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P990 or N93? |
shaliron
Joined: Jan 15, 2006
Posts: > 500
From: Melbourne, Australia
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Actually we in Australia do not have EDGE. 
A wooden spoon is a spoon made from wood. Source: WikipediaWinner of: Best Thread (Huge SE Portfolio) 2007, Best Post (Huge SE Portfolio) 2007, Best Signature 2007, and 2nd Best Nickname 2007. | |
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Menageryl
Joined: Aug 14, 2004
Posts: 18
From: South Africa
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' Well, a good example of what was said about EDGE is in South Africa...
' EDGE coverage is almost as complete as basic GSM now, whereas 3G coverage exists solely in the 5 major S.A. cities - and in all but the capital and nearby Johannesburg only the city core is really covered!
' So far, of course... This will change - 3G coverage will improve... But that's the case for S.A.
' Then there are speed considerations, of course!
' ~Moi
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Super G
Joined: Mar 07, 2002
Posts: > 500
From: France
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Quote:
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On 2006-05-20 12:33:19, shaliron wrote:
Actually we in Australia do not have EDGE.
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Telstra is deploying EDGE.
(actually there's 204 networks in 113 countries deploying EDGE) |
adnhk1
Joined: May 23, 2002
Posts: 447
PM |
Thanks to all who finds my posts in this thread helpful. Really hoped this can in some ways help fellow esato members to understand more about the differences between flash/dynamic memory and Active RAM memory. Symbian OS is a FULL MULTITASKING OS and its main selling point is for us to purchase and install tons of useful applications to make our daily lives more productive and fun. If there is not enough Active RAM for multiple applications to make use of simultaneously, then there is NO POINT spending so much $$$ purchasing a Symbian device.
Sincerely hoped Admins can make this thread sticky in order for others to easily find and read it. Thanks. |
mcrosser
Joined: Oct 11, 2005
Posts: > 500
From: Peru
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cool, but perhaps making a new thread would be better? this thread is about P990 vs N93 as title says. I would also like a RAM thread to be made sticky. cheers
AVAILABLE - advertise here!!  |
adnhk1
Joined: May 23, 2002
Posts: 447
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Hi Admins, not sure if this is allowed, but can I start a new thread copying and pasting my posts from this thread? If it is ok, then can Admins please help to make that thread sticky? Thanks. |
shug
Joined: Nov 05, 2003
Posts: 330
From: Sweden
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About available RAM it seems a bit unclear how much active ram the N80 has this page from the same forum states that the RAM is 48mb with 25-30 left after boot.
http://forums.mobileburn.com/showthread.php?p=126417 |
steelsheen
Joined: May 23, 2006
Posts: 9
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Quote:
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it is common that people are misleaded by manufacturers claims when comes to specs, especially those who do not know in depth about technology. Perhaps I should phrase it this way:
1. Think of N80's 50MB and SE's 80MB as your PC's Hard Disk Drive, those that commonly shows 40GB/60GB/80GB, etc etc, where you would install your Windows XP and all other applications, like anti virus, firewall software, anti spyware, Microsoft Office, Internet browsers, and most imortantly to me, GAMES!, etc.
2. Now, think of the ACTIVE RAM as your PC's DRAM, those that you see DDR/DDR2 512MB, 1GB blah blah blah... These are DIE DIE needed for Windows XP to boot properly, as well as ALL those applications that you "double click" on, to startup properly.
Now think of this, can your Windows XP boot without point no. 2 above? No you can't as the moment the DRAM is plugged out of the system, your PC will not even boot up past the initial POST (the initial black screen with some words for showing system checks etc). It does not matter if I have up to 1 terabyte (i.e., 1000 Gigabyte) of hard disk drive in my PC, cos as long as I do not have the DRAM inside my PC, the PC just will not boot properly.
So, now comes the amount of DRAM a PC should have. We all knew, and I assume normal consumers would also know, that THE MORE THE MERRIER, right? So, if I can afford 2GB of DRAM to stick into my PC, I would stick them into my PC. Same goes to mobile devices, the more the available Active RAM, the merrier. Active RAM is required for applications to launch and store it's data into. This is where the difference between PC and mobile devices comes into play. On a PC, if I only have very little RAM, Windows XP knows how to "cheat" applications by making use of the hard disk drive's available space. Do a search for pagefile.sys in your PC. This is the "cheat" RAM which is actually residing on your hard disk drive that applications can make use of if your RAM is not enough. However, for a mobile device, there is no such pagefile.sys residing on your available 50MB of intermal memory, nor is it being "cleverly" made available on your external memory (You mentioned 128MB comes with N80). Hence once the miserable 10MB of the N80 is used up (and yes, ALL APPLICATIONS NEEDS TO USE THIS RAM and they use it A LOT), "Out of memory" messages will pop up, as what was witnessed on the N80 JUST BY ZOOMING INTO A PICTURE...
I hate to say this, but NK is somewhat "deceiving" their customers, and knowing a lot of these customers are not tech savvy enough to understand the difference between "internal memory (PC's hard disk drive)" and "Active RAM (PC's DDR/DDR2 RAM), they are misleading a lot of customers... SE on their website clearly states the P990i (in fact, since P800 they are already stating clearly) comes with 64MB of RAM memory and 128MB Flash memory with up to 80MB for our applications to be installed. For a quick calculation, Symbian OS 9.1 and UIQ 3.0, plus those built-in apps that gets automatically started at boot time should take up about 20MB at boot time. This still leaves us with about 44MB of FREE ACTIVE RAM everytime the phone is booted, which is a whopping 34MB or more than 300% higher than N80...
Hope this helps.
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this is a great post! very very helpful 
my question is that where can we find information indicating a phone's Active RAM? i've spent a good deal of time hunting the net where i can get to see this spec and so far i cant find one. is it only indicated in the product manual? is it only called "Active RAM" or does this term go by other names? (such as "internal dynamic memory" and "shared memory" seems to be referring to the same thing: the phone's "hard drive")
any more light that you can shed on this matter would be most appreciated |
Menageryl
Joined: Aug 14, 2004
Posts: 18
From: South Africa
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SHARED MEMORY
' "Memory" used for storage on a handset is usually called "shared" memory - shared internal memory of course! <IMG SRC="/images/smiles/icon_smile.gif">
' Nokia has a habit of calling it "dynamic memory" or "shared dynamic memory" - a bad (IMNSHO) label other manafacturers may have adopted in kind.
' This is essentially disk space on which files are stored.
RAM
' Active-RAM should just be called "RAM" as it acts as and is used identically to RAM on other types of computers - PCs, servers, etc. But the mobile market (starting with MS' entrance into the PDA market, then twisted further with the advent of smartphones and converged devices) muddied the waters somewhat as vendors manipulated terms - I think either in order to hoodwink punters or in the belief their target market was intellectually challenged and unable to grasp certain technical aspects...
' SE calls it "RAM memory" - which is a little circular (Random Access Memory memory?) - but it is close enough I suppose. <IMG SRC="/images/smiles/icon_wink.gif">
' I'm not too sure what other manafacturers are currently (officially) using and how accurate or inaccurate those labels are - my own memory fails me right now... <G> But RAM is what it is!
FLASH MEMORY
' Another relevant memory type for handsets which one should at least understand (even though it's not usually a major buying concern really) is what most vendors call "flash memory." This is essentially PROM - Programmable Read Only Memory - it's where all of the absolutely essential data for handset operation resides - the boot loader; kernel; operating system; etc. It's also where networks and service providers load their annoying branding and so-on. It's read-only in all normal circumstances in order to ensure the stability of the handset (and the continuity of any branding - yech!), but can be "flashed" (hence the name) by special applications in order to upgrade these special programs.
' As for where one finds such information...
' RAM info on Nokia handsets is a difficult question... I personally am not aware of any "official" site or source which is certain to list this information. In fact for most handsets the info is missing even from the packaged documentation and manuals.
' SE make life a lot easier!!! All this information for all modern / current handsets can be found under the "phones" tab on the following site: http://www.sonyericsson.com/developer/
' And that's my contribution for now!
' ~Moi
_________________
~Menageryl
-Jack of All Trades, Master of Some!-
[ This Message was edited by: Menageryl on 2006-05-24 08:28 ]
[ This Message was edited by: Menageryl on 2006-05-24 08:32 ]
[ This Message was edited by: Menageryl on 2006-05-24 08:33 ]
[ This Message was edited by: Menageryl on 2006-05-24 08:37 ] |
aquila2
Joined: Sep 20, 2004
Posts: 99
From: slovakia
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Quote:
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On 2006-05-17 15:40:04, adnhk1 wrote:
Quote:
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On 2006-05-16 21:08:55, Waka wrote:
That's interesting about available memory. According to here:
http://www.gsmarena.com/compare.php3?idPhone2=1551&idPhone1=1318
the Nokia has 50MB c/w the SE's 80MB - however the Nokia comes with a 128MB memory card c/w the P990's 64MB. I guess these phones don't have the equivalent of virtual memory?! ;-p
Unless the N93 has an equivalent to the Sonys excelent jog wheel and ezitap software, I'll be staying with the Pxxx series.
W.
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Hi,
it is common that people are misleaded by manufacturers claims when comes to specs, especially those who do not know in depth about technology. Perhaps I should phrase it this way:
1. Think of N80's 50MB and SE's 80MB as your PC's Hard Disk Drive, those that commonly shows 40GB/60GB/80GB, etc etc, where you would install your Windows XP and all other applications, like anti virus, firewall software, anti spyware, Microsoft Office, Internet browsers, and most imortantly to me, GAMES!, etc.
2. Now, think of the ACTIVE RAM as your PC's DRAM, those that you see DDR/DDR2 512MB, 1GB blah blah blah... These are DIE DIE needed for Windows XP to boot properly, as well as ALL those applications that you "double click" on, to startup properly.
Now think of this, can your Windows XP boot without point no. 2 above? No you can't as the moment the DRAM is plugged out of the system, your PC will not even boot up past the initial POST (the initial black screen with some words for showing system checks etc). It does not matter if I have up to 1 terabyte (i.e., 1000 Gigabyte) of hard disk drive in my PC, cos as long as I do not have the DRAM inside my PC, the PC just will not boot properly.
So, now comes the amount of DRAM a PC should have. We all knew, and I assume normal consumers would also know, that THE MORE THE MERRIER, right? So, if I can afford 2GB of DRAM to stick into my PC, I would stick them into my PC. Same goes to mobile devices, the more the available Active RAM, the merrier. Active RAM is required for applications to launch and store it's data into. This is where the difference between PC and mobile devices comes into play. On a PC, if I only have very little RAM, Windows XP knows how to "cheat" applications by making use of the hard disk drive's available space. Do a search for pagefile.sys in your PC. This is the "cheat" RAM which is actually residing on your hard disk drive that applications can make use of if your RAM is not enough. However, for a mobile device, there is no such pagefile.sys residing on your available 50MB of intermal memory, nor is it being "cleverly" made available on your external memory (You mentioned 128MB comes with N80). Hence once the miserable 10MB of the N80 is used up (and yes, ALL APPLICATIONS NEEDS TO USE THIS RAM and they use it A LOT), "Out of memory" messages will pop up, as what was witnessed on the N80 JUST BY ZOOMING INTO A PICTURE...
I hate to say this, but NK is somewhat "deceiving" their customers, and knowing a lot of these customers are not tech savvy enough to understand the difference between "internal memory (PC's hard disk drive)" and "Active RAM (PC's DDR/DDR2 RAM), they are misleading a lot of customers... SE on their website clearly states the P990i (in fact, since P800 they are already stating clearly) comes with 64MB of RAM memory and 128MB Flash memory with up to 80MB for our applications to be installed. For a quick calculation, Symbian OS 9.1 and UIQ 3.0, plus those built-in apps that gets automatically started at boot time should take up about 20MB at boot time. This still leaves us with about 44MB of FREE ACTIVE RAM everytime the phone is booted, which is a whopping 34MB or more than 300% higher than N80...
Hope this helps.
Admins, can this be made sticky so that potential customers can read it prior to spending their hard earned $$$?
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oh boy, you are completely wrong
nokia 6680 was the last symbian S60 phone with just 10MB of free RAM. even N70 has got over 30MB free ACTIVE RAM after the booting up procedure
just to make it clear I took the liberty to quote here someone from mobile review
Michal from my-symbian states 45MB (not by guessing, but by using a program that reads out the corresponding values from the HAL), and even the 3250 has 33MB...
btw. nokia N80 is selling now for 570 euros and you can find it even for less. the price of P990 was said to be around 750 euros.
~ mfp ~ |
SteamSHIFT
Joined: Mar 29, 2004
Posts: 7
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What about the Nokia E61 - any thoughts on this? Apart from touch screen and camera, it looks like it ticks all the boxes.
[ This Message was edited by: SteamSHIFT on 2006-05-25 10:03 ] |
Menageryl
Joined: Aug 14, 2004
Posts: 18
From: South Africa
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' Hmm... Well - I've been looking around after the question was asked... Turns out www.my-symbian.com lists specifications for as many Symbian handsets as they can manage and have pretty verbose listings - including RAM values - though some entries have this area empty as it's obvious they as-yet don't have the relevant information...
' aquila2: I'm not too confident about the numbers you gave... Unfortunately the site both you and I mentioned don't as-yet list most of the N-Range's RAM values barring the N80 which has 45MB total and 19MB free after bootup... Which makes me, as I said, a little hesitant to go with the figures you're just assuming are standard across a range!!!
' The E60, E61, and E70 are listed as having 48MB total with approx. 22MB free after boot... And these phones are running the race pretty much alongside their N-Range bretheren.
' As such I think we can still safely say (though admittably still conjecture - until we have definitive numbers for the rest of the N-Range) that the UIQ3 phones revealed to us thusfar are still streaks ahead in the RAM department.
' Sorry. Hehe. ;-D
' ~Moi
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_LAU_
Joined: Sep 10, 2004
Posts: > 500
From: Zeta Reticuli Phones:.P1;.P910
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About the RAM, the Symbian OS discards the least used application running on RAM if the available RAM ends.
Although many applications don't behave properly when the OS requests them to close - usually they crash - the most recently *used* applications usually don't have memory issues.
Of course, the bigger the memory the better.
My P910 boots with 56 processes on RAM (results of Magic Launcher), 13 of them are applications (results of SMan)
These can easily increase after running other applications.
My P910 it's using 16.3MB of RAM (of 32MB)
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Menageryl
Joined: Aug 14, 2004
Posts: 18
From: South Africa
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' @_LAU_: Yep... Most of us are aware of how the OS manages the need for RAM... The argument(s) being made here though is that the more RAM one has built into (and available after boot) a device, the more complex the potential application, as well as granting one the ability to run more application simultaneously!
' BTW - can't say I've really experienced much \"crashing\" of applications when they're asked to shut down due to RAM constraints on my P900... The only application I've really had this with (not too infrequently) has been the Opera browser - and only when the page being browsed maxes out all available memory (RAM) on the entire device!!!
' @all: BTW, it seems like www.allaboutsymbian.com also has a number of devices (Nokia or otherwise) for which they keep specifications etc. online - and I see they have some data my-symbian doesn't have and vica-versa.
' So it really looks like it's a shot-in-the-dark sorta situation with regards finding solid, dependable information regarding RAM in Nokia models. SE make it so much easier by providing it themselves, no? <smiles>
' More info found:
' N70 has 58MB RAM total.
' N90 has 48MB RAM total.
' ~Moi
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adnhk1
Joined: May 23, 2002
Posts: 447
PM |
@ aquila2,
If you read my posts, you should understand that I am basing the N80's "operating memory" of 10MB via mobile review's owners feedback Here's a recap on page 2 of this thread: "...The N80, from mobile reivew's forum was found to be having only 10MB at boot time..."
Secondly, my posts are to highlight to esato members about what Nokia failed to clearly advises their customers, ie, the available active RAM (or what Michal calls it operating memory).
If Nokia has been honest to customers like SE when comes to active RAM, then there is no need for us to "guess" today and no need for me to type in such long winded posts. | |
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Posted: 2006-05-20 12:33
