14 DAY TRIAL // The cheapest Android smartphone launched by Nokia and the first to go on sale, Nokia X will be officially introduced in India next week.
The affordable handset is already available for purchase in various European countries and has been confirmed to arrive in Malaysia next week as well. If Nokia maintains the trend, we might see more of these announcements in other Asian countries.
According to AndroidOS, Nokia India has already started to send invitations to a press event that will take place on March 10. The obvious reason is the official launch of the Nokia X smartphone in India, though the device might not go on sale right away.
Yesterday we already reported on the upcoming availability of the Nokia X, which is expected to hit shelves on March 15 according to major retailer Mobile Store.
Given the fact that only one Indian authorized reseller confirmed the smartphone would arrive in mid-March, we should wait and see what Nokia has to say on the X’ availability in India.
The good news is the smartphone has already been priced, so potential customers can prepare their wallets for the release. Nokia X will be available at Mobile Store for only Rs 8,500 ($140 / €100) outright, which is slightly higher than the company’s recommended retail price of $125 / €90.
It’s unclear whether Nokia will launch both single and dual-SIM versions in India on March 10 or it will bring the dual-SIM model next and the former by the end of the month.
We’re also not sure whether or not Mobile Store’s price on Nokia X is the final price, as the Finnish company may announce new numbers on March 10.
First of all, Nokia X does not provide access to Google Play Store, instead the smartphone comes preloaded with Nokia’s own applications store.
The phone will ship with Android 4.1.2 Jelly Bean operating system out of the box, but it will feature Nokia’s Fastlane UI, which is included on Asha smartphones.
Hardware-wise, Nokia X is far from being impressive, but it wasn’t intended anyway. It comes equipped with a 1GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 Play processor, an Adreno 203 graphics processing unit and only 512MB of RAM.
It also packs 4GB of internal memory, a 4-inch IPS LCD capacitive touchscreen display that supports 480 x 800 pixels resolution, as well as microSD card slot (up to 32GB).