I dunno about you N900 be seems like it was not the N900 fault but bad phone or damaged while shiped or was of the first (that had faukty USB)
my N900 didn't have any hardware problems (didn't have the dreaded faulty usb)
it was my first smartphone and I'm happy with it
I dropped it a couple of times and its sill sturdy
i had only one problem when i installed kruchtik and it hogged all CPU and empied the battery in 1hour and after unistalling its as good as new