Nokia N950 Now Available for Developers (Updated w/ release notes)

June 21st, 2011 • • 15 comments

We’re still excited about the Nokia N9 announcement, but another MeeGo device was launched silently today. To aid the speedy development of apps for the Nokia N9 smartphone, Nokia has produced a limited number of developer phones, the Nokia N950. The N950 isn’t available for purchase and can only be obtained through selected developer programs.

Meego nokia n9.jpg

We haven’t found any official photos of the Nokia N950 but we suspect it is the same device as the previously leaked Nokia N9 prototype. If you want to develop apps for the Nokia N9, there are currently two places to get the devkit: Nokia Developer Launchpad and the MeeGo Community Device Program. Good luck and tell them @thenokiablog sent you!

UPDATE: The release notes for the Nokia N950 describing hardware and software differences between the Nokia N950 developer phone and the Nokia N9 smartphone is now available for developers. You can download the whole file here, but I’ve highlighted just the hardware aspect.

Nokia N950 phone uses same hardware components as the Nokia N9 phone with the following exceptions:

  • N950 is physically larger and is made out of aluminum, whereas N9 has a polycarbonate unibody.
  • N950 has a physical slide-out QWERTY keyboard. The N9 is a touchscreen-only device.
  • N950 has a 4-inch TFT LCD display whereas N9 has 3.9-inch AMOLED display.
  • Display resolution is same on both devices (854×480).
  • N950 has a different physical camera module than N9. Both camera modules have very similar image quality (Carl Zeiss branding in N9) and both modules support 8Mpix image mode.
  • In the N950 the front facing camera is in top right corner and on N9 it is in the bottom right corner. The actual camera module is same.
  • N950 supports Bluetooth version 2.1+EDR, whereas N9 supports version 4.0
  • N950 does not have support for NFC
  • N950 has 1320mAh battery, the N9 has 1450mAh battery
  • http://twitter.com/MarT_TweetBeats Martyn Collins

    so the #Nokia n950 and the n9 are not the same handset/tablet? #meego #smartphone #tablet

    • http://twitter.com/thefalken Tom Chiverton

      No

  • http://nwerneck.sdf.org dividebyzero

    So, some crazy file shows up in a remote location in developers.nokia and that is enough for us to say the device was “quietly announced”, and to confirm all the existing speculation? Tell me another one. For all I know they might still either sell or kill that. It’s not some obscure download that will announce it quietly or loudly. Did you talk to anyone who said “oh yeah, sure we are anouncig it. See this crazy obscure download here. This is it.”??? I mean, if this is how the thing is gonna work I am so not messing with Maemo/MeeGo ever again…

  • Anonymous

    Oh well. Eff that. Later Nokia.

  • http://twitter.com/thefalken Tom Chiverton

    Bah. Why waste time applying for and writing an application targeting a device that is EOL before it’s even launched ?

    • http://twitter.com/akseX akse

      If you didn’t know Qt apps port to many OS’s and devices, even for Android with Lighthouse plugin.

      • http://twitter.com/thefalken Tom Chiverton

        Nokia doesn’t even stand behind QT any more. Remember they sold it when MS bought them. And QT wont run on Windows Phone so Nokia will have no incentive to do anything with it. After all, they’re betting the farm on Microsoft.

        • sillie

          they didn’t sell it. they only sold the consulting/commercial division. they still own qt, just not the CS support for commercial developers.

        • sillie

          they didn’t sell it. they only sold the consulting/commercial division. they still own qt, just not the CS support for commercial developers.

        • MrBluesman

          The entire N9 software is written in Qt. So how can you say that Nokia doesn’t stant behind Qt?  Symbian based phones will still be sold even after WM7 and so, the apps written in Qt will be sold.

  • Dr.Tek

    Are you sure it has BT 4.0?  I haven’t heard of BT4.0, but i have heard of BT3.0.

  • Dr.Tek

    Are you sure it has BT 4.0?  I haven’t heard of BT4.0, but i have heard of BT3.0.

  • Dr.Tek

    The N9 ALSO has BT 2.1+EDR per their web site.  Ididn’t think there was a BT 4.0.  Also, why does this not have BT 3.0?  The N8 does.  As well as having a 12mp camera.  It appears that they are going a bit backwards with the features to make up for the power and the screen size.

  • Anonymous

    ok . Want that one. Please. But I am no developer.

  • Smith himself

    I tried N9 yesterday. Great phone, but I’d absolutely prefer N950 if it would be available. I might buy N9 but N950 I’d definitely buy!

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