Yeah, you're right. But, in my case, I really don't want the contract or the BIG monthly payment. I could be persuaded, however, if the power of the phone and the cost of the plan was cheap enough.

I was glad, however, to see stkeeps reply, and that my supposition is correct. If you look at all of the activity on these talk boards over the past years, you could plot a chart and show the sharp drop in posts by those that got one of the 300 demo units. They must be pretty good, otherwise they'd be putting them down and logging in, maybe even to help with Mer.

For me, Mer is a last effort to keep my willingness to not buy a new device. My N810 was my xmas gift last year, I wanted an MP3 player with video capabilities, and found it for 125 bucks on ebay. Little did I know what I was really getting into, as now I have Linux on all of my machines at home, along with vista :-().

Right now I carry an mp3 player (sansa fuze), a net10 cell phone that costs me 15 bucks a month, and my N810. I'm feeling like it's time to consolidate devices, but was waiting for these TI drivers to see if they could help hold me off from a purchase until I start seeing N900's on ebay for 200 bucks. There are too many powerful MIDs out there that are a little bigger, that are in the 400-600 range. I'd buy one of those before an N900. I'm sure there are plenty of others out there just like me drooling for that all in one device with no contract, or maybe a minimal contract if you want just basic phone service. I'm fine with spotty wifi when traveling, along with good wifi at home and work.

I tried Mer 15, and thought it was very promising, .16 didn't install cleanly so I bagged it hearing it wasn't much different than .15, and then I read about the TI drivers so I think I'll wait...but not months.