Nokia Releases Lumia 720, Lumia 520 At MWC. Targets Lower Market Of Smartphones

By Shailesh Shrivastava email: s.shrivastava@mobilenapps.com | Feb 25, 2013 07:14 AM EST

Tags Nokia Lumia 720, Nokia Lumia 520, Nokia Lumia 920

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On the first day of the Mobile World Congress (MWC) in Barcelona, Nokia grabs the headlines of almost all the media as it releases four new products out of which two are under its Lumia flagship.

Nokia, on Monday, launched Lumia 720, Lumia 520, Nokia 301, and Nokia 105 handsets, and all are under the 'budget phone' category.

"The momentum behind Nokia is gathering pace. The launches today reflect our commitment to broadening our devices and services portfolio to meet the demands of people and businesses around the globe," Nokia's official blog quoted Nokia CEO, Stephen Elop, as saying.

Though the Finnish mobile-maker launched four handsets, the one product that got maximum attention was Nokia Lumia 720 because of some obvious reasons.

Lumia 720 is being compared with the high-end products in Lumia series like Lumia 920 and Lumia 820. The 720 is mid-range Windows 8 phone specially designed keeping youngsters in mind. Lumia 720 is a thinner, lighter, cheaper version of Lumia 920. It has almost every option of the Lumia 920, but hardware-wise the device was produced in a cost-cutting mode.

The new phone comes with a 4.3 inch screen that is equipped with ClearBlack technology. ClearBlack LCD screens let the user have a clear view of the screen even in a bright day outside atmosphere.

The biggest plus point of the latest Windows 8 phone is its camera. Though the capacity of the camera is limited to 6.7 megapixels, the f/1.9 aperture makes it bigger than of any other high-end smartphone. On top of that the bond between Nokia and Carl Zeiss gives Lumia 720 users many reasons to smile in front of this camera.

When it comes to processor and RAM, Lumia 720 is like an average smartphone with 1 GHz CPU and 512 MB RAM. The storage space is quite a lot in this device as it comes with an 8 GB internal memory, a microSD card slot supported up to 64 GB, and 7GB online storage through SkyDrive.

The phone is going to be available in five colors: white, black, red, yellow, and cyan.

The phone will be first launched in China and other Asian markets like Indian later this quarter and then it will be headed to European and American markets.

The phone is going to cost somewhere around $330-340 in the U.S. market.

Nokia's second Lumia product to be come out from the MWC this year was Nokia Lumia 520. The 520 is the cheapest smartphone in the Lumia series and is expected to be huge hit among people with 'social quotient.'

Though the hardware of this phone are not very impressive like of Lumia 920 and 720, when the specifications are compared with other phones available in its price range Lumia 520 gains an upper hand.

Nokia Lumia 520 sports an impressive Snapdragon 1 GHz CPU supported with 512 GB of RAM. Running on Windows' latest mobile operating system Windows 8, it has an internal storage of 8 GB. The storage can be extended till 64 GB with a microSD card. Nokia also gives Lumia 520 an additional 7 GB of cloud storage through SkyDrive.

The most budget smartphone from Nokia is going to cost about $180-190 without contract in the U.S.

There are also reports suggesting that Nokia will be launching Lumia 521 with T-Mobile in the U.S. market and the devices will be no different from Lumia 520.