Click to View

Sometimes the initial attempt to implement a new technology doesn't succeed as planned. Following a policy unlike that of its Redmond-based rival, Nokia actually nixed a product because the platform it was built on wasn't up to snuff.

That device, the 7700 Media Phone, would have been Nokia's first mobile handset built on the mobile phone giant's new Series 90 smartphone platform. Because of reported problems with the Series 90 software, however, Nokia decided to cancel the release of the 7700.

What is Series 90?

Series 90 is the follow-up to Series 80, the interface used in Nokia's popular Communicator series, including the upcoming 9300 and 9500 models. Like the better-known Series 60 interface—by far the most popular smartphone platform—Series 80 and now Series 90 are built on top of the Symbian operating system.

New with the Series 90 platform is touch-screen support for pen input. A multimedia-orientated interface, Series 90 delivers high-resolution display, music and video playback and streaming, multimedia messaging, among other visual and audio features and standard personal information management.

Nokia is reportedly putting the finishing touches on the sequel to the never-released 7700 Media Phone, called the 7710. Instead of implementing the same edition of Series 90 used for the 7700, the 7710 will integrate version 2.0 of the platform. This edition of Series 90 solves the problems—most likely with the touchscreen—that caused Nokia to set aside the 7700.

Reports say the tri-band GSM/GPRS/EDGE 7710 should offer basically the same feature set as the 7700. These include a 640 x 320 pixel resolution and 65,536 color display. Instead of a keyboard found in the Communicator series, the touch-screen of the 7710 enables a virtual keyboard and handwriting recognition. It also offers all the multimedia features mentioned in our description of Series 90 plus a VGA integrated VGA camera and an FM radio.

As an EDGE smartphone, the 7710 will send and receive data at around 384 Kbps on a supported network. EDGE is the sequal to GPRS (115 Kbps), the current data exchange standard for GSM. Nokia's 6620, offered by AT&T Wireless and Cingular, is the first EDGE smartphone to ship in the United States.

Nokia offered no timeframe for the release or the potential cost of the 7710.