I would assume that we mostly all agree that the L920 has better hardware specs. And since I already have an N9, I'd hypothetically take the L920 out for a spin.

There is some relevant evidence to consider. First, check out this comparison of WP8 and WP7.5.

http://m.youtube.com/#/watch?feature...&v=3aY1SNnWk4Q

would say that my N9 is slightly faster than the WP7.5 when booting Facebook (Fmobi), but in all honesty, it is no where near as fast as the WP8 experience. (And forget it if you use the N9 stock Facebook app, LOL)

Notice also that the multitasking experience of WP8 has greatly improved, since you can now leave apps, come back, and the app picks up where you left off and doesn't make you start over like WP7.5 did. Maybe it's not N9-level multitasking, but it's definitely better.

The browsing experience and browsers are clearly superior with the Lumia 920 from what I've seen so far, though N9 is workable.

Skype experience should be clearly superior with the L920. And access to most of the most popular apps is available with that device. I read that M$ has got 45 of the 50 most popular apps in the M$ WP8 app store. Finally, I see a LOT of swipe-y goodness built into the apps that I see running in WP. And I like swipe-y goodness.

So I see the Lumia 920 as a defensible choice, with way better hardware, improved WP software that is somewhat closer to MeeGo performance, and (compared to the lovely N9) has an app availability edge. The only downsides are well known to those in this forum, so I won't repeat them.