Most expensive cellphones unveiled in 2008

After jewelry and modern gadgets, cellphones festooned with gold, platinum and diamonds are turning out to be the best assets to flaunt lavishness. The ubiquitous trend of encrusting crystals on gadgets has made it pretty clear that men love bling as much as women. If your wish list for this holiday season includes a luxurious, bejeweled phone, take a look at this list of the best luxury phones launched this year.

Tag Heuer Meridiist

With leather and metal embellishments complementing its angular design, the Tag Heuer Meridiist is an example of precision craftsmanship in the mobile space. The Meridiist boasts a Sapphire crystal display glass, 2 megapixel camera, 1.9-inch QVGA display, mp3 player and bluetooth wireless technology. Priced between $5300 and $6100. More here.

Apple iPhone 24ct Gold Edition by Goldstriker

Goldstriker has always been famous for its gold plated handsets. Their latest addition is the Apple iphone 3G 24ct Gold edition. Parts adorned are front bezel and all outer command buttons. Priced at £1,195. More here.

Mobiado Professional 105 ZAF

Claimed to be the thinnest luxury phone in the world, the 105 ZAF measures a mere 10.6mm thin. The entire front and back of the phone has been fabricated from large pieces of sapphire crystal, providing a modern minimalist look with a wear resistance second only to diamond. More here.

Motorola Aura

Boasting of outstanding craftsmanship, inspired by high-end watches, the AURA breaks convention and marks the return of artistry in the design of mobile phones. The luxury handset comes with a 1.55-inch circular LCD screen, and a 2-megapixel camera. Priced at £1400. More here.

Vertu Ascent Ti collection

The Vertu Ascent Ti collection is targeted straight at the affluent Ferrari fans. The three new models include the limited edition Nero (Black) and some special editions called the Rosso (Red) and Gaillo (Yellow). All three phones will bear a Ferrari logo on their back. More here.

Mobiado 105GMT Gold with dual mechanical Swiss watch

The 105GMT Gold will be limited to 50 masterpieces, with the limited edition number being machine engraved into the back of each phone. The entire front and back of the 105GMT Gold Luxury Mechanical Watch mobile phone has been crafted from large pieces of sapphire crystal. The 105GMT Gold incorporates a unique dual mechanical watch movement. More here.

Continental 3G iPhone with emeralds

This is the world’s first iPhone set with emeralds and VS1 quality diamonds. This masterpiece, with vivid green emeralds, is one of the most iconic and coveted phones ever conceived. Blending seamlessly with the 3G iPhone’s sleek curves, the handcrafted case emanates a sensual allure that is almost impossible to resist. Priced at £2999 and £3099 8GB and the 16GB version respectively. More here.

Solid gold Vertu Boucheron 150

With lots of planes and angles, the phone case has been crafted from a single piece of gold, and it took 1,000 hours to cut into shape, 700 hours to hand polish, and more than 500 hours to build. The phone is expected to sell for $30,000. More here.

Nokia 8800 Arte Pink

The Nokia 8800 Arte Pink by Peter Aloisson is the epitome of luxury. The handset touts 680 white and pink glistening diamonds in addition to coating the entire handset in gold. Priced at €85,000. More here.

Gresso White Diamonds Collection

The Gresso White Diamonds Collection features inherit hand-assembled body panels made out of 200-year old African blackwood, keyboards with base plate made of titanium and stainless steel battery cover with a magnetic lock plus leather and gold decoration. Priced at 9000 Euros. More here.

Knalihs Athem’s Nokia 8800 Sapphire

Only 20 units of the Knalihs Athem Diamond encrusted Nokia 8800 Saphire Arte were put into production. There are 1000 diamonds that weigh 6.75 carats placed on the Nokia 8800. Pricing starts from $20,000. More here.

Softbank 823SH Tiffany phone

The Softbank 823SH Tiffany phone comes encrusted with 537 (18.34 carat) diamonds. The glittering phone will retail for 12.98 million yen, which comes out to approximately US $132,140. More here.

Diamond-studded Nokia E90

The Nokia E90 by Peter Aloisson has been festooned with 408 diamonds and an 18 carat white gold shell. Moreover, a total of 9.86 carats of VVSI–IF (LC) diamonds have been used to beautify the rim of the phone. Youirs for 52,000 Euros. More here.

Peter Aloisson’s Princess Plus

The custom iPhone, called Princess Plus, has half of its 318 diamonds in the bedazzling square princess cut while the total weight of the stones came down to 17.75. There is an 18K white gold lining around the edge of the phone. Yours for a cool $176,400. More here.

Amosu Ultimo Diamond

Perfectly set with 1179 dazzling 16.18 carat diamonds, the Amosu Ultimo Diamond iPhone is handcrafted by skilled craftsmen using only the most exceptional materials. This exclusive Ultimo Diamond iPhone features 458 diamonds caked around the flat-front face. While the rear bottom case is made of 18 carat solid white gold encrusted with 660 diamonds. Priced at £89,000. More here.

[via CellPhoneBeat]

Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte Premium Mobile Phone: Timeless Design

Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte, a new premium mobile phone that marries the timeless design of the Nokia 8800 Arte range with materials that reflect a new exclusivity based on refinement and authenticity. Engineered from carbon fibre, titanium, polished glass and stainless steel, the Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte is for individuals who appreciate uncompromised high performance.

Carbon fibre is an ultra light and strong material that expresses a woven pattern that is both high-tech and sensuous. Custom built to ensure the precision engineering that these materials require, the Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte features 3D patterns that express the inherent performance and lustre of carbon fibre.

Combining timeless style with superb functionality, the Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte offers the unique tap-for-time feature - consumers can tap the steel surface below the display twice and a clock appears on the screen. Background images organically change during the day, giving a unique appearance to the display. The turn-to-mute silencing mechanism allows individuals to silence incoming calls in a discrete manner by turning the phone over, screen-side down.

In addition to the 3G capabilities and 3.2 megapixel auto focus camera and high quality audio, the Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte boasts a stunning OLED display and built-in memory that has been expanded from previous offerings in the range to 4 GB. Meanwhile, Nokia's anti-fingerprint coating reduces smudges on metal and glass and unsightly outer seams are hidden by a unique all-in-one microUSB connector.

Enhancing the experience, the Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte is delivered with an exclusive range of accessories. These include a Bluetooth touch-sensitive volume control headset, a stylish desk stand and a beautiful leather carrying case.

The Nokia 8800 Carbon Arte will be available in the 3rd quarter of 2008 with an estimated retail price of EUR 1,100 exclusive of subsidies and taxes.

[Source]

Review: Nokia 8800 Arte

Nokia's 8800 Arte is not a low cost mobile. SIM-free you are looking at anything from around £600 to more than £700 from the well-known outlets. For instance, while writing this review I found it for between £199.99 and £499.99 on O2 depending on your contract choice and for £209.99 to £399.99 on various Orange contracts.

Its near twin, the 8800 Arte Sapphire, is an even pricier option coming in at over £800 SIM-free. I can only surmise that the latter's leather trimmings and the real sapphire that sits at the centre of the navigation button are to blame for the hike, because inwardly the phones seem identical. As always, though, prices do vary wildly so it's worth shopping around if you simply must have that gemstone.

Both phones are powered by the S40 operating system. This means they are less sophisticated than some other Nokia handsets, and it is the design that you are paying all that dosh for. Oh, and a rather stylish Bluetooth headset, a desktop stand and a leather slipcase.

Whether the design and extras justify the price is up to you, of course. I'm not convinced, but then again both the 8800 Arte and the 8800 Arte Sapphire do have a rather nice minimalist look. I don't usually go for bronze but in this case the bronzing of the 8800 Sapphire Arte is eye catching, and the black of the 8800 Arte is, well, black which tends to make for a good, sleek look.

There is nothing on the front of the slider design apart from the screen and navigation key until a call comes in, or you open the slide. At this point two pairs of vertically stacked buttons light up. On the left the pair offers a softmenu and Call function and on the right they house a softmenu and End function.

There are no shortcut buttons around the edges of these handsets. Instead the black of the Arte and the bronze of the Arte Sapphire are complemented by a band of silver all around the edge. This picks up horizontal silver banding on the front and back of the casing. With no side buttons you access the camera from the main menu and adjust the volume using the navigation button.

In an interesting first, you can mute the phone when a call is coming in simply by turning it face down on the table. That is great psychology: ‘No, I don't want to talk to you, and actually I don't even want to see that you are calling'.

A microUSB connector is used to link the handset to your computer and to charge the battery. Anyone used to carrying a miniUSB charge cable for several devices will need to also carry the microUSB one required here.

The 8800 Arte and Arte Sapphire have a metal and glass shell and this means they are quite heavy phones at 150g. With many similarly sized mobiles a third lighter, you are likely to notice the weight in your pocket.

I'm going to stop differentiating between the Arte and Arte Sapphire and refer to both phones as the 8800 because the remainder of the specifications are identical.

Holding either phone in the hand is a satisfying experience. The 8800 has a thin candybar design measuring 109mm tall, 46mm wide and 15mm thick. Flick up the slide and the phone grows to about 133mm tall.

However, the number pad is quite squeezed. Its keys are reasonably wide but very short. They are shaped with a raised bottom edge, which makes hitting them a little less troublesome than it would be if they were flat, but texting at speed was still not easy. If you have stubby fingers you might also find things too cramped for comfort.

There is 1GB of internal storage but no flash memory card slot to add more. I find mobiles without memory expansion harder and harder to fathom unless they are at the entry level. Who wouldn't prefer to pop a microSD card to get photos or music on and off their handset over having to physically connect it to a computer or use Bluetooth?

On the software front there are some goodies to be found. Opera Mini is here, for a start. And while viewing Web pages on the 2-inch OLED screen might be a challenge to some, downloading pages should be fine as the handset is 3G, with tri-band GSM, GPRS and EDGE as fallbacks.

You could always opt for WidSets instead. This is a sort of RSS-like service, pushing new content out to your handset whenever a change is detected in a Web site. Web sites need to be in the scheme and offer a WidSets service; you need to have a data plan and to be able to justify the download costs; and you need to really want to see every change to a web page. If those three things triangulate, then WidSets could be very useful.

As you would expect, the 8800 plays music and takes pictures. Bizarrely for such an expensive phone a wired headset is not supplied. And there is no support for a 3.5mm jack. All you have for wired sound output is that microUSB slot I already mentioned. Playback through the loudspeaker is quite loud. Unfortunately it also distorts at the higher volumes. On the other hand, battery life was good. I got 8 hours 50 minutes of music playback from a full charge.

The camera has auto focus and shoots at resolutions up to 3.2-megapixels. It has no flash or self-portrait mirror. Image quality was generally acceptable, but not as good as I'd expect from a mobile of this price.

The coloured dish, shot indoors under normal household lighting, is grainy, though the colours are reproduced quite faithfully. The white chair is again accurate on the colour front, but the detail is not wonderful with some noticeable lens distortion at the edges. The flowers show how the camera functions for closer shots. Not too hot, in my opinion, with the autofocus missing the main subject of the composition.

Verdict
For all of Nokia's efforts to brand the Arte and Arte Sapphire as high class mobiles there simply isn't enough here to justify the price. Distortion from the loudspeaker, a below par camera, no front camera for two-way video calls, and the S40 OS with its reasonable but not wonderful set of features are not top-notch specifications.

[Source]

Review: Nokia 8800 Arte Introduction

Nokia has been playing an important role lately in the enhancement in the field of internet and mobile communication. Meeting the demands of the picky and trend-following consumer, the company put two new mobile phones on the market at the end of last year; the 8800 Arte and the 8800 Sapphire Arte. High quality materials and a classy appearance are the characteristics of these mobile phones. We will review the Nokia 8800 Arte, the black version of the two. Design, user's ease and user's fun are key words for this technological masterpiece. The 3.2 Megapixel digital camera, MP3 player, ambient light sensor and the internal memory of 1GB are just a few aspects of the promising Nokia 8800 Arte mobile phone.

Nokia 8800 Arte retail package

In addition to the Nokia 8800 Arte, the black box contains a sophisticated Bluetooth headset with corresponding manual. The manual of the mobile phone itself is included too, in two languages and besides that a USB cable, battery charger and software CD are available. A leather pouch prevents the Nokia 8800 Arte from getting damaged and whilst charging the mobile phone, it can be placed in the included solid DT-19 desk stand.The Nokia Arte is a sophisticatedly designed slider phone. The black housing is crafted from glass and metal, which explains its weight of no less than 150 grams. When you take the handset out of the package, you will instantly feel the durability. The simplicity of the design ensures a classy, timeless appearance that will appeal to younger as well as older people.

Nokia 8800 cell phone design

The navigation buttons and some quick access buttons are available on the front, and when you slide open the Nokia 8800 Arte, a full keyboard becomes available. The 2 inch OLED QVGA monitor of 320x240 pixels supports a maximum of 16 million colours and is so very clear that it is a joy to scroll through the menus or to view pictures. Moreover, the Nokia 8800 Arte has been equipped with a sensor that detects ambient light, as a result of which the clearness of the monitor is adjusted automatically to the light circumstances. The device measures 4.3 x 1.9 x 0.57 inches and is neatly finished with silver-coloured edges. According to Nokia's press release, the 8800 Arte features anti-fingerprint coating, however; personally I did not experience the use of it. The back of the mobile phone has a matte coating, but I was forced to clean the shiny front on a regular base.


Nokia 8800 Arte menu

Nokia allow the user to adjust the main menu to his or her own preference. For example, the option button in the main menu allows you to choose from four different icon reproductions: 'List', 'Roster reproduction', 'Roster reproduction with labels' and 'Tabs'. You can even change the sequence of the icons which offers faster access to your favourite options. This saves a lot of time scrolling up and down. The time, the power of the signal and battery status remain visible in every menu; even while using most functions. Unfortunately, the menus respond remarkably slower the moment the battery starts to run low.



Nokia 8800 active standby

Not only the main menu; also the standby mode can be arranged to your own preferences. The active standby lets you collect all the preference functions in the standby screen of the Nokia 8800 Arte. There is room for four sections and a choice from eight different functions, such as the quick access bar, music player, agenda and notes. The quick access bar holds a minimum of 1 and a maximum of 48 icons, which gives you easy access to every far corner of the menu. You can also change the sequence of the icons in the quick access bar. Even the way of selecting the sections of the 'active standby' is entirely up to the user.


Nokia Arte digital camera

The Nokia 8800 Arte has been equipped with a 3.2 Megapixel digital camera. The 8x digital zoom lets you get the object you want to capture, a lot closer. Still I wouldn't recommend using the zoom function frequently since the quality of the end result drops drastically due to this zoom. The pictures turn out granular and blurred and the format of the pictures decreases. The camera features an auto focus and automatic light compensation, whilst it is also possible to adjust the brightness manually through the menu. In bad light situations, the night mode can be activated which compensates for the lack of the possibility to select an ISO setting. Where the normal mode achieves a bad result in badly lit circumstances; the night mode offers a slightly better result. You will have to do without flash, and that is a vast restriction in practising mobile photography. In this case; you will have to learn to live with colour noise and underexposure as obvious factors.


Quality of the camera
In addition to setting the white balance, you can also add a few effects such as sepia or negative. The colour and contrast reproduction of the mobile phone's monitor are not representative for the true colours. You can't expect that, to be honest, since calibration is not playing a role in this segment for the time being. Mobile photography is an area that is not mature yet on the Nokia 8800 Arte. In particular the colour shifting, the limited dynamic range and the lack of a built-in flash make mobile photography with the 8800 Arte a true deed of courage. The Nokia 8800 Arte feels at home in ideal circumstances and that's when you can expect a reasonable photo quality.


Photo editing options

A picture is taken reasonably fast, for mobile concepts, since the shutter release is just 1 second. Besides that, it is quite handy the camera switches automatically to the standby mode if there is no action for a certain amount of time. This saves energy without having to turn the camera function off completely. The photo editing option lets you crop the captured pictures afterwards and adjust the contrast. Various elements can be added e.g. a text, frame or pictogram. The Nokia Arte supports photo formats in JPEG, GIF, BMP, PNG and video formats: 3GPP, H.263 and H.264.

Nokia 8800 Arte MP3 player

Just like every mobile phone nowadays, the Nokia 8800 Arte, too, features an MP3 player. It is easy to operate this function; the navigation button allows you to scroll through the songs and adjust the volume. You can switch between the themes: 'Standard' (blue tones) and 'Magnetic' (grey tones). The music menu gives access to making play lists and to the songs via genre, album and artist. The equalizer in the setting menu lets you choose the right sound to the right song. To enable you to make a better choice when selecting a genre, the ratio between the bass and high tones is visible. The speaker produces a strong clear sound. Listening to music is also very interesting with the included Bluetooth headset. Of course the stereo effect is gone when you listen with only one ear but listening wireless and having an invisible volume adjuster on the touch-sensitive part of the headset, makes you stand out from all the headset and ear-set users. Finally; the Nokia 8800 Arte features an uncomplicated voice recorder to capture voice notes.


8800 Nokia Arte additional functions

A nice and fun function of the Nokia 8800 Arte is the 'tap for time' system. If you are in a rush wanting to know the time, you don't have to slide open the phone or wait for the monitor light. Just tap on the phone twice with your finger and an analogue clock will appear on the screen telling you the correct time. The Nokia 8800 Arte also features a sensor that enables refusing an incoming call or deactivating the alarm just by turning the phone face down. The Nokia 8800 Arte has a lot more going for it than standard conversion of currency, lengths and temperatures. Taking this Nokia phone with you, will end all insecurities about foreign clothes sizes. For example; use size conversion to insert the size of your shoes and a whole list appears with every size from different countries divided in male and female sizes. The function contains information about sweaters, suits, trousers, shirts, dresses and skirts. A superb addition if you like shopping. The translation function in the application menu also looked promising; however, it turned out to be somewhat poor still. It couldn't seem to find simple words such as: dog, office and sun. And when I filled in the word 'lamp' (Dutch for lamp), the English translation said: raspberry, which made my trust in this application disappear at once. The Opera Mini browser lets you surf the Internet with the Nokia 8800 Arte.

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Top 5 unique mobile phones

By Damian Koh

We've seen our share of bizarre cell phones on the planet, some of them downright ridiculous, some a hair's breath from making the list of stupidest phones ever. Concept phones are nice to look at, but some are horribly flawed--like the one that requires the user to insert his finger into the appropriate keyhole to dial a number. That said, we did coo over the Transformers mobile bot. But before I digress any further, we've selected five mobile phones (yes, real ones) that are special in one way or another. We've also decided to include the Apple iPhone as an honorable mention, even though we're still sore that we have to wait till 2008 for it in Asia.

Touched by a screen: LG Prada Phone

So the iPhone isn't coming to Asia until 2008? Fine… whatever. The LG Prada Phone is a trendy touchscreen mobile phone that's available in the market now. Synonymous with class and style, the Prada Phone courts the well-heeled and fashion-conscious. It doesn't have the latest features, but beggars can't be choosers, right?

Bend it like Beckham: Moto Z8

Slider phones? Totally passé. The Moto Z8 re-jigged the whole sliding motion with a kick-slide mechanism that curves the phone closer to your mouth and ear. We must say the idea is pretty cool though we're not too sure how useful it will be. Remember the old Nokia banana phone (made famous in Matrix)? It's the same idea here. If you like that one, you'll probably fall in love with this Moto.

Glass act: Nokia 8600 Luna

When it comes to phones crafted from unique materials, Nokia comes to mind. Its 8600 Luna sports an opaque, smoked glass cover over its keypad. Did you just say glass? Yeah, we're still worried it might break if we drop the phone, but who can resist a handset that is romanticized as "mysteriously, it glows, magnetically, it calls", "inspired by moonlight, it pulsates with allure". We can't.

The show must go on: Samsung Ultra Video F500

Here's a candy-bar phone for movie aficionados who need their screen fix. Sit this Samsung on a desktop with the screen facing toward you and you're all ready to catch the latest blockbuster on this DivX-certified device. And when your boss walks past, you can flip the lid down and pretend you're talking to an important client on the earpiece. Quite easily done.

Just shoot me: Sony Ericsson K850i

We're still not convinced that camera-phones will replace dedicated digicams, although the upcoming Cyber-shot K850i may just change our minds. Sony Ericsson isn't the first to have a 5-megapixel shooter, but its Cyber-shot pedigree should have people clamoring for the K850i. Will this Sony Ericsson best the 5-megapixel Nokia N95 in terms of performance and image quality? We'll find out toward the end of the year.

Airtel introduces GPS Navigation on BlackBerry 8800 Smartphones in India

Bharti Airtel, one of India’s leading providers of telecommunications services has just announced the launch of GPS-based Navigation Application on Mobile handsets.

The company has collaborated with Swedish-based Wayfinder Systems AB for application of this navigation system.

Using this navigation system, users will be continuously updated with real-time content and geographical data via the wireless network using EDGE/GPRS.

This GPS-based Navigation Application turns compatible mobile phones into a GPS-based navigation system complete with detailed maps and Points-of-Interest of a number of Indian cities such as Delhi and NCR ( Gurgaon, Faridabad, Noida, Greater Noida, and Ghaziabad), Bangalore, Mumbai and Navi Mumbai, Thane, Pune, Chennai, Hyderabad, Kolkata and Chandigarh.

Besides, Airtel users will also have the option to purchase map information as well as area coverage details in other countries such as Europe and North America.

According to Sanjay Gupta, Chief Marketing Officer, Mobile Services, Bharti Airtel, “We are now introducing in India, a state of the art GPS based navigation system that will largely benefit all frequent travelers using compatible mobile handsets like BlackBerry 8800.”

For starters, this GPS Navigation application will be available on the BlackBerry 8800 smartphone.

In fact, Airtel is offering a six month free trial for all its Airtel BlackBerry 8800 users. As per this offer, the customer will not be required to pay any subscription charges on the GPS application during this period.

However, data download charges will apply as per the subscriber’s BlackBerry plan.

If you wish to download this GPS Navigation application on to your BlackBerry 8800 smartphone, you will need to send ‘NAV’ as an SMS to ‘3636’.