There's a fascinating (and welcome) post by Phil Northam over on the Symbian Foundation site talking about the new i8910HD. Particularly interesting is the quote "the i8910HD is packed with a host of powerful options: Qt, Python, Ruby... All these run out-of-the box without change on the i8910HD". Good news all round, I say, though I suspect there's a degree of firmware-updating, downloadable addons and poetic license still involved. Anyone able to shed more light on this? See also Samsung's accelerating Mobile Innovator programme.
Read on in the full article.
"All these run out-of-the box without change on the i8910HD" has at least three interpretations, here listed in order of decreasing optimism:
- In a future firmware upgrade, these will come preinstalled.
- These will work fine, provided you download and install them first.
- These will work fine, provided you download them, get Samsung to sign them, and install them.
I really don't believe they meant the first one. I'm inclined to believe the second one, which means that (a) they didn't use any Nokia-specific API in implementing them, and (b) they will cooperate with Samsung to ensure each release will be signed for use on both Nokia and Samsung phones.
I rang 02 today and asked when they are releasing the Samsung i8910, guess what they said? they said they have NO plans to stock it at all!
WHAT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
looks like i will be getting the Nokia N97 instead then
It's currently an Orange exclusive, in the UK at least. Not sure for how long, though.
I'm very tempted but will wait for a few reviews (and some sense of what Orange has done to the firmware) before going for it.
Orange have it for one month
I wonder how much Orange will ruin this phone by installing their notorious crippling bloatware onto it? I would NEVER buy a phone without being able to remove the Orange firmware.
From the comments (Benm at Samsung):
"Re Qt, Ruby, Python � we have mispoken � what we mean to say is that all are supported, so any of these runtime versions that are working on S60 from other vendors (cough) should run fine on i8910 HD. But you will need to install. Sorry for the confusion."
Sorted.
Regardless of what it ships with, when is it shipping?!
It's supposed to be an Orange "exclusive", it's available unlocked in Italy, online stores say it's available but out of stock, and the Samsung Ambassadors (who were supposed to get it a month ahead of everyone else) still haven't received theirs.
What the hell is going on?
If it's any consolation, even here in Italy there are currently very, very few units available. I've spent half of the day yesterday looking for it in a lot of electronics stores, but either they hadn't received any shipment yet, or they had received just 2-3 of them, which sold out immediately upon arrival. A very frustrating experience 😞. I've ordered it in two different online stores, in the hope that at least one of them will be able to get me one by the end of next week.
Update: I GOT IT! Today I went on another search. Sold out everywhere, one store even told me that they weren't expecting any for next week either, maybe in two weeks. I had already given up, when I entered, as a last-ditch effort, into an electronics store on my way home. And there it was. They had received their shipment half an hour before. The clerk was putting the boxes on the shelves, and he asks me "Do you need something?", to which I respond "Yes! That box you're holding in your hand!".
Awesome. Glad to hear you got yours and that it's finally starting to turn up. 😊