Nokia will put the S^3 OS on its N8 smartphone

MOBILE PHONE SOFTWARE HOUSE Symbian has announced that Nokia's upcoming N8 smartphone will be powered by its S^3 operating system.

Nokia is the first device manufacturer to get behind the software, which has been delayed, and the firms said that the handset will show off many of its features and usability enhancements.

Lee Williams, executive director of Symbian, said, "We are stoked that Nokia has chosen our fully open source S^3 for their latest device, the Nokia N8. S^3 enables an unparalleled set of options for device creators and app developers to extend the usefulness of Symbian products and services and, in turn, enhance the lives of mobile consumers. This is an example of what is possible with the latest and greatest version of the Symbian platform."

The Nokia N8 will offer multiple, personalised homescreens, multi-touch and single tap access, improved graphics, better memory management and a faster and improved user interface.

The official Nokia blog gushes with enthusiasm over the forthcoming release of the N8 and has a two exclamation mark headline. It seems you don't just make mobile phones anymore, you carve them from a 'single piece of anodised aluminium' and deck them out in 'five eye-catching colours'.

Much is also made of the camera in the phone, which on the N8 has an impressive 12-megapixel resolution with Carl Zeiss optics and a Xenon flash. The N8 also lets users capture and edit high definition videos and comes with an HDMI connector for plugging into a television.

Speaking of televisions, the Nokia's N8 smartphone has a 3.5-inch touchscreen, so users presumably will be able to approximate the viewing experience of travelling on aircraft or watching telly.

The Nokia N8 also has 16GB of built-in storage, expandable up to 48GB with a micro SD card. It will cost €370, before local taxes and subsidies, and will start shipping in the third quarter of 2010.

The third quarter is likely to be a busy one for handset upgrades and new smartphones. Not only has the release of S^3 been pushed back until then, but it is also the timeframe when Blackberry plans to release its next operating system, Dell hopes to start shipping its own Android smartphones, and Microsoft will once again attempt to flog some life into its own mobile operating system with the release of version 7. µ