Amazon has the 16GB Nokia N96 with no contract for $449.99, down from over $550 yesterday. I don’t know, still feels kind of expensive but the heart wants what it wants.

The phone has a 2.8-inch screen, 5-megapixel camera, and works on GSM networks like AT&T and T-Mobile here in the US. The deal’s good today only.

Nokia N96 [Amazon.com]

Nokia has released a Bruce Lee edition of the N96. What makes it a so Bruce Lee? How about a photo of the man on the case, along with his signature, and a bunch of photos included in the package. It’s only available in Hong Kong, so don’t bother driving over to the mall to grab one.

Oh, it’s also incredibly expensive, coming in at around $1,280. You could buy a used POS car for that kind of money.

Embarrassing admission: I’ve never seen a Bruce Lee movie. All hate mail can be sent to my Twitter.

Bummed out because the N78 doesn’t offer VoIP compatability right out of the box? Fear not – Fring has got you covered. Apparently using their own VoIP client rather than the Nokia-made client (which Nokia decided not to build into the latest N-series devices) required by other services, Fring has added support for both the N78 and the N96.

If you’ve got an N78 or by some sort of trickery already own an N96, you can grab Fring here.

The Nokia N96 is now shipping, for the before-subsidy (if you find any) price of 550 Euros, or about $794. An $800 cellphone? I guess that’s why Nokia is wisely calling it a “multimedia computer.”

To be fair, just looking at the specs sorta makes me say, “iPhone, what’s that?” Built-in 5-megapixel camera and 16GB memory (expandable to 24GB with microSD cards), live video, proper speakers, etc. It’s like, if all you’ve used is the iPhone and think that’s the pinnacle of mobile devices, interface aside, you might want to expand your horizon a bit.

Anyway, it’s shipping today. Seeing as though I just started using my N76 like it’s meant to be used, I eagerly await hanging out with people who have money so I can play with one for a few minutes. Dare to dream.

Gigaom reported that the N78 is not VoIP compatible and when they asked Nokia why, the company replied:

“Nokia Nseries is committed VoIP services as part of its offering. That is why we have included SIP stack and improved the developer VoIP offering in S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 2 by enhancing the VoIP APIs to improve the call quality…A Nokia VoIP client is not included with the Nokia N78 and the Nokia N96 and VoIP solutions based on this particular client such as Gizmo will not work. However, Forum Nokia will cooperate with third-party developers to support them in porting their applications from S60 3.0/3.1 releases to S60 3.2. One example is Fring, whose popular application will be offered via Nokia’s Download! service for the Nokia N96.”

The removal of VoIP brings into question Nokia’s new ‘openness’ platform, especially at a time when carriers are starting to explore the possibilities of fixed/mobile convergence, in services like T-Mobile’s HotSpot@Home offering.

But before we condemn, we’ll wait and see how Nokia’s ‘commitment’ to VoIP services shakes out.

A British cellphone carrier has confirmed that the Nokia N96 will be released there in September. This isn’t a rumor, or from some guy who knows some guy or anything, but comes from a “Christmas in July” event held all the way in the UK. The mobile operator is 3, by the way.

At current exchange rates, Americans should be prepared to fork over quite a bit of cash to nab this one, whenever it’s more widely available.

And really, it couldn’t be any worse than the iPhone 3G, right? They (Peter and John) tell me the battery lasts less than a day before you have to charge it, which is hardly ideal.

The N96 – which is similar to the N95 but is one more better – has finally gotten its own special Flash-based web-tour. It goes into all the dirty details regarding GPS, music playback, and Internet browsing but sadly leaves out the cool bloopy music we’re used to when we see these sorts of tours.

Nothing amazingly exciting but if you’re a Nokiard you might get a kick out of it.

I’m not going to watch this whole thing, but the N96 sure looks purdy. It better be since Cellulare-Magazine.it takes an entire 10 minutes to profess its love for the upcoming Nok.

Here comes Nokia out of the gate with a set of two N-Series devices, the N96 and the N78. Both of these should be available in the U.S., so that’s the first plus, and they’re priced at a premium, so that’s the first minus.

The N78 (350 euros or about $400) has a 3.2-megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss optics and support for microSD. It has A-GPS for geotagging and supports Nokia’s Share on Ovi media sharing system.

The N96 is considerably hotter with a sexy 2.8-inch screen and 16GB of internal memory. It will cost 550 euros ($600+) and supports Wi-Fi and HSDPA. The player supports MPEG-4, WMV, and Flash video. It’s got a 5-megapixel camera and video-capture at 30 fps.

Rather than dribble on, let’s take a look at the specs for the upcoming N96. Sound good?

* Quadband EDGE
* Dualband HSDPA 850/2100 MHz
* DVB-H Class C
* 92 cc volume
* 125 gram weight
* 103 x 55 x 18 mm
* 16 GB internal memory AND a microSD slot; 24 GB total if you spend an extra $80
* 950 mAh battery
* 6.1 cm (2.8 inch) 320×240 display with 16 million colors
* 3.5 mm headphone jack
* WiFi (802.11b/g)
* AGPS
* 5 megapixel camera with Carl Zeiss lens that also does VGA video recording at 30 FPS, Dual LED flash that can also be used when video recording!
* S60 3rd Edition Feature Pack 2 (Flash Lite 3 enabled web browser included)
* microUSB

16GB of internal storage?! It appears to be true. The features look fantastic for this device, but the lack of QWERTY is a deal breaker. It is for me, at least.

Nokia Germany [via Into Mobile]

It certainly looks real. The photos are a little grainy, but the N96 badging seems legit. The hardware also doesn’t look like anything else Nokia has produced. Check em out.

7 pictures of the Nokia N96 leak! This isn’t a render folks, this is real hardware [Into Mobile]