be signed by one Tinchy Stryder.

The hip-hop star and multimedia mogul can be seen rocking a Nokia Lumia 800 (in stylish black) in the video for his latest single, Bright Lights featuring Pixie Lott, which you can check out below.

Even if you don’t win a Nokia Lumia 800, three runners up will receive a pair of Nokia Purity HD headphones from Monster. Not only do these crystal-clear, bass-rich headphones make your Nokia Music play lists sound extra good, they’re also fully optimised for use with your Nokia Lumia 800. They fold up into a compact carry case, and they also possess integrated call handling so you won’t miss any incoming phone calls.

Nokia Lumia 800: Top 5 peripherals

To be in with a chance of winning one of these seven fine prizes, simply head on over to the Nokia UK Facebook page and Like them. Then, click on the Enter Now button and fill out your details. It really is as simple as that!

In the mean time, take a look at Mr Stryder listening to music on his Nokia Lumia 800 through a pair of Monster headphones. Then imagine yourself doing the same when you win this competition…

Nokia Belle is the latest software update for your Symbian smartphone and getting hold of it is easy. Just watch this video, or check out are handy guide and away you go! 

Nokia Suite v3.3.84 Beta preps for Nokia Belle update

Oh, the only thing you may need to do is check that it’s available in your country but Nokia has thought of that with this handy Nokia Belle World Map. 

Check out How to install Nokia Belle: 

Nokia Belle

The Nokia Store version 3.20.050 firmware update comes as part of the Nokia Belle rollout but you need to download and install it separately. At least, this was the case with our Nokia N8. It’s not a big issue, as it’s a mere 4.3MB download and we found that it was up and running within a couple of minutes. 

Nokia N8: Why you need to upgrade to Nokia Belle

That said, it’s still better to carry out an update like this when you’re at home and using the Wi-Fi connection, rather than relying on your data connection when out and about. 

The Nokia Store version 3.20.050 brings with it everything you we’ve come to expect from the Nokia Belle rollout, so along with a faster load speed, you’ll also find a more intuitive and easy-to-use interface. 

Icons along the bottom of the Nokia N8, in our case, screen, allow you to navigate back, search and also dive easier into categories. There is also a neat little icon that allows you to check your account, as well as notifying you when updates are available for al your downloaded apps. 

While we’ve been checking out the Nokia Store version 3.20.050 on our Nokia N8 you’ll find that it;s compatible with all Nokia Belle smartphones and is well work making part of your update regime. 

Already using Nokia Store version 3.20.050 on your Nokia Belle smartphone? What do you think, let us know your thoughts about this update in the Comments below. 

 Check out our Nokia Store version 3.20.050 hands on photo gallery:

Nokia Lumia 800 White Edition Hands-on Preview

It’s not until you see the Nokia Lumia 800 White Edition on video that you truly realise how pretty it is. You might wonder how different a white phone can look, but it’s not just about the colour (or lack thereof) – it’s about the finish. While the rest of the Nokia Lumia 800 range come in a matte finish, this one goes all-out with the glamour and applies a shiny finish.

Check out the video below and you’ll notice the pronounced glossy effect as Stephen rotates it under the glare of the Nokia UK HQ lights. Mmm, shiny.

Of course, underneath this glossy exterior lies the same 1.4GHz processor, the same 3.7-inch AMOLED display, the same 8-megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss lens and – of course – the same revolutionary Windows Phone 7.5 operating system. If you don’t know what all this means, then you can catch up with our Nokia Lumia 800 review. Go on.

In the meantime, what do you think of the new glossy white shade Nokia has gone with? Is it indeed – as Stephen contends in the video – “one of the most gorgeous phones we’ve ever laid hands on”? Let us know what you think in the Comments section below the video.

Nokia Lumia 710 review (hardware)

The Nokia Lumia 710 is exciting news for anyone who wants to experience the latest in Nokia design couple with Microsoft’s revolutionary Windows Phone OS without paying top dollar. We rated it pretty highly in our hardware review, thanks to its solid build quality, sharp 3.7-inch LCD screen and swift 1.4GHz processor.

Here’s a closer look at what you’ll get in your Nokia Lumia 710 package, straight from the horse’s mouth. Check out the official Nokia UK video, which not only runs through what you’ll get in the box, but also finds time to show off some fetching Monster headphones that will really do your Nokia Music playlists justice.

How about an unboxing featuring a comparison with Nokia’s other recent Windows Phone device, the Nokia Lumia 800? This one from Netbook News in Taiwan does just that, and throws in the the Nokia N9 to boot. Don’t they look lovely together?

In keeping with the Windows Phone OS’s minimalistic, straight-to-the-point style, this video’s entirely wordless and pretty short. Unlike the Windows Phone OS and the Nokia Lumia 710 in general, it’s also a bit shaky, but never mind.

For a true amateurish unboxing, though, check this one out from some chap who couldn’t even wait to get out of his car before ripping into the box. That’s enthusiasm for you. Shaky cam and excessive lap-shots aside, it’s a pretty informative vid.

Have you seen any interesting, amusing or downright bizzarre Nokia Lumia 710 unboxing videos floating around the web? If so, feel free to share them with us and the rest of our readers below.