Nokia Boosts Cellphone Memory To 16GB

By Joseph Palenchar -- TWICE, 2/14/2008

Barcelona, Spain — A Nokia cellphone with more flash memory than most of the MP3 players now on the market is coming to the United States later this year.

The 16GB N96 multimedia computer, a dual slider like the N95, is due in overseas markets and in the U.S. in the third quarter an estimated 550 euros (about $805) before subsidies or taxes. In the U.S., it won’t be sold through carrier channels.

Nokia’s N96 sports 16GB of embedded flash memory.

The N96 doubles the embedded memory of Nokia’s current N95-8GB and equals the embedded memory of the new 16GB $499 version of the iPhone. In the memory department, it falls short of the 32GB versions of the iPod Touch at $499 and Sansa View at $349, both of which are dedicated portable media players with the most embedded flash memory currently available in the U.S.

The Touch, like the N96, feature Wi-Fi-based Web browsing, and the View, like the N96, features expandable memory through a microSDHC slot that accepts memory cards up to 8GB.

The N96, shown at the Mobile World Congress here, is a quadband GSM/EDGE phone with W-CDMA HSDPA operation in foreign 900/2100MHz bands. The N96 features 2.8-inch screen to display video encoded in the MPEG-4, WMV and Flash Video formats at up to 30 fps. Its embedded memory can store up to 40 hours of video content, excluding optional microSDHC card. In select markets, it will incorporate DVB-H reception of live TV.

The device also features dedicated media keys, a 3.5mm headphone connector, built-in stereo speakers, 5-megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics, flash and video light, and a kickstand that allows for hands-free viewing. Integrated A-GPS lets consumers geo-tag their pictures.

The Nokia N96 also supports Nokia’s family of Internet services, including route guidance and music downloading. The latter isn’t available in the United States.