Nokia making 4-inch 'entry' Maemo smartphone?
updated 07:55 am EDT, Thu April 15, 2010
Nokia may go below N900 in price with large screen
A purported leak by Taiwan's Commercial Times newspaper today has Nokia developing its second Maemo smartphone as an unusual entry level model. While it would have a slower Qualcomm 7000 series processor compared to the N900's quick Samsung ARM Cortex-A8, the unnamed new phone would have a four-inch or larger touchscreen. Compal would make the handset, and it would notably be the contractor's first phone to have a pure cost over $150; the actual selling price would be higher.
Despite having already received the order, Compal isn't expected to ship the finished design until the second half of 2011, when the processor will very likely be considered even lower cost than it is today.
A Maemo phone at that stage would be somewhat unexpected as Intel and Nokia have been focusing much of their attention on MeeGo, which should largely replace Maemo late this year. Nokia had previously said it would use Maemo on a small number of phones, but this predated news of the MeeGo OS.
