Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Nokia Big Screen with Nokia N8 and Wii Remote

Nokia Beta Labs today announced the availability of Nokia Big Screen for Symbian^3 devices with HDMI-out (currently only the Nokia N8 supports this, with the E7 not due out for a couple of weeks).

Symbian^3 with HDMI-out ports already allow users to watch videos, pictures and play music on their HD telly, but the mobile orientated UI is far from suitable for media consumption. With Nokia Big Screen, the application presents the user with a UI that is designed from the ground up to take advantage of a large HD screen (up to 720p). The phone's screen will double as a remote, with a layout similar to a TV remote. But even then that isn't ideal.

In comes the Wii remote (and other Bluetooth enabled devices like keyboard). In the case of Nintendo's waggle device, just activate the Wiimote's Bluetooth pairing mode by pressing the red button at the back (or press the 1+2 buttons which I forgot...). The buttons works as they should: A for select, B for back and the Home key takes you right back to the front.

It isn't perfect though, but then this is merely a proof of concept app by their Beta Labs department. I would like to see bigger fonts, as well as support for folder/sorting support (what's with Nokia and their refusal to support folders with picture viewing apps?) and proper 720p support (images are still displayed at what I believe is VGA resolution).

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