Nokia C7 Chronicle: A Life With Anna Day 1 ~ SCRATCH e-PAD!

18:00 Hours, +8 GMT, August 22, 2011

Got my confirmation from Nokia that I can now download its latest and greatest Operating System upgrade of Symbian^3 dubbed Symbian Anna and in no time download it over the air (OTA) via WIFI. Downloading takes for about less than an hour which will then prompt users install the operating system that will also take another few minutes. Then after the reboot, bunch of software updates will be prompted for download which will take another hour to download and install.

Gone were the days when the upgrade is via NSU were users will have to manually connect the phone to pc and pray that nothing goes wrong because one wrong move will damage the phone forever.

19:30 Hours, +8 GMT, August 22, 2011

Got the first glimpse of Symbian Anna on my phone with a white middle rotating circle loading mechanism. This will open the Log-in procedure to all services that users were currently subscribe which in my case, all Nokia services, then after which the colorful Homescreen opens which now have transition effect’s making it more lively, barraging new youthful icons. On plain view, everything looks fresh, simple and delightful.

Just like any other users who got hold on the touchscreen phone, side swipe in between Homescreen will be the first gesture that I did, and the Symbian Anna’s swipe interface gives users a notion of fastness because of the new slide mechanism that was implemented even though it registered the same time of completion as that of the Symbian^3 in my observation. I call it a half slide full acceleration implementation rather than the across the screen full finger slide. The swipe mechanism was the key here which came out very effective.

Then I did a fast run through to all areas of the phone and found quite a few new applications installed. On the Office folder under Applications, Communicator icon appeared which is very common among E-Series devices being a business related application. Notification also pops out on the Applications folder which I believe will list all important updates of the phone. Then the NFC related applications such as Share and NFC tutorials icon. Only the Nokia C7 got this feature among the current Symbian^3 phones so this will become its unique feature for now. Angry Birds Magic was also installed adding to the list of free pre-installed games on the phone.

21:30 Hours, +8 GMT, August 22, 2011

I was ready to send my very first tweet and status update using the phones updated Nokia Social App. Though I could not see any visual improvement on the app’s interface, the message writing mechanism of the phone became easier than ever with the new virtual QWERTY keyboard for portrait mode. I have never enjoyed the use virtual keyboard before than now because of the accurateness I get from the current keyboard. I even start to enjoy Swype now because of the said keyboard.

Dug down further to individual applications which have reportedly been upgraded trying the new Browser first being one of my most used phone feature. Well. I have to say that it was indeed a lot better than the previous cutting the loading time to almost half. Just like the Safari browser on iPhone, the phone‘s browser will open a customize mobile version of any webpage first with an option to access the full webpage afterwards. But either which, the browser is blazing fast in rendering pages.
Messaging has always been a strong area from Nokia, and the phones Nokia Messaging feature just got even better nowadays with a full image rendering.

23:00 Hours, +8 GMT, August 22, 2011

Hit the bed early since I still have to recuperate from my sleepless nights brought about by our exam last weekend. Things are getting better so far for Nokia C7, my chronicle continues as I discover more features of the phone and stay tuned for my upcoming re-review which will be due in a weeks time.