You may have seen Nokia making the news today as they've announced they're going to buy the operating system maker Symbian. This is tremendously important because all N-Gage-compatible phones run on the Symbian OS, and what happens to Symbian will ultimately determine what happens to N-Gage too.
Read on in the full article.
We don't normally post such technical articles here on All About N-Gage, but this is such big news for N-Gage I thought it was worth explaining in detail.
Well done on a concise & well-written article...I know actually know in a simpled manner what will be happening to Symbian in due course.
Thanks very much hargs48, I'm glad you appreciate it! 😊
While I really hope that this will bring N-Gage to non-Nokia phones, I'm not overly optimistic about it.
For some strange reason, Nokia seems to want to keep N-Gage exclusive to a select few models. There are plenty of S60 3rd phones out there that are technically powerful enough to be N-Gage compatible, but for some reason they aren't.
Like I said in the article, this is all VERY long term stuff we're talking about.
Unification of Symbian won't happen until 2010. Nokia becoming mainly a software company probably wouldn't happen until 2020 or 2030, if ever.
By that stage phones may be so cheap that we don't really care who we buy them from or which model we have.
For some strange reason, Nokia seems to want to keep N-Gage exclusive to a select few models. There are plenty of S60 3rd phones out there that are technically powerful enough to be N-Gage compatible, but for some reason they aren't.
I suspect the reason is simply because testing all the games on every S60v3 phone (and all their network variants and all the firmware versions) would take a very long time. It would be especially difficult because most S60v3 models were designed before the new N-Gage platform even existed, and they tend to have a more limited amount of RAM.
If the N-Gage app does spread to other current models, the 6120 would be an obvious choice, it will probably be later rather than sooner as they're still trying to get the current version to work fully! 😊
One thing's for certain, Nokia are definitely NOT trying to keep N-Gage exclusive to expensive models. The 5320 due out soon will be the cheapest S60 phone so far (200 euros launch price) and it will be N-Gage compatible, it even has N-Gage gaming buttons. That's the kind of thing that will help it get to the mass market.
What will probably happen is N-Gage will be added to more and more phones as they're designed with the app in mind.
While many have concluded that single chipped phones like the Nokia N81 lack a 3D chip, it came as a huge discovery that this device actually does have a 3D Chip. Apart from having a faster processor than the dual chipped N95s and N82s, a 3D chip is present in the i.Mx... chip variant embedded in the N81. Question is does the 6120 also contain this?
While many have concluded that single chipped phones like the Nokia N81 lack a 3D chip, it came as a huge discovery that this device actually does have a 3D Chip
Where exactly did you read this discovery? I don't think the N81 does have a 3D chip, and it's not mentioned in any of the specs given out to developers which means no one would use it even if it was present.
As for the processors, a higher clock speed doesn't mean a faster processor. The N95's dual processors mean it can get most stuff done more quickly than the N81.
Cad..d-_-b.. wrote:While many have concluded that single chipped phones like the Nokia N81 lack a 3D chip, it came as a huge discovery that this device actually does have a 3D Chip. Apart from having a faster processor than the dual chipped N95s and N82s, a 3D chip is present in the i.Mx... chip variant embedded in the N81. Question is does the 6120 also contain this?
N81 doesn't use Freescale i.Mx. Neither do any other Nokia phone (as far as I know). N81, 6120 and the other phones use Freescale i.300-30 or possibly Freescale MXC300-30. But I don't think we seen any MXC300-30 phones on the market yet, but they Nokia & Freescale showed the platform together on the Mobile World Congress 2008 back in february so we will no doubt see phones using it some day.
Also, if I'm wrong and the phones actually do use i.Mx, there are 8 different i.Mx models and only one of them have a 3D chip in it and a ARM CPU running at 400-532 MHz. Since N81 and the others run at 369 MHz, they can't be running that particular i.Mx platform.
LMAOL. All this and that, the N81 chipset does contain a 3D GPU for 3D Acceleration, read here http://my-symbian.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=34618 . Problem is the 3D GPU within the N81 is running at an amble 40mhz... thats why its not even mentioned because its like a brain dead patient on life support. Interesting thing is if Nokia wanted to, they could overclock the GPU in a firmware update which would give the N81 hardware-enhanced graphics. And Kazu dude, please relax and do sufficient research. The Nokia N81 chipset is part of the Freescale i.Mx series. Everybody happy?
Nice work Krisse, as always.
By the way, I think you're a bit wasted on All About N-Gage. Games are ok in their place but lots of us just don't get the time to play them. Please get back to doing your thorough reviews and making your perceptive comments on All About Symbian.
[QUOTE='Cad..d[+_+]b;382469']And Kazu dude, please relax and do sufficient research.[/QUOTE]
I have, which is why I can safetly say that it doesn't have any 3D GPU.
And a moderator on the on the forums of the speculation thread you linked to, seem to think the same.