Nokia’s N9 beats iPhone 4′s camera in latency (but iOS 5 will take care of that)

Judging by the comments, many of our readers are actually liking the N9, Nokia’s inaugural smartphone running MeeGo software. Some even deemed it the worthiest iPhone wannabe to date (and a killer Android apps phone), even if it borrows slavishly from Apple. An eight-megapixel back camera with Carl Zeiss lens and autofocus is one of the N9′s selling points so Nokia took it upon themselves to tell the world in a blog post that it’s also one of the fastest smartphone cameras around (see the below chart).

The N9′s camera launches from the lock screen in 2.6 seconds, Nokia says. This is the time to turn on the camera app, ready the viewfinder, focus on the subject and capture the image. Yes, the N9 beats Apple’s iPhone 4 (three seconds), HTC’s HD7 (8.3 seconds), Samsung’s Galaxy II (5.8 seconds) and even Canon’s Powershot S95 point-and-shoot digital camera. Nokia’s test doesn’t take into account an iOS 5 optimization which cuts down latency by providing direct camera access from the lock screen, by double-pressing the Home button. More N9 camera features and another nice promo clip below.