My 770 arrived this afternoon. An initial disappointment was the fact that it was not the 2006 version and was made in Estonia. I immediately checked the notorious cracking areas and found nothing. BTW, thanks guys--now I can't plug the power or headphone jacks in without handling the thing like it was going to explode.

I was very surprised at the lack of documentation, but as an engineer, who reads it anyway? As time passed, I began to realize the cleverness of those Finns. If you are having issues with the interface, get a Palm.

This brings me to why I bought the 770. I was seeking a solution to travel issues with my laptop, which is just getting too troublesome to cart around from airport to airport. It is also too bulky to open up in a cramped plane seat. What was I looking for:

1) Browser ability with a useful sized screen.
2) Wi-Fi for at the airport or coffee shop.
3) Email
4) PDF/Document display
5) Bluetooth DUN (for at hotels with no Wi-Fi) to my cell.
6) Video and Music ability--a movie makes a 2 hour flight whizz by.

All of the above seemed to be met by a Palm T|X. I bought one and everything was ok except for #5. In fact, the reason that the T|X would not work with my phone was because Palm had crippled the BT stack to only work with GSM phones, not CDMA. Does this stink like a Verizon/Palm conspiracy? You betcha! I said screw them. Now back to the 770.

The first thing I did was see if I could pair and do DUN to my V3c. As an aside, the V3c is one of the most difficult phones to get to work with anything outside of Verizon. Let me tell you, getting it to work with the 770 was near effortless. I was browsing within five minutes (yes, it is very slow, but in a pinch I can get data and email and that is the point). The more I use the 770 the more I realize that the best people to make a device like this is folks that know phones. This is not a PDA or UMPC! Comparisons are futile. The 770 is, well, a 770.

I next setup my Wi-Fi. Simple, simplistic, no more discussion.

Then I explored the unit. Fascinating.

I went to Maemo and downloaded apps. Installation was flawless and automatic.

Games: what a delight. One of my favorite time wasters on the Palm (I own a Palm Tungsten C, the 770 replaces it) is Shanghai, a variant of Mahjong. Needless to say I was pleased to find it built-in.

Unix: this was the final issue that pushed me over the nervousness barrier (since it is impossible to go anywhere and play with one) to buy the 770. As a long time user and programmer of Unix systems, the fact that the 770 is Unix is just icing on the cake. Now I just need a mini C compiler and a VI editor and I am set...