
Nokia 9 PureView Now Available: A Flagship with a 5+1-Camera Array - laacz
https://www.anandtech.com/show/14131/nokia-9-pureview-now-available-a-flagship-with-6camera-array
======
ignoramous
This pureview-camera is designed by [https://light.co](https://light.co) who
bagged $121m [0] in Series D funding lead by SoftBank a year back to develop
what they call 'software-defined cameras' (SDN/IDN/NFV equivalent of the
computer networking world, I guess). We might see more of these.

Here's a talk from co-founder Rajiv Laroia on their first camera, L16:
[https://spot.light.co/the-l16-under-the-
hood/](https://spot.light.co/the-l16-under-the-hood/) (
[https://youtu.be/vKmC9xWHhM4](https://youtu.be/vKmC9xWHhM4) )

The fancy camera aside, I'd have tough time recommending a Nokia device after
they were caught sending user-data to servers in China:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19449824](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19449824)
but then again almost all major android phone manufacturers are Chinese...

[0] [https://angel.co/light](https://angel.co/light)

~~~
sorenjan
I almost bought a Nokia phone, but after I found out their Android One phones
have a bunch of Chinese made services running on them I figured I might as
well buy a Chinese phone with better specs for the money and went with Xiaomi.

~~~
perttir
The phone which send data to Chinese servers, were using firmware/software
version only used in Chinese market. There were some faulty phones in wrong
market where the firmware was using the "chinese version."

~~~
sorenjan
Yes, but as far as I know all Nokia phones have services from evenwell
running.

[https://www.reddit.com/r/Nokia/comments/actk7z/android_one_p...](https://www.reddit.com/r/Nokia/comments/actk7z/android_one_phones_has_the_evenwell_services/)

------
kmlx
am i the only one that is reminded by the "multi-blade razor wars", when
gillette and wilkinson got into a "mine has more blades" competition?
[https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/the-
knive...](https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/this-britain/the-knives-are-
out-in-the-razor-wars-6107113.html)

>> Gillette has historically called the shots in this razor war. It enjoys a
huge worldwide sales advantage over Schick/Wilkinson Sword, which is now based
in St Louis. With several lawsuits and countersuits constantly on the go, the
companies can fairly be said truly to hate one another - especially since
Gillette was unnerved in 2003 by Wilkinson Sword's brilliant and somewhat
insolent introduction of the Quattro, a four-blade beast of a razor, which
captured Gillette's jealously-guarded "most blades" title and has held on to
it for the past three years.

~~~
4thaccount
If you think that is crazy look back to the Nokia 1020 that had a 41 MP camera
and PureView back when most phones had like 8 MP. It took some awesome photos
and several of my friends were very satisfied with the phone.

~~~
fraqed
AAWP just did a PureView comparison, very interesting that the older Nokias
actually beat the new Nokia 9 PureView

[http://allaboutwindowsphone.com/features/item/23435_Imaging_...](http://allaboutwindowsphone.com/features/item/23435_Imaging_showdown_Nokia_808_Sym.php)

~~~
diggernet
Sounds like maybe I ought to pull the old 1020 out of my museum. One error in
that article, though... it _is_ possible to turn off the downsampling to 5MP.

------
jj2ay0
[https://www.zdnet.com/article/nokia-firmware-blunder-sent-
so...](https://www.zdnet.com/article/nokia-firmware-blunder-sent-some-user-
data-to-china/)

~~~
nabla9
It was bad screw up and PR hit, but it was not intentional.

~~~
giancarlostoro
I just hope it doesn't continue to happen, I would love to see Nokia not fail.
Unfortunately bad PR like this will be uttered for years to come, some geeks
are not very forgiving. We see it with Microsoft still, despite their many
contributions to open source, and their openness compared to Oracle.

Otherwise I will have to stick to Motorola for my next phone, I love that
Nokia and Motorola make more minimal phones. If Google would bring back Nexus
as a way for manufacturers to release phones that are fully stock android,
that would be great, or some sort of similar line of phones. Otherwise I'm
leaning towards iPhone with all the stupid Android scandals, especially if one
of the Moto phones is found to have a similar problem, enough is enough.

------
felipeerias
I've tried one and the quality of the camera(s) is indeed excellent. The phone
can do some neat tricks, like changing the focus of a photo after it has been
taken. However, it feels kind of slow: RAW photos need to be post-processed
before you can tinker with them and this can take a while, specially if you
have taken several pics at the same time.

------
Yizahi
Abysmal battery (in 2019) and chinese ad spyware in supposedly pure Android
drop this phone to the bottom of competition. If it had rumored 4150mAh
battery and clean system I would buy it immediately.

------
surfingdino
The UK site offers a free screen replacement... does that mean the screens
need replacing straight out of factory?

[https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_gb/nokia-9-pureview/#recomme...](https://www.nokia.com/phones/en_gb/nokia-9-pureview/#recommended-
phones)

"6) The offer will be open to any customers who has purchased Nokia 9 PureView
from the Nokia mobile online shop between 24.02.2019 and 30.04.2019 and are
residents of Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy,
Ireland, Luxemburg, Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden or UK. The
offer is valid until the stock lasts. Coverage period of the screen
replacement is only valid for ninety (90) days after date of delivery of the
phone. The customer must be aged 18+ and agree to the promotion rules to
participate. Redeeming the Service may require a valid proof of purchase such
as order confirmation from Nokia online store, or receipt or invoice from
authorized Nokia reseller, showing the date of purchase of the eligible Nokia
phone. Instructions on how to redeem your free screen replacement and full
Terms & Conditions can be found here. Your personal data will be used
according to HMD Global Privacy Policy."

~~~
surfingdino
Or is this in lieu of the free earbuds they used to offer before?

------
diggernet
A PureView phone with no dedicated two-stage camera button? I thought these
folks were former Nokia engineers!

------
obrisintor
> No 3.5 mm jack

Oh well

~~~
krn
I personally didn't find the lack of 3.5 mm jack to be as big of an issue as I
thought it will be. I just attached the USB-C-to-3.5mm adapter that came in
the box to the headphone cable and forgot about it.

~~~
dagw
Do you know if these converters are device specific or can I plug them into
any USB-C port on any computer and have sound come out of my headphones.

~~~
morsch
Some phones support _audio accessory mode_ , which is a way to reserve some
pins for analog audio signals. In this case, you only need a passive adapter.
There's no reason why desktop or laptops computers couldn't support it, too,
but if they do, it's rare. So such an adapter is unlikely to work with a
computer, and may not work with all phones.

The alternative is an active device, with its own DAC and amplifier. This is
more likely to work with all your devices; I'm pretty sure I could connect my
desktop computer's external USB headphone amp to my android phone and it'd
just work.

Details: [https://www.soundguys.com/usb-audio-
explained-18563/](https://www.soundguys.com/usb-audio-explained-18563/)
[https://www.androidcentral.com/usb-c-
audio](https://www.androidcentral.com/usb-c-audio)

------
hokobomo
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trypophobia](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trypophobia)

~~~
citeguised
Very fascinating. Now I know why the Light-Camera [1] looks just plain ugly to
me. The Nokia-Phone is a little better, but also non-pleasant at least.

[1] [https://light.co/camera](https://light.co/camera)

~~~
winter_blue
That camera does look really ugly. Like it's got chicken pox. I wonder how
they expect to sell well, with it _looking like that_.

------
jo-wol
Is it sending data to Chinese servers?

~~~
smush
No. That was one particular model (the 7) that accidentally got Chinese-market
software loaded onto all the phones, not just the ones required by law to have
it. A software update corrected the issue since.

Your caution is warranted and laudable. In terms of traffic, this is not a
stop sign, but a proceed cautiously sign.

------
swarnie_
2 × 12 MP RGB, f/1.8, 1/2.9", 1.25µm

3 × 12 MP BW, f/1.8, 1/2.9", 1.25µm

1 × TOF depth sensor

1 × dual-LED/dual-tone flash

Zeiss Optics

Who is this phone even for? If you're that into cameras wouldn't you go buy...
a camera?

~~~
rasz
The very best camera is the one you have on hand when opportunity for taking a
shot arises. Good luck lugging a DSLR 24/7.

~~~
random878
Cheap phone + Ricoh GR

------
josteink
Does this one also report all your activity to China like the 7+ was exposed
doing?[1]

That I even have to ask this question about _a Nokia phone_ is just mind
blowing and utterly telling about the appalling state of digital privacy in
general.

[1]
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19449824](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19449824)

~~~
unionpivo
Don't want to shill too much for nokia (or HTE), but it was fixed, and since
it affected only one phone out of their line up I believe them, it wasn't
intentional. Edit: typos

~~~
josteink
Something like that doesn’t happen _by accident_ though. Someone had to write
that code. For some configurations, markets or customers this was _intentional
behavior_.

Maybe it wasn’t meant for everyone. This time. But if Nokia let it slip once,
I see no reason not to be skeptical of future models.

They lost my trust. Now they’ll have to re-earn it.

~~~
xrisk
Yes, that code was written for the model meant to be sold in China. I can
completely understand how it might have accidentally been bundled onto a non-
Chinese model.

