The Nokia 8 - An Android Flagship phone...for those on a budget!

[Honosuseri]

Back in the UK for a short spell and needed to sort out a few odds and sods...a new phone for one, being right up there on the list!

My Moto G 2nd Edition (2014 LTE/Codename Thea) has served me very well for a looong time and my Mother has the Moto G5. With reviews saying the new G6 could well be the best budget smartphone, naturally I went and bought...a Nokia!

With the G6 Plus priced at £270 it was a no brainer really to go for the Nokia 8 at £300. Packing the Snapdragon 835 processor, 4GB of RAM, 64GB of storage (128GB model is £350) with an SD card slot.  There's a 5.3 inch WQHD display which is incredibly bright to help viewing in direct sunlight. Updated to Oreo (Android 8.1) it really is a Flagship phone for the price of a midrange handset and in my view, a bit of a bargain! 

I'm already incredibly impressed with what the device can do. It's cooled with a copper pipe that's attached to a graphite shield to disperse the heat throughout the aluminium chassis. I'll be interested to see down the line whether we can overclock this 835 processor for even better performance.

I'll attach a few screenshots and as we are (or should be) predominantly retro gamers here...naturally I'll put it through it's paces doing emulation. I've started this thread mainly to gauge interest in doing a video on the phone. If there are questions or stuff you want to see being run, then do let me know.

All the best guys in your projects, I look forward to hearing from you.

Screenshot of my "desktop". The phone is updated to Oreo (8.1) although it will look different, as I customise it with Nova Launcher.

 

Nintendo DS emulation with "Drastic".
 

Nintendo Gamecube emulation with Dolphin (5.0-7127)

 

Classic point and click adventure games with ScummVM

 

Capcom Play System 3, emulated with RetroArch's FBAlpha2012 core.
 

Android gaming with Zen Pinball

 

[thatman84]

Its crazy how good phones are these days.

I am not in the market for a new phone myself but its always interesting to see whats new and what you do my friend!

[Honosuseri]

13 minutes ago, thatman84 said:

Its crazy how good phones are these days.

I am not in the market for a new phone myself but its always interesting to see whats new and what you do my friend!

It's not a brand new model it was released very late in 2017, as Nokia's (HMD Global) first crack at a Flagship Android phone. Although there are reviews of the phone already obviously, these were done comparing it to other flagships when this was sold at £500-600. Now it's available for £300, I think some of the criticisms about the phone can be overlooked, as it packs more power than the new midrange phones (that have the Snapdragon 600 chipset).

I am still doing the "Shield me from the Sea" Project, once I return to the Yacht next month. So I'll still be tinkering with the Shield TV and wanted a better phone to help document the project. Obviously I have a lot of experience with the Android apps for emulation and do have the games, so getting this Nokia 8 gaming won't be a problem. I might even do some Amiga stuff with it

Nice to hear from you buddy, hope all is well with you and the family and the DIY is going well

[Honosuseri]

6 hours ago, Honosuseri said:

I might even do some Amiga stuff with it

True to my word! Sadly I can't showcase the games with Hyperspin BUT this is why I bought Arc Browser! I can use that on the STV and an Android phone

Nothing has been done with Amiberry for Android as far as I can see for 4 months or so  The latest build of UAE4ARM (to emulate the Amiga) doesn't work on the STV, so thought I'd try it on this Nokia 8... 

Using Arc Browser as the Frontend to showcase the games. It does include metadata and box art, the dev would like to implement video previews one day.

 

UAE4ARM emulator main menu. I've moved across some .uae files from my STV setup, ditched the Hyperspin names so Arc Browser could scrape the games.

 

Yes...I AM BATMAN!
 

Batman: The Movie playing in UAE4ARM
 

Wolf Child running in UAE4ARM. I have disabled the onscreen controls via the .uae files as I have a bluetooth gamepad. Pairing a keyboard & mouse would really make sense too as this is a classic computer