The Nokia Asha 501 has been launched for less than twenty-fours hours, but it’s already the talk of the town. Hardly surprising when you consider how dramatically it’s reshaped the smartphone landscape. Whether it’s the striking design, the brand new Nokia Asha platform, the ingenious Fastlane feature or the smarter internet, there really is plenty to get excited about. But rather than take our word for it, check out some of the first reactions from around the web.
“…the Asha 501 is possibly what an iPhone might look like when the “i” stands for “India”, rather than “I have money to burn”. In fact, it calls back in many ways to Nokia’s first serious current-generation smartphone concept, the Meego-driven N9.”
“It’s a cute little thing that’s completely dwarfed by the behemoth proportions of modern smartphones…It’s no surprise, then, that even the smallest hands will find it easy to hold and manipulate. Despite the boxy design and sharp angles, the 501 has comfortable curves in all the right places.”
“Asha 501 shows what you can achieve when you design bottom up rather than strip down features to hit the right price point… Dual SIM with hot swap is very important to users but what is most striking on this device is the user interface.”
“One of the benefits a featurephone provides is battery life and the Asha 501 is no different with Nokia claiming it will be good for 47 days of standby, and 17 hours of talk time on one charge – something today’s smartphones can only dream of.”
“…for most users the distinction between smart and feature phones will be irrelevant so long as they can get hold of the apps they want — and Nokia said applications are already available or in development for the Asha platform including Facebook, Foursquare, and LinkedIn.”
“The Asha 501 does what Nokia would argue only it can: distill the build quality and usability of a Lumia into something with the mass market reach of an Asha.”
The Nokia Asha 501 is clearly making a big impression amongst the tech world’s movers and shakers, but what do you think about the latest bold addition to the much loved Asha family? Let us know in the comments below.
