When Nokia reintroduces itself to the world as a Windows Phone maker later this year, many anticipate that the company will instantly steal the limelight from other Microsoft partners. If HTC has anything to say about it, however, that won’t be the case. HTC looks primed to take a giant leap forward in the megapixel race with a 12-megapixel Windows Phone that can shoot RAW images. Industry insider Eldar Murtazin on Sunday posted an image and preliminary impressions of the unreleased Windows Phone being readied by HTC. The smartphone resembles the HTC Trophy just launched by Verizon Wireless, but the addition of a 12-megapixel camera supplies a point of differentiation that could have photogs drooling in anticipation. HTC has never been known to equip its smartphones with good image sensors and Murtazin says the quality of images taken with the upcoming 12-megapixel offering is just “not bad at all,” but he’s working with pre-release software so let’s hope HTC has some tweaks in store ahead of launch.

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Thanks to Eldar Murtazin we had our less-than-favorable first look at the Nokia N8 earlier this week and today Nokia has made the handset official. The N8 will be Nokia’s first Symbian^3 handset and will be the flagship for its new and improved Symbian OS. The Nokia N8 has a knock-out set of specs that include:

• 3.5 inch capacitive multi-touch touchscreen with gesture support
• Multiple homescreens with widget support
• 12 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics and Xenon Flash
• HD recording and on-phone editing
• Facebook and Twitter integration via homescreen widgets
• HDMI support
• 16GB on board storage
• WebTV, Ovi Store
• Ovi maps with walk and drive navigation
• Symbian S^3
• Anodized aluminum casing

Folks looking to get their hands on the new hotness from Nokia will have to exercise patience as the N8 is not slated to launch until Q3 2010. When it finally hits the retail shelves later this year, the N8 will debut in select global markets with a price tag of €370 ($494 USD).

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Conflicting reports are coming in this morning about Nokia’s upcoming handset lineup. Leaked information from Tom’s Guide, a French technology website, reveals several new Nokia handsets that rumored to be slated for launch starting in early summer. According to the not confirmed info, Nokia will be structuring its handset lineup using the following naming conventions:

• C: Lower end voice-based
• X: Focus on entertainment, music for a young target
• E: Dedicated to business, solutions for e-mails
• N: High-end
• S: Very upscale and limited editions

Nokia is supposedly developing a wide range of C-series handsets including the C5-10, a QWERTY handset that will take on BlackBerry handsets. On the top of the heap is the N8-00, a capacitive, multitouch handset with 720p video capture and a 12 megapixel camera. The N8-00 will be the first Symbian^3 handset and is rumored to launch this summer. Expectations are high for Nokia at MWC with this rumor pointing to a potential unveiling of one or more of these handsets at the upcoming Barcelona conference. This rumor would be exciting if not for the fact that another rumor fresh out today suggests that Nokia will not unveil any new handsets at MWC 2010. According to an unidentified source involved with the MWC planning, the Espoo manufacturer will not have a stand at MWC and has has made a strategic decision to withhold any hardware launches until a later unspecified date. When MWC finally begins next week, will Nokia dazzle us with its latest offerings or will there be a gaping hole where Nokia and its Symbian handsets used to be?

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A random video on YouTube shows what looks something like an official Nokia document outlining some initial features of the Nokia N87 12MP. According to the document, the N87 will feature a 12 megapixel Carl Zeiss lens with a dual-LED Xenon flash, a 3.2 inch capacitive WVGA display, 600 MHz processor and 16GB internal storage. It is nice to see Nokia getting up to speed and finally introducing an N-series phone with some desirable specs. If this pans out, let’s hope this is the one that “Comes With Maemo”.

[Via PhoneArena]

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Sony Ericsson had the first press conference of MWC 2009 and used that opportunity to announce the W995, previously known as the Hikaru. The W995 is an 8 megapixel slider with 3.5mm headphone jack, stereo speakers, 2.6″ QVGA scratch-resistant screen, 118MB built-in memory, A-GPS with Google Maps and Wayfinder Navigator pre-installed, Wi-Fi and full PlayStation 3 compatibility. The phone also supports Sony Ericsson’s new Media Go service which allows you to easily transfer music, videos, photos and podcasts between your mobile phone and computer. This handset will be available in Progressive Black, Cosmic Silver and Energetic Red in select markets starting at the end of Q1 2009.

Sony Ericsson also unveiled the 12 megapixel Symbian-based Idou. The Idou will feature a Xenon flash, large 3.5″ 16:9 touchscreen and will be capable of “full media consumption”. The Idou does not have a model name yet and is expected to be available in the second half of 2009. Hit the jump for the press photo of the Idou.

Samsung may have a megapixel or two (or twelve) up its sleeve for the upcoming MWC 2009 expo in Barcelona. According to leaked information from two Korean news sources, Samsung is expected to debut a 12 megapixel camera phone that builds upon the success of the 8 megapixel Innov8. The only relevant information available is that Samsung may begin mass production at the end of February with a European launch soon thereafter. Anyone hungry for additional details about this mobile shooter and whether the optics behind the 12 megapixel will live up to the marketing hype will have to wait a few more weeks for that information to materialize.

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According to an article at Telecoms Korea, Samsung may have some high-end camera phones on the way for 2009. Two of Samsung’s subsidiaries have already produced an 8 megapixel camera module that has 3x optical zoom, autofocus with a 57% performance increase, a 1/2.5 inch CMOS sensor and a lens that supports F2.85. The new camera modules are expected to make their debut in phones starting in early 2009. Awesome! The same article suggests that Samsung has a 12 megapixel camera module in the works that is even smaller in size than the 8 megapixel module, making it ideally suited for mobile phones. There is no indication as to when a 12 megapixel Samsung shooter will make its debut but we can tell it won’t be soon enough. Then again, knowing Samsung it won’t have US 3G anyway…

[via Unwired View]

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