Thanks all for the responses!

First to address some of the questions. I love my N900 because it is super functional without ever opening the "store", and using only the FLOSS in the repos, i.e. the 'ecosystem'. I use unison to sync my tomboy notes with conboy, use gpodder a lot (unfortunately some servers have upgraded SSL and I can no longer download episodes from those servers due to an SSL error.) I appreciate the plugin frameworks for IM and VOIP; I had been using it for skype calls and I use 'hangouts' via gtalk. (Of all the issues I have with Google, I have to say that using their IM using an open protocol makes me happy.) I also like the user replaceable battery, the fact that I can take it apart (I should replace the keyboard but I have not found a source that does not charge more for shipping than the keyboard itself; I'm in Canada) and the durability is a real plus. I've dropped it sooo many times and it seems rock solid. I do appreciate the hardware keyboard, but I could survive without it (using a BT keyboard).

I think it will fail soon because I've been having difficulty with the SIM connection which seems to be intermittent; i.e. it sometimes can't communicate with the SIM and I get disconnected from the cell network). This happened twice in the last week, but I'm thinking now it could be occurring when the phone gets damp... Both times it happened when it was in a wet pocket in the rain, but the problem persisted for hours.

I had been following sailfish but it seems N900 folks are not so happy about that; how come? Other than the lack of HW keyboard...

I have a droid tablet I will eventually switch to Lineage to see what that is like, but my tablet use is much more media oriented and I do use (proprietary) streaming apps on there (and hangouts). I find the software in fdroid much more buggy than I'm used to.

So what do people like in terms of a functional phone with a strong FLOSS ecosystem? One that plays nice with my Linux machines would be good (I have my desktop unison package pinned to a super old version to keep the N900 syncing working).

Aside: I'm running CSSU Stable since this is my main phone, has everyone else switched to the CSSU Testing? would it be considered "stable" at this point? I did not know about Leste! That is exciting news.

It's nice to hear so many people are still using their N900s!

I'll keep along and hope this SIM problem does not return if I keep my N900 more dry...