Installing Symbian Anna on N8, E7, C7 and C6

You might have already read about the recent announcement by Nokia that Symbian Anna is now being pushed to all the Symbian ^3 capable devices, like Nokia N8, E7, C7 and C6-01. To read more visit the official announcement on Nokia Conversations blog here.

In this post, I will give you some pointers, if you are unable to install Symbian Anna on your device.

The first thing you need to do is find out if the update is pushed for your region or not. Start SW Update app on your device, and wait for it to refresh the list of available updates. Once the list is refreshed, it will show you if the device update is available.

On my brother’s Nokia C7, the update was offered as OTA (Over The Air) 28mb update. Once updated, the SW Update now shows two more updates named as Symbian Anna 1/2 and Symbian Anna 2/2. Both updates are about 30mb each. I did not continue with the updates yet because the battery was not fully charged. So, will update it later.

Update for Nokia C7: Okay, I continued the updates on my brother’s C7, and both of the updates installed fine. Remember, that after update 1/2 is installed, it will ask you to restart device, DO NOT restart, as update 2/2 is already being in installing process. Just wait till the updates are installed (about 20 mins).

Then I checked for the update on my Nokia E7 development device, SW Update app showed me the update on device, but it asked me to install the update via Ovi Suite or Nokia Software Updater.

When checked via Ovi Suite, it always showed update for Here and Now app, but not the device update. So, after many tries in 2 hours, I downloaded Nokia Software Updater.

SymbianAnna-install

The Nokia Software Updater reminded me that I’m using the device without a SIM, so I have to put a SIM to make the updater work. So, remember developers, you need to put any SIM in device before trying update, otherwise the update will fail. Maybe Ovi Suite was also failing because of no SIM.

For my E7, the update size is 325mb, and it’s still downloading. I will update this post with my success, and might write another post to review the new things in Symbian Anna update.

Update 1

Okay, after the download and installation of Device Update for my Nokia E7 via Nokia Software Updater, I got quite a bit of Symbian Anna feeling. The icons and browser have new look.

Just after few hours, I checked for updates via SW Update app, and to my surprise, there were two more updates, like I seen on my brother’s Nokia C7. I checked and started the updates. The interesting thing to note is, the first 325mb update was only available via PC, and these two updates are OTA.

WP_000035

They took about 30 minutes to install. During the installation, I was asked two time for EULA for MS Communicator and JoikuSpot. I think these later updates are new version of built-in apps like Mail for Exchange and couple of new apps.

For me, both of these updates went fine on the first go. It restarted my E7, and everything seems to be working alright.

Important note, that after update 1/2 is installed, DO NOT restart your device manually. Just wait for the 2nd update to be installed as well.

Thanks to Nokia for this much needed update.

// challn3g3r //

Fixed: Ovi Store not working after Hard Reset

I have seen many users complaining Ovi Store app not working at all after they Hard Rest their Symbian^3 device, such as Nokia N8, E7, C7 etc.

Ovi Store app is developed using Qt and it requires the Qt runtime on device to work properly. When a user Hard Rests his device, the runtime is gone. And unfortunately, Nokia is unable to tackle this issue so far when installing Ovi Store again on device.

I have to reset my Nokia N8 once, and I got hit by the same issue. I knew what was missing, so I just installed the Qt runtime (4.6.3) SIS from the Qt SDK 1.0 folder to my N8 and it started working just fine.

Normal users don’t have Qt SDK, which is ~1.3GB download. So, I thought it would be a good idea to put the Qt runtime SIS files on my server and let the users having issues with Ovi Store, download and install the Qt runtime without downloading the Qt SDK.

ovi_store_fixed

I created a special mobile friendly page on our SWF2Go website, where any user can just go directly using his mobile and download and install the Qt runtime.

Direct Download Qt Runtime: https://chall3ng3r.com/downloads/qt/

I uploaded Qt 4.6.3 as well as Qt 4.7.3 runtimes. You just need only one of them. I’d recommend the later as the most of the new apps such as LinkedIn for Symbian is based on it.

Update: Based on feedback I have also added Qt Mobility 1.1.3 SIS along Qt runtime. Some users have reported Ovi Store app uses Qt Mobility as well. I guess this will fix Ovi Store always loading issue after installing Qt.

Update 2: I have now added Qt Notifications APIs SIS on the download link above. The new version of Ovi Store uses these new APIs as well.

Update 3 “€œ Recommended for Symbian ^3: Nokia team has finally made available a standalone download of the Ovi Store client app. Just visit the following link to download the latest version. Read more about this at official blog.

Direct Download Ovi Store App: http://lr.ovi.mobi/store/client-symbian-3/

Update 4 (26 Oct 2011): Download new Qt QML based beta Nokia Store app. 18mb download contains Qt runtime and the client. No need to install Qt. Get it from here.

My suggestion to Nokia / Qt Team: There should be similar Qt runtime download page optimized for mobile devices, for end users. Who disparately search on internet when Ovi Store stops working.

Update 5 (Sep-2015):
Nokia Store for Symbian is no longer available. Most of the apps are moved to Opera at http://apps.opera.com. Visit this website for Opera Store installation on your Symbian OS phone.

Have fun downloading great apps from Ovi Store!

// chall3ng3r //

Nokia N8 or C7 Software Updates Failing? Try This : Updated

Nokia is earning bad reputation almost every day. It’s unfortunate, but it’s true. Recently Nokia published some minor OTA software updates for Symbian ^3 devices, Nokia N8 and C7.

The updates are named as follows:

  • Phone apps update (important)
  • Apps update 1.0
  • Nokia DAB Radio
  • Videos

For some users updates are failing without any apparent reason, this includes me, and I’ve been following the discussions on official forums.

Users have tried changing the dates, soft-rebooting and hard-rebooting (8 secs power button) their devices, even some already tried factory-rest without any luck, this also includes me. All four updates failed every time, even it felt like the software updater not even trying to make a connection to internet to retry the download.

Now lets get back to the solution, which worked for me. As I mentioned, I also own a Nokia N8, and it was happening to me as well. Since it’s my secondary device, I am using it without SIM for emails, news and keeping an eye on Facebook and Twitter activity.

I found an old prepaid Tchibo SIM bought from Germany, I just popped in this SIM and did a soft-reboot. After the reboot when device was responsive again, I tried the updater. This time all four updates installed successfully, one by one. Yay!

nokia-n8-updates

So, the root cause seems to be with the SIM a folder located in Mass Storage “E:Private20019119”. You can try with the following:

Working Solution Update:

Big thanks to user “Unick” on Nokia Support Forums, who posted a working solution to the problem, and there are couple of successful installs reported from the solution.

Today I deleted folder E:Private20019119. Aftar that I run update and it finished successful. Maybe current version on Nokia server is correct.

The simple steps would be:

  • Connect your Nokia N8/C7 in Mass Storage mode to PC via USB cable
  • Locate and delete folder named “20019119” under Private folder of Mass Storage
  • That’s all.
  • Unplug the device from PC, and retry again. It should work.
  • If you have installed a SIM in your N8/C7, and update is failing. Remove the SIM, do a soft-reboot. Then try the updater without SIM. If it’s successful, reinstall the SIM and do a soft-reboot.
  • If you are using it SIM-less, like me, just put any SIM into device, do a soft-reboot. Try the updater.
  • If updater is failing with your current SIM and without SIM, you can borrow a SIM from your friend or family member, but remember, it should be from different operator than yours. Try the updater after soft-reboot.

I hope my findings will help others with the same issue. And also let me know if it worked for you as well, and which method you used.

I hope Nokia engineers are already working on a permanent solution, and they will be more careful with the updates in future.

// chall3ng3r //