Thinking of buying an N900
 

Hello, I'm thinking of replacing my old c905 with a new phone, I had a few in mind the like HTC desire, iphone 3gs, windows phone, n97 and also the n900.

I would like a phone that is great to use for the internet like youtube, facebook and just general internet browsing at school.

I would also like a phone that I could pretty much use as a satnav and that is easy to use for texting.

I would just like to know how the n900 compares to the iphone and the android OS'

Also I would like something that has alot of good apps.

How does the touch screen compare to the iphone or even the old Nokia 5800.

Is the qwerty keyboard nice to use on this phone? Also is the phone out dated as its been out for over a year now?

I'm more going for the N900 however I don't want to spend £320 on a phone and not like it at all.

Thanks, John

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

N900
for internet usage it's good
touch screen much better than 5800 and n97 but not multitouch
phone capabilities average maybe below average for some though i myself make or recieve call with N900 very less. Hardware keyboard good .
Virtual keyboard slow.
Apps depends on what kind of apps u need.

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

All right thank you :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Basically i you want to have a n900, then you should go for.
1. It fully open source
2. Great apps (depends on you)
3. You will love it when you will dual boot to android or meego.....etc
4. Even a large storage memory
...............so on !!!!!

KNOW IT DEPENDS ON YOU

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

I just recently purchased an n900 myself. By far, the most significant distinguishing feature of this machine is not the hardware, but rather the operating system; Maemo is an open source, Linux-based OS, and fully embraces the open source community. As such, instead of billions of tiny apps, the n900 is capable of running standard, full-featured Linux applications, making it much more of a palm-top computer than anything else in this form factor.

Browsing the internet on this device is much more like browsing on a tiny laptop computer than on a smartphone. For one thing, Flash is supported on this phone, so a huge number of websites that don't play well with other smartphones work fine on the n900. And the screen's resolution is high enough that many desktop-oriented web pages will fit the width of the screen without resizing.

One difference of this machine with other recent phones is that it has a resistive, rather than a capacitive touchscreen. A downside of this is that multi-touch operations are not possible; you can't do the "pinch-to-zoom" thing. On the other hand, you can use a stylus with this sort of screen, which makes fine interaction with windows and icons much easier. It'd be nice to be able to do both, but I tend to prefer the stylus over multi-finger use.

I do like the keyboard. I don't have much experience with other cellphone keyboards, though. :)

Is it outdated? Certainly, new hardware appears every year, and there are phones out there with slightly faster CPUs or more memory or whatever. Rumors of the n900 being discontinued and its successor nearing release are swirling about. The problem is, whatever you choose, there will always be newer and better devices just around the corner. For me, the n900 does everything I want, and no other device supports Linux the way it does, so I had no qualms about choosing it.

On the downside, this phone is nowhere near as popular as the iPhone or the various Android phones, and "app" support is therefore much more limited. If you're looking for a phone that has "an app for that", the other choices are much more likely to suit your use.

In short, I'd go for this phone if you want the ability to carry around a tiny device that can do almost anything a Linux computer can do; I'd go for a different one if you just want to carry around a phone that also has some fun apps to play with.

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

I personally think you might be happier with one of the Android devices, such as the Samsung Galaxy S, unless the hardware keyboard is very important to you. If satnav capabilities are important, consider the Nokia N8. I have one alongside my N900, and it's a great smartphone.

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

If you're also considering an iPhone 3GS and WP7 the N900 may not be for you. The user experience isn't so polished and it doesn't hand you everything on a silver platter. It's the ultimate hacker's phone, if you like tinkering and are into computers I highly recommend it, but if you don't want to do anything fancy and want a "just works" phone, you might want to get an Android phone or wait for a MeeGo device. Even Nokia has called the N900 "a developer's phone."

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

I had my eye on the N900 over an android phone as I do like linux, and the customisation that comes with it.

I've heard its a pocket pc and I do like the n900 due to the keyboard as I would rather have a qwerty keyboard.

The satnav isn't very important to me however it would be nice to have, to the point at the touch I too would prefer to use the stylus.

I also read in some reviews the phone is great for multitasking however I do have a question would I be able to surf the web while on the phone.

And one last question is that is the phone worth the £320 price tag?

@Gamer I would love a phone that I could play about with and make pretty much into "my own OS" if you get me. Even if I don't play around with it that much I do love the phone for what it is a mini pc with a phone capabilities.

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Hahahaha...How do I know you reside in Europe.....

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Yes you can browse and talk at the same time (with speaker phone or a headset of course). If you want a "mini-pc with a phone" then the N900 is what you want :)

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

What gave me away :P


Thanks very much mate :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

You know, I've never even tried that; but yeah, I just called my land-line, and was able to leave a message on my answering machine while clicking links and opening new web pages on the browser. That's using wifi for the browser; let's see if t-mobile will let me both browse the web and handle a call at the same time... yup, that works too. (I'm in the US, though, don't know if cell service elsewhere would work the same.)

Funny thing, the guy (or answering machine) on the other end of the line gets to hear all the "click" and "swish" sounds made when you're hitting icons and navigating links. :)

Edit: Drat, someone else answered this one before me. :)

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Thanks for trying. I'm going to go with this phone and hopefully buy it of play soon in the next few days D:

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Not true, it's mostly open source. Conveniently [a bit of sarcasm there], a lot of the common setbacks of the OS are the closed source components such as the video driver.

Anyway, if you're looking for a phone, don't get the N900. Although it's a great device that can make calls and texts, it's not a great phone. You're better off with a higher-end Android if you're looking at OS-hacking and customizing while still having a decent phone. Android may not be true-linux, but many of the popular Maemo mods, apps, and functions are also available for Android, many of them work better, for instance, Gameboid is a GBA emulator that runs at 100% speed for just about everything, the UI is graphically accelerated on the better ones, Maemo's is not, root access is available on many devices, and although it's not as easy to set up, it gives you just as much power. I ordered an HTC Vision that I'll be receiving tomorrow to use alongside the N900, and I'm quite impressed by what it can do, me being an N900 diehard.

There's a pretty good, non-fanboy opinion.

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Actually, most modern desktop Linux distributions seem to use closed source video drivers by default. Closed-source hardware drivers are, unfortunately, hard to avoid in today's world...

Sigh. My age is showing, I guess; I'm using my n900 as my main phone, and yes, in my world a phone is something you use to make phone calls; anything else is extra. Can you at least consent to saying the n900 is not a great "smartphone"? It certainly has no deficits as a regular old phone. :) :)

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

to me.. the n900 is still the best internet experience mobile-wise.

In fact, i used to think of it as mainly an internet tablet but now with abiword, koffice, gnumeric and the like, I find it to be quite an office workhorse too.. some even got it to printing too!

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Guys I have another question, see I heard this phone is great for hacking the OS itself.

I was wondering if you could put a custom OS like say one that a member made or have I to do it all myself once I open the box?

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

:) :) This is not something I've tried yet, but there's plenty of support. Check out this Wiki on some of the existing alternative OSs:

http://wiki.maemo.org/Alternative_operating_systems

Of course, there's also an entire section of the forums here devoted to this topic, lots of good info there as well:

http://talk.maemo.org/forumdisplay.php?f=36

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

All right thanks.

Was talking to a friend in school who owns an iphone 4.

He reckons I will hate the phone and that it is sht however I would like to get your guys views on this before I buy it.

Thanks, vista.

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Took the leap of faith and ordered it :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Is that a good friend of yours?
Prepare to engage in continuous mortal battles with him over who's "right" *G*

Btw, congrats on your purchase!

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

How to win N900 vs A. N. Other phone arguments 101:

1. The N900 is not a phone, it's a pocket computer.

;)

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Yea he is a good friend of mimes, however he is a bit biased towards it :P I would have went for an iphone however he paid £300 for the phone alone plus 24month contract at £30 per month.

That is going to be my main argument :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Cool! I hope you enjoy yours as much as I'm enjoying mine. :)

On iPhone vs. n900: I've had a 1st generation iPhone for four years. The thing is downright beautiful, as well as being built strong as a tank. Honestly, I think today's iPhone still outclasses all the competition in sheer design brilliance; the guys at Apple just know how to create a piece of hardware that looks good and does its job well. Heck, mine still looks good just sitting there on my desk.

But, for me, that's really the problem with the iPhone; all I really ever did with it is look at it as it sat there on my desk. Yeah, it's got all those amazing cool little apps; but most of the time, I just have better things to do than play around with cool little apps. In the month or so I've had my n900, the thing has rarely been out of my hands -- I'm browsing web pages that are just a pain to use on an iPhone, answering e-mail with a real keyboard (trying to hit virtual keys on a hard glass screen gets to be literally painful), even composing files using Vim (my favorite text editor!). I can easily pull up an xterm and examine the processes running on the machine, or log into one of my desktop machines and perform administrative or other tasks on them. The full power of Linux is just sitting there in my hands, wherever I go...

To me, an iPhone (or, honestly, an Android phone) is a device you buy to play around with or show off. The n900 is a device you can use to get actual work done. That makes all the difference. :)

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Thanks for the help mate, I can't wait to get it :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Play still haven't shipped the phone so I get sometime time to ask you about what apps should I install :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

I was going to open a new topic but this one seems to be the place to ask my questions.

I own and use a N800 since about 3 years now, and I use it every single day, and enjoy it. But I hate to write on the screen of N800. It just sucks,

I have used my N800 mostly for private and business occasions. Now I am thinking of getting a mobile computer for business purposes, but my main needs must be satisfied to an extent by the phone. Price is not the main issue.

I need the following applications for business:

dedicated ftp application,
video player
power point presentation wiever
qwerty keyboard
excell viewer
pdf viewer
if possible outlook syncronisation of emails, possibility to connect to MS exchange server
if possible push email
if possible an application to view 3D data, something like "transmagic" that runs on MS machines.
**satnav

**I am using maemo mapper on my N800 since long time with great satisfaction. Due to my work, I need to visit unknown cities and also go to very remote parts of the land, away from towns. I use google maps, sat images, VE street or sat, Yahoo street or whatever I can find to illuminate my target area in maemo mapper. I have covered so far thousands of kilometers and the application runs very stable for me using an external sat receiver, coupled with bluetooth. If N900 can not do that much, I can still keep my N800 for satnav as long as N900 can support N800 for internet access over 3G network on one side and BT on the N900-N800 side.

My new device must be below 500 grams and must be able to fit to my pocket or at least to my not so large purse. By the way, I carry a business notebook in my car for desktop computing needs but I also need a phone-computer that can release me to carry the notebook to fairs, factory visits, customer presentations and such occasions. Actually, my N800 was able to do much of that so far, the only missing parts for me were typing problems and wifi but no 3G to access the internet.

So considering all my needs, which ones are possible which ones are not with n900 please?

It is interesting to admit that, instead of getting a new N900, I could buy an USB or BT type tiny keyboard, and a cheap mobile phone that is 3G and BT DUN capable to tether to my N800 and then I would probably use N800 another 3-5 years.

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

I've got the SDK installed in a chroot on mine, and have actually used it to build some Linux apps. Try that on an iPhone.

My theory is that if it has gcc and make, then it is a computer :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

That's part of why I got the N900 from Nokia direct. Paying for the 3G plan seemed excessive to me, especially when 80% of the time I'm in an area where there's wifi. (When I'm not 2.5G is just fine...)

There are a few good pages on apps to start off with. Do a quick search and you'll find quite a few. There are also threads on how to solve common problems (including ones that may just look like device limitations at first, like MMS).

Hope you enjoy your new N900 when it arrives! :)

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

iphone is for kids, n900 is for men (or is it geeks? :D)

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Kids are offended by the implication :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

I've installed a pile of apps, but I've gotta admit so far I mostly just use the pre-installed applications, they are pretty good. The downloaded apps I've used most frequently are:

Vim -- Maemo comes with a minimal vi editor built-in, but I just can't live without my infinite undo, colored text, syntax highlighting, etc. :)

Raemote -- remote control widget for Apple computers; easy way to control playback from iTunes.

WifiEye -- a nice quick view of the strength of local wireless access points (useful for hinting where they may have contention with one another as well).

Other apps that I rarely use, but are very cool:

Mappero -- amazingly powerful (and yet fully open) GPS-powered mapping program; works with several different map repositories (including Google maps)

Firefox Mobile -- more full-featured than Maemo's Microb browser, though Microb does everything I need so far...

Battle for Wesnoth -- While the iPod version of this game has been under construction for some time, and they are only starting to talk about adapting it for Android devices, someone simply compiled the raw desktop version of the game for the n900. And it works beautifully!

Kanatest -- as an Anime addict, I've been trying to learn Japanese for years. Kanatest only drills you on hiragana and katakana (no kanji), but (sadly) I still need that level of help...

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

The phone should be here around 2 days hopefully as play shipped it to me today.

Can't wait to get it, once I do get it I will just add the basic things I need like MMS, get vnc on it and some wireless and internet apps such as firefox and wifieye like you said.

I would get some kid of satnav which would help me out when out in my mates car incase he gets lost.

Thanks for the help guys :D Can't wait for a good phone and also a great community D:

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

I've gotta say, lots of people here complain about the lack of navigation options on the n900, but Mappero has served all my needs so far. In particular, it includes the ability to cache map tiles; simply download the tiles for the area you will be travelling before you leave, and you'll be able to continue using the map even if you leave your cell service area. (A very important feature here in Ohio, as there are still large areas of no service away from the major cities. :( )

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Thank you mate, phone hasn't came today ;( should have it on Monday once I come back from school :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

ahhha! you are going to feel like heaven with N900! are not you?

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Phone came today so updating the phone now and going to install some apps :D

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Cool, tell us how it goes! :)

(Also, don't ignore the apps that come with the device; the thing has a huge number of them, and most are pretty good!)

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Love the phone installed a battery app, haven't a clue what else to install

Re: Thinking of buying an N900
 

Guys I need help, first time using the phone, today seems like that the battery doesn't seem to last more than 6 hours.

So I need somehelp maybe a app that could save some battery or an app killer.

Thanks, VisTa.