Becomeroot
Second snafu: FBreader crashed my tablet! WTF?? I opened Preferences to set the keys to my liking and the thing rebooted. It hasn't happened again and I managed to get my keys configured, but this does not bode well...
Fourth problem: Softpoweroff does NOT work. I edited mce.ini to invoke sofpoweroff on longkeypress (being careful here and leaving shortkeypress alone) on the power button, rebooted and tried it: long keypress forces offline mode, does not lock screen and keys.
Major bummer, but I had sorta expected this: Nokia drones claim the softpoweroff issue has been resolved, but it seems it's quite prudent not to believe them. I can use "lock keys and screen" from the menu, but it's less power efficient than softpoweroff which, in view of the next point, is troubling.
Sixth dégoût: Application Mangler hasn't improved at all AFAICS:
It stalled twice already and it appears to happily add repositories that contain nothing but incompatible applications. Not nice, but then again not unexpected either.
I didn't notice the speed enhancements people keep shouting about, but I didn't anticipate them either, so no loss there. I'll wait and see; if not at least three of my personal annoyances get solved in the next two weeks, I'm probably going to mothball this thing and just wait for a Pandora.