Thoughts on the Nokia 808 PureView

I’ve always been a fan of Nokia’s cameraphones because it meant carrying one device instead of a point-and-shoot camera AND a phone. In regards to imaging, my favorites were the Nokia N93, N82, N86 8MP, and the N8. Nokia recently announced the 808 PureView which is going to be Nokia’s best imaging phone yet. I’ve played with the device at Mobile World Congress and was impressed especially with the technology behind it. There’s just one problem. It’s not a Windows Phone device.



Nokia already made me fall in love with Windows Phone and it’s going to be really hard for anyone to convince me to use Symbian again. That’s my big problem. I want the 808 PureView’s camera, but not Symbian.






When asked why their new imaging flagship is running Symbian instead of Windows Phone, Nokia’s usual response to the press was that they’ve been working on the technology for five years. They’ve just recently adopted Windows Phone. Nokia insisted we’ll eventually see a ‘combination’ of PureView technologies on Windows Phone.


The keyword ‘combination’ came up multiple times when I asked about Windows Phone and PureView. I suspect it means we’ll see a Nokia Windows Phone device with high performance optics and Nokia industry-leading image processing algorithms, BUT with a smaller sensor than the 41 megapixels found on the Nokia 808 PureView.

I will not be buying the Nokia 808 PureView as my main device, but I may be tempted to get it as a point-and-shoot camera. Ultimately, I’m looking forward to the day PureView technology comes to the Nokia Lumia lineup.