Dan from WPCentral is over in London getting his formerly slab-hating hands on the first steel and glass tech to run Windows Phone 7.5 Mango… from Nokia. It’s dubbed Lumia and Dan wants one. Badly.

The device is pretty smashing. The screen really is one of the best we’ve ever seen both in terms of color (“wet” blacks) and just how it pops up at you. The touch sensitivity, always a finicky setting, seems perfect to us on the device as well. The unibody design makes it truly an elegant piece of art and with a top notch camera, really makes this an excellent device.

Check out the video, and WPCentral‘s complete Nokia World and Lumia coverage and then let us know — do you think Nokia and Microsoft together can give iPhone I run for its money?

New Nokia CEO Steven Elop, who formerly ran Microsoft’s most successful business unit, has written one of the most brutally candid and forthright state-of-the-enterprise memos the mobile industry has ever seen, including an assessment of their position post-iPhone. Their “platform is burning”:

In 2008, Apple’s market share in the $300+ price range was 25 percent; by 2010 it escalated to 61 percent. They are enjoying a tremendous growth trajectory with a 78 percent earnings growth year over year in Q4 2010. Apple demonstrated that if designed well, consumers would buy a high-priced phone with a great experience and developers would build applications. They changed the game, and today, Apple owns the high-end range.

The first iPhone shipped in 2007, and we still don’t have a product that is close to their experience. Android came on the scene just over 2 years ago, and this week they took our leadership position in smartphone volumes. Unbelievable.

Nokia makes brilliant hardware, arguably the best in the business, but they’ve been slow to adapt to the capacitive multitouch, app-centric, ecosystem-driven new smartphone world. And their software strategy has been fractured and frustrating. Elop clearly recognizes the issues and plans to start addressing them. Our own resident Nokia Expert, Matt Miller says:

Nokia will be holding their Capital Markets Day on Friday where Mr. Elop will reveal his future strategy. There are rumors that he might partner with Microsoft and release Windows Phone 7 devices or go with Android in an HTC-like multiple platform approach. As a fan of both Nokia and Windows Phone 7 you know what I would prefer. If Windows Phone 7 is brought to Nokia hardware then get ready to see a LOT more writing here on Nokia Experts as WP7 is my personal preferred platform at this time.

Will Nokia go with Windows Phone 7 or Android, try to relaunch MeeGo or Symbian at a faster pace with better user experience, or do something else entirely? And how, if at all, will it effect competition with iPhone? We’ll find out Friday.

[Engadget via Nokia Experts]

Our friend Matt Miller over at sister-site NokiaExperts has just posted up his first impressions of the white Nokia N97. Like most premium handsets over the last few years, the N97 has been played up as another “iPhone killer” so we figured we’d better keep an eye on it at well.

What’s Matt’s take away? Good but not great if we’re reading it right, though Nokia is promising updates that might make it even better.

Head on over to NokiaExperts for the full rundown and video overview, and let us know what you think!