I’ve been slacking with this site for a while now, but I hope to change that soon. Here are some nice themes which render well on the E90 and look very sweet:

Nokia Intelllisync (quite old but discovered recently)

Nseries Dark by Bongoman

Flavour 73 is available for certain regions, but still rolling out very slowly. I have the Arabian Mocha E90 (0544406) and the new firmware is still not available, so I am using the APAC region code 0546002 currently with the new firmware.

The CP-285 case is now available on special order from Expansys in the UK and the US. The UK site has a 4 day waiting period, and the US one 7 days, as of April 7. 

EDIT: It seems to be available on all of Expansys’ regional sites with varying number of days for stock order. Reader Oliver, I hope this helps you in the Philippines!

Firmware v200.x has been released! v200.34.72 was released on April 4 on Nokia Software Update then quickly removed, which might be explained by a couple of glaring bugs that appeared when using Web and Maps, as pointed out by the magnificent Steve Litchfield. 

If you look on the Blackberry client download page for Nokia, it has the new v8.9.1 for firmware v200.34.73, and not 200.34.72 as was released by Nokia on NSU. Flavour 73 should be coming down the pipelines any day now - keep watching this space.

Why the enormous leap in firmware version number though, I wonder….

 Just got done watching the premiere of the new Knight Rider “movie” on NBC, and lo and behold! An N95 in the hands of the lead bad guy! I’ve put “movie” in quotes since it may well turn out not to be a movie at all, but in fact the series premiere of a new series starting in fall of 2008. I find it sacrilegious that they used a Mustang for KITT. Seriously? Here’s the video I took of the TV screen, of the N95 in action: 

So no new Eseries devices shown at MWC this year. Bummer. The S60 Touch demo itself  looked a bit lame (at least from the videos people have posted around the web) mainly because the lady is essentially scrolling through contacts with a finger and trying to explain what else it can do without demonstrating it, but I do look forward to S60 Touch phones soon. The only outstanding moment for me was the N96 launch.  However, once you get past the flashy new look and the 16GB built-in flash memory as well as microSDHC slot, for me personally it boils down to this: 1. It has a 950 mAh battery. Ouch? 2. Its 4mm longer and 2mm wider than the N95-2, but only 1mm thinner.3. DVB-H. Before you say OMG!… are you going to watch TV on your mobile? No, really. I’m serious. You are? No, you’re not. And if you *are* nodding your head eagerly right now, WHEN? Let’s say DVB-H signals are widespread (even though thats a long time away) around the world, when you’re out and about, you need to listen and watch your chosen media. Your music. Your TV shows (pre-selected, and loaded up on your mobile). Your movies. Not random stuff on publicly broadcast live TV. Listening to random radio when out and about is another thing completely. TV? Not for me, at least…4. The camera just might disappoint. This is completely up in the air for now, till we see some actual images shot by the N96. My reasoning is that the camera, while it has the same Zeiss Tessar 5mp module as the N95-x and N82, also has a focal length of 5.2mm compared to 5.6mm in the latter two. If the CMOS sensor is the same size (which it most likely is), the shorter focal length will degrade output (read: more noise).   Thanks to James Burland of nokiacreative for this image. His excellent blog features a lot of Nseries content if you’re interested…On the positive side, it has a very cool kickstand built-in to the camera lens housing. VERY USEFUL ADDITION! I wish the N95-2 had this feature. Incredibly appropriate, despite its simplicity.  The flash, while LED and not xenon, is now dual and works for video lighting. Love to get your opinions…even though 99% of you people are E90 afficionados, and nothing else will do. Right? ;)   

After the weirdness that is the CP-181, Nokia have finally made available an active case CP-285 which looks pretty good. Made of “high-quality polyurethane” i.e. fake leather, it seems to be on Nokia Europe’s site only at the moment, and not for sale through them either. If anyone gets a hold of this, I’d love to get some pics and opinion about it. My Noreve cover has been giving me problems lately… seems to be blocking signal reception! Hopefully this new Nokia case will have a good fit, and not block reception :P 

Boxwave has an excellent desktop stand which charges the E90 as well having USB sync. Mine arrived a few weeks ago - I just hadn’t gotten around to announcing it :P Anyhow, I love it. Why Nokia can’t be arsed to put out a stand for the flagship of the E-series, is completely beyond me. But the Boxwave stand suffices nicely. Charging is relatively quick, and sync is as normal as a regular USB sync. The lights on this thing are SUPER BRIGHT. This is the only caveat. The blue light at the front left of the stand is so bright it casts a yard wide circle of blue light on the ceiling when its dark. It kept me awake the first few nights I had it in my bedroom actually I have since moved it to the desk in the study… There is also a red light on the rear right side which blinks rapidly unless you have a spare battery charging in the stand ( I bought the stand with spare battery charger - there is an option to buy it without this).Overall, I find it to be a useful addition to my E90 accessories. Head over to Boxwave.com to explore buying options.   

This new modification of the E90 keyboard looks like it will take care of the grease and button prints on the internal keyboard. The character keys are now flush with those on the left and right margins of the keyboard.

 

 

 

 via Symbian World 

In the tradition of Ed, that most excellent author of the E-Series blog and who hosts Free Theme Fridays, I bring you Theme Tuesday!It’s hard enough finding a good SVG theme that looks decent on the E90’s internal widescreen. So I’m going to try to present at least one nice theme a week for the E90- most importantly something that doesn’t go to all hell on the internal screen.To kick things off, I have here a couple of themes The first one is Teal, made by Jack18:   A very nice dark texture. The icon variation is sweet too. I personally don’t like themes with very busy backgrounds, and this one has a colour that contrasts very nicely with both the mocha and red E90s. I’m thinking the red E90 will end up looking like a Christmas edition of the phone =)And here is Inverted FP2, made by Taieb: Excellent shade of hazelnut brown, looks super smooth on the mocha E90. Thanks to Zach of Symbian in Motion for hosting them, and Stefan  of IntoMobile for bring Zach’s blog to my attention. You can find these themes, and a lot more, here.