E-Z Life

Filed under: Cellphones

We were always curious why a device that (at least on paper) was superior in a lot of ways to Nokia’s N96 wasn’t trumpeted as the outfit’s flagship device, but nevertheless, an Italian reviewer has made us feel a touch better about our previously ludicrous thoughts. After spending a solid fortnight with the phone, the critic felt comfortable deeming the N85 a “very, very beautiful” handset, also noting that it was “definitely the best Symbian [device]” out there. He even went out of his way to recommend the N85 over the N96 so long as you’re cool without DVB-H or a super-snazzy camera. As if you really needed more, he also found the OLED display to be spectacular, the audio quality very satisfactory and the GPS / multimedia functions to be top-notch. Wait, is that the N96 we hear crying? There’s no crying in Espoo!

[Via All About Symbian]

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Filed under: Desktops, Laptops

Maybe you’re running a six-year old pirated copy of XP because you still don’t trust Vista — “I’m waiting on one more Service Pack, just to be extra sure,” you say. If that’s the case, you might have to come up with a new excuse soon: Mary Jo Foley over at ZDNet is reporting that a beta build of Vista Service Pack 2 is already in the hands of some software and hardware partners, and that Microsoft intends to deliver both Vista SP2 and Server 2008 SP2 before it launches Windows 7 — err, 6.1, no wait, yeah let’s go with 7 — which it supposedly hopes to release June 3rd of next year. At present we know very little about SP2′s features, but we’re sure you have a few ideas.

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The online search engine Google defies economic worries, as its profits rise 26% sending its shares soaring.

The online search engine Google defies economic worries, as its profits rise 26% sending its shares soaring.

Filed under: Cellphones, Portable Audio

If you’re not in the UK, chances are that you haven’t really paid attention to the teeny, tiny fact that Nokia’s long-awaited Comes With Music download service launched today. Regardless of your ignorance to the facts, the all-you-can-eat music service has been activated for users across the pond who forked over the poundage for a CwM-equipped 5310 XpressMusic. Early impressions are actually pretty great, with critics finding themselves pleasantly surprised with just how intuitive the navigation was. MusicAlly did point out that these “free” tunes weren’t transferable to blank CDs — when they tried, they got a message notifying them of epic failure. At any rate, the reviews are sure looking good for Nokia right out of the gate, though only time will tell if people will take notice and buy into yet another music service.

[Via CNET]

Read – MusicAlly impressions
Read – NetworkWorld impressions

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