Smoku,

It is possible to agree and disagree at the same time, you know. Far from sitting on the fence on this one, I'm trying to burn the damn fence down:

Far from being a victim of Nokia's marketing, I have simply spent time getting to know my N900 and trying out new concepts. As a pure PHONE nothing will ever replace good, old-fashioned physical buttons for ease of use in my book because they offer tactile feedback - I could unlock and speed-dial my old 6210 Navigator blindfolded.

However, my N900 allows for multiple desktop contact icons and widgets like K9 Call and MyContacts allows dialling options way beyond anything I have ever seen.

Phone Speaker Switch allows me to automatically activate the excellent loudspeakers when I open the slide to search for a contact or open Conboy whilst on a call. Recaller allows me to replay & review all my old calls (unless I'm on BT headset)

These are real, tangible and valuable improvements in the PHONE that my friends' devices just cannot compete with - so I'm afraid your argument just does not hold water with me.

I have even been largely untroubled by the incoming call bug reported elsewhere. I can get a solid signal when other manufacturer's devices fail. Maybe I am lucky, but I am certainly not stupid...

To me N900 is a very good phone that can do so much more courtesy of its computing and input abilities (resistive touchscreen, physical buttons).

To you it may be something else - but these are our opinions and we should respect them mutually. What is fact is that N900 is almost universally regarded as a PHONE and is inevitably and almost universally compared to other PHONES by manufacturers, retailers, media, prospective and existing owners alike.

I just don't think we need to make excuses for it being a 'bad' phone anymore.

A zebra may not be a horse, but they are of the same Equine genus. There are people who have broken them, saddled them, and ridden them.

Incidentally, the word Zebra derives from the old Portugese word for 'Wild ***' - something you may care to reflect on...