I had bought a Sandisk e280 for MP3 use 6 weeks before I bought the N800.

You can replace the original firmware with Rockbox.

http://www.rockbox.org

It's cool stuff. It lets you play movies... or read books... or play doom.. all on the 1.5" screen on the MP3 player.

Of course doing all of those things is exactly the reason a "smart phone" is not acceptable to me. You can browse or read PDF files on a phone.. but the screen is so small it's not comfortable.

The very reason the N800 is needed. (And why an iPod touch or iPhone is NOT acceptable... even if the Apple advocates think it is.)

Personally I think a slightly larger internet tablet would be okay. The size of a paperback book is acceptable.

ANYWAY: I find I still have a use for my MP3 player... I use it to listen to music. I can use the N800... but it's bulky for the gym and the battery doesn't last as long.

But I'm considering removing rockbox... I have no need for anything but music playing on that device. And the original firmware has the best battery life.

But I must give kudos to the Rockbox people... they have done a great job for what they have done. When I toyed with Rockbox I thought it was very very VERY cool. (And it still is. But with the N800... I have no use for it.)

Ergo my subject title: The N800 ruined Rockbox for me.

I actually had a play with an iPhone today and the screen wasn't too bad to be honest. Seemed similar to the 770/N800 in terms of what one could see (I understand the dpi and resolution is lower). The UI was very snazzy, but it was a bit slow.

I use rockbox on my iriver, works well (though looks a bit utilitarian) as it's able to do on-the-fly playlists unlike the standard firmware.

I haved used Rockbox for quite awhile, since the my Archos 10gb Studio. I should be getting a Sansa e280 in the next few days. Rockbox is probably the 3rd thing I'll do to it, after opening then charging it. I was wanting something smaller and flash based that I can use when mowing the lawn, exercising etc... and buy.com had a decent deal on them.

Rockbox has a very good user community also and works very well on different devices. There is a little overlap on functionality between these 2 devices but each can be useful in different situations.

I ran Rockbox on my Sansa e280 for about 4 months. The added functionality was nice but it was the battery life, USB and database issues that put me back with the stock firmware. It's been a while since I've checked it out. I'm sorry to hear the battery life is still an issue.

If it's not pocketable, it's not acceptable. After several years of experience in the book industry, I can state with confidence that paperbacks books are not pocketable.

Paperback books have the advantage that they can be dropped from great heights and/or left in a bag without protection and still work though

I wouldn't mind something with a bigger screen, more the size of the Psion Series 5 - this was only pocketable with very large pockets, but had a usefully large screen. Perhaps it's just my eyes....?

Hehe, I had a Newton that fit a similar description and I don't want to go back to that.

It's a bit of a trade off isn't it; for an ebook reader I'd like something at least as large as a paperback book, for a phone I'd like something as small as possible (as I just use it as a phone and alarm/calender reminder), and for a pda a size somewhere in the middle ground between usability and portability.

I'm not sure the whole device convergence thing will ever work for me.