It seems that HTC doesn’t believe in only launching touchscreen phones. After the recent success of the HTC Touch Diamond, and the probable success of the costly HTC Touch Pro, the company is coming up with the S740, a lookalike of the Touch Pro, but without a touchscreen, and with a numeric keypad on the candy-bar form.

The HTC S740 has HSDPA, GPS, a 2.4″ display with QVGA resolution (240×320 pixels), Bluetooth, WiFi, a 3.2 megapixel camera, Qualcomm® MSM7225, 528 MHz processor, 256MB RAM, and runs on Windows Mobile 6.1 Standard.

Press release after the jump.

[via vnunet]

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If you still haven’t figured out the trend of NSeries phones, where a N9x is followed by a N8x of the same category, this one should be obvious. When the N91 8GB was released, the N81 8GB followed after a while, and the same applies to the N95 8GB - N82 relationship, and it’s once again happening between the N96 and N85.

I don’t understand really why Nokia does it. The N85 is sort  of a flagship phone, just like the N96, but it targets the mid-high-end consumer, unlike the N96 which targets the high-high end consumer only. This pattern might be actually an economical reasoning, and then the phones are followed by a N7x?

Whatever are Nokia’s patterns, we’ll just speak about the phone itself now: The N85 doesn’t bring anything new, but as other NSeries, it’s a convergence focused device, and puts everything together. From the 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss lens, to the 10 included NGage games with dedicated music buttons. You can also find the 3.5mm jack, HSDPA, built-in A-GPS, and WiFi. The only thing that is NEW is the 2.6″ OLED display, and the inclusion of a 8GB microSD memory card. Nokia has decided to go for these displays not only because they waste less power, but because they have better quality as well.

You can include our opinion on the Nokia N79 here as well, for the strategy behind this phone, which will affect the Nokia N96’s sales.

Press release and pictures after the jump. Do check out the promotion video, as well as the demo video. Jason Goh from Symbian Smashpop has been at the launch event, and had a hands-on moment with the device, check the video out.

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Nokia calls it a fusion of technology and style. I call it rubbish - for me N79 is the ugliest Nokia I’ve seen in ages, and definitely, the ugliest NSeries phone. If anything could change my mind, that would have to be a hands-on, on my hands, as I’ve seen live pictures, press pictures, and I’m not happy.

In terms of features, it’s an improved version of the Nokia N78, and the only thing that really improved is the camera, Nokia added a 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss lens. The reason Nokia recalls style is that they allow you to switch Xpress-on covers with the following colours: light sea blue, espresso brown, olive green, white and coral red. Three of those come in the box. The specifications aren’t bad at all, there’s GPS, a 3.5mm audio jack, sliding lock, HSDPA, an included 4GB microSD memory card, FM Transmitter, a Friendster widget, and 10 NGage games, with one free licence. The N79 will retail at 350€ w.s.o.t.

A “style” highlight is that the phone can change themes by auto-detecting what cover you attach to it…pretty cool. There is an accelerometer as well as a navi-wheel for improved navigation.

To tell you the truth, the only reason why I see Nokia launching such a phone is to get rid of the stock. The manufacturer has noticed that they need to start releasing phones that can stand up against the upcoming 8 megapixel camera-phones and touchscreen-phones from their competitors, so they thought it was a good idea to just dump lots of phones into the market, for the user to have some choice in NSeries, and not just go for the other brands. What happens is that the consumer will get confused. Now I don’t do any market research unlike the Nokia boffins, but I’ve been around long enough to notice that. Let’s say a person wants a Nokia N78, and he suddenly sees a Nokia N79, and he thinks to himself: “I will wait and buy it as it’s better”. Now you can see that this is bad timing as well. Nokia has just released the N78 to the retail market, and suddenly it opens the doors to the N79, which is a higher-end phone which will cost less, and make the consumer wait for it, which will translate in a loss of revenue for the N78. If Nokia wanted to put the N79 into the market, they should do it either at the same time, or 3 months later, and here is the news: The N79 is coming three months after the N78, but the consumer doesn’t know that, and thinks it will be worth the wait, and once again I say, Nokia will lose money.

If you disagree with anything, please do comment and share your views with me. If you do agree, please also state your points. It’s interesting to analyse Nokia’s current strategy.

Press release and pictures after the jump. Also do check out the promotion video, and the demo video. Jason Goh from Symbian Smashpop has been at the launch event, and had a hands-on moment with the device, check the video out.

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