Nokia
N81 8GB

The N81 8GB was announced in August 2007 as part of Nokia’s “Go Play” event which was primarily focused on the launch of its Ovi services business and brand.  The phone was optimised to support the music and games offered by the Ovi platform and it could almost have been described as an “Ovi-phone”. A key feature of the N81 8GB was the dedicated music navigation button which had keys around it that lit up when activated (e.g. music control keys). The phone also had two keys either side of the earpiece that could be used as game-play buttons. These buttons could also be used for other functions such as zooming in and out of photos. The N81 8GB was the first time Nokia had used conductive or capacitive sensing technology. This allows users to drag a finger around the silver square on the front of the device in a similar manner to the iPod “click-wheel” to navigate some elements of the user interface such as the multimedia screen. When launched, the N81 8GB cost €430.