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Phone News: New Nokia Lumias and Galaxy S3 NFC app
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Welcome once again to Phone News — CNET UK’s quasi-weekly peek at the shiniest things pinging their way into the great big notification tray in the sky.
Click on the big play symbol in the video window above to watch Phone News — or read on for a breakdown of what to expect in this week’s instalment of mobile-focused happenings.
First up: Microsoft and Nokia, the pair of mobile lovers who signed a pact to adore Windows Phone forever — or at least until Steve Ballmer disowns it — are about to unbox their new baby. Or babies. Shiny new Windows Phone 8 babies, that is.
While we don’t yet know exactly what we’ll see at their New York press conference tomorrow afternoon , there’s a fairly good chance whatever it is will look something like the various leaked photos that have been spilling onto the Internet, thanks to the @evleaks Twitter account.
The new Nokia devices will apparently be called the Lumia 920 and 820; the 920 will have a 4.5-inch screen, a 1.5GHz dual-core chip, some form of Nokia’s PureView camera technology and also include wireless charging, while the presumably cheaper 820 will have a 4.3-inch screen.
We’ll find out what Nokia’s unboxing for sure tomorrow afternoon, so stay tuned to CNET UK for all the news as we get it.
Also covered on this week’s show, news that UK mobile operator Orange and never-never purveyor Barclaycard have named the first Android phone that will be compatible with their Quick Tap contactless payment service.
Quick Tap lets you use a phone to pay for stuff worth up to £20 in shops that accept contactless payments, just by swiping your handset over a reader.
Quick Tap previously worked with phones running Samsung’s Bada OS. But the Android-based Samsung Galaxy S3 will be added to the line-up tomorrow — making what’s already a very full featured phone even more functional. Even better, Orange will give you £50 of credit.
Another news story that tickled our Phone News fancy is the BBC’s announcement that it’s updated its on-demand TV app, iPlayer, to allow owners of Apple iPhones and iPads to download stuff to watch when they’re not online, rather than always having to stream content over Wi-Fi or 3G.
iPod touch owners can also get in on the downloads action — which goes live from today. So if you always wanted to take the cast of EastEnders to the beach with you, now you can.
What do you think of Phone News? Tell us your views on the show — or any of the news stories covered — in the comments below, or drop us a line over on our Facebook page.
