Nokia Storms Market with its N97

Nokia has unveiled the Nokia N97, the next generation high-end mobile phone and what some regard as the company's most powerful handset to date.
The most physically immediate stand-out feature of the N97 is its kick-out full QWERTY keyboard ( the first N-series phone with such feature), hidden behind a 3.5-inch wide screen 16:9 touch display that tilts smartly above the keys. Both control methods neatly coexist and are tailored to ensure every experience, be it messaging, social, entertainment-focussed or otherwise, are manageable via the most instinctive physical tool set available. The touchscreen promises to be exploited to full effect, even when inactive, courtesy of a new home screen that automatically sucks in live information via custom widgets sat on a S60 5th Edition backbone.
It has 32 gigabytes of memory, expandable to 42 GB via 16 GB memory card. With this space, you can enjoy many more music, movies, photos and N-Gage games and the good thing is the company has worked hard to ensure the N97's battery is up to the task – it promises to kick out up to 37 hours of music and 4.5 hours of video.
Embracing location based services and the concept of context awareness, the N97 is location-savvy, automatically sensing where it is at any given time via A-GPS. The benefit being that you'll be able to tap into local services with ease and share your social location with friends minus any extra fiddling or fuss.
Other key talents include a 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss Tessar lens and dual LED flash, GPS, HSDPA, Wi-Fi, USB 2.0, stereo Bluetooth and a 3.5mm headphone jack.
The Nokia N97 is expected to begin shipping in the first half of 2009 at an estimated retail price of EUR 550 before taxes or subsidies.