I've been a faithful Palm user for about 5 years. I'm fed up with the lack of interesting hardware (and software) from Palm. And to make matters worse my Zodiac 2 is slowly on its last limb with digitizer drift.

I've been looking at the Nokia 770 very closely recently and I really like the device. It has everything I want in a compact design. However I hate the RSMMC slot because I have a bunch of SD cards I use a lot. Won't be a problem because I'll go out and buy a new card.

Anywho I'm interested in running some of my favorite linux applications on the Nokia 770 and I'm hoping for it to completely replace my Zodiac 2 in terms of PIM, Graphing Calculator, music player, and mobile office.

So far I've found a descent PIM suite and the internal music player will play everything except my OGG encoded music (grr).

What's going on with the mobile office situation? Last I checked GNumeric and Abiword have been ported, but Abiword is lacking many of the basic options of the desktop version. Is there anyhope for a mini version of open office?

Thanks for your help guys. I'm trying to decide my next device and this will be a great help to me.

Welcome to the forums, frenchie.
I can say without a doubt, that i don't regret buying a nokia 770.
I too, like you own a zodiac, and it's great for watching movies, but one device can't do it all. If you want mobile Wifi, and surfing, get a 770. If you want movies and music, get an ipod or zodiac.

One device can't do everything

I used Palm for close to ten years, so there!

Wait a minute, maybe I shouldn't be proud of that fact. Seriously, I would caution you about how you proceed with your comparisons of the Palm devices with the 770. They are very, very different. First and foremost, the 770 is not a PDA, in fact, many think is does very poorly in that respect. I was ecstatic when I bought a Tungsten C--gorgeous screen and built-in Wi-Fi and a H/W keyboard thrown in. What I was after at that point was a portable browser and media player. Ooops, no stereo headset and no way to get one. The SD card is limited to 1 GB, the list goes on...

Finally, the T|X came out and I thought I was there. After fooling for a week with it to get it to DUN with my CDMA phone I sent it back vowing never to Palm again.

The 770 has a great (not quite as beutiful as the Palms, but much larger) screen and does everything I want--BT DUN to my phone, high-speed Wi-Fi, super interface (I grew up with Unix and my desktops/laptop are Macs) and completely open. Although I thought the 770 would be trip machine I find myself in bed with it browsing between commercials on TV. I have a 1GB SD card from my Palm experiments that I just got interfaced to the 770 that I will use to carry full-length movies on plane flights. As for music, at my age I cannot tell the difference between an iPod or the 770 from a sound quality standpoint, so even that aspect is great!

Finally, one reviewer said the 770 looked like a early vintage Star Trek communicator. Having watched all those episodes when they first aired, I thought the clown was heralding the 770 until I looked closer--no matter, I like the fact that I can ask for a beam up with it.

Hi there; here are a few more comments on your post.

Which one? I'm happy so far with JPilot, but I don't use it very heavily.

You can download an OGG player from the Maemo application catalog. Playback is not as smooth as MP3, because it uses the CPU and not the DSP, but it's easily good enough for me.

My experience is that the Gnumeric port is fine. It's annoying because the virtual KB doesn't pop up when you click in a cell - you have to click in the entry widget up top instead - and because when the KB does come up all the characters are shifted - which means you have to click the shift-change button before you can type in numbers! But it basically works.

The Abiword port, on the other hand, didn't work for me at all, when I tried to use it to open a Word doc.

Regards - Neil

As people have mentioned, the 770 is pretty much in it's own class. One of the downfalls of it's acceptance is that it does a little bit of everything but perhaps not as well as dedicated devices.

I apologize for not having time to dig for links as I'm at work but check out Deja PIM. It's free, though if you want to use their services for synching there's a nominal monthly fee. I've used it on and off and it suited my needs just fine and didn't seem buggy at all.

So far as a graphing calculator, I seem to recall a project where someone emulated a Texas Instruments graphing calculator (complete with scanned graphic of the hardware) and slapped it on the 770. Check www.maemo.org and root around the apps section (most likely in the Work In Progress section).

I've said, and will still say, if you want a full fledged Office Suit, get a laptop. Gnumeric has worked great for me but it still hasn't been completely converted to the 770's interface so some menus are a bit scrunched and illegible. I haven't tried AbiWord but I can't imagine using the 770 to hammer out a document several pages long... even with a bluetooth keyboard I personally wouldn't mind formatting it later. That's me tho.

Otherwise, from my experiences, I love this little thing! There are more and more apps being ported/written every week that keep giving it a new lease on life. There's a new edition of the OS due out this month and I think a lot of devs are holding back until that comes out (there are changes which make current apps incompatible with it. This can be fixed of course but that's an issue of free time to do it)

I'd recommend hopping down to a CompUSA if you're in the U.S. and trying one hands on. I drove to Michigan from Toronto to get one and don't regret the trip for a second. And I hate Michigan.

Thanks guys you've been great.

I know that the 770 is in a class all of its own. I've seen a lot of arguments about that here But nonetheless I want to be able to carry around 1 less device.

Well you see I want to be able to make quick edits here and there on the go. I mean I've never bothered worknig out an entire essay on my Zodiac in Docs to Go. It's too much of a hassal.

The GPE suite looks as good as it is going to get. I've used PIM suites for pretty much all handheld OS (except linux) and i'm up for a new challenge and experiance.

The TI emulator looks like it could be a promising solution. I'll watch that.

I'd love to go to a CompUSA and see the Nokia 770, but the nearest one is in Cleveland which is an hour drive away (yes life without a CompUSA really stinks).

I like to carry around one device at a time. And the 770 looks like it can handle most of my music . I'll just reencode my OGG files or wait for a better music player.

Mike, whereever he may be, knows me quite well ;-) Little shotout to you buddy,

As many Palm users learn, but we can do our best to achieve a near nirvana like state!

Twomore questions: With the OS update will we see more linux programs appear on the Maemo page and what's the deal with 2gb RSMMC cards?

Thanks again!

Edit: @Hedgecore You know there's a CompUSA in Buffelo right?

Yup, but there's only one. Michigan was the best bet for us because there were 6 of them within an hours' drive of eachother and we didn't want to come back empty handed. We screwed up and ended up missing the exit in Detroit and found ourselves near the Troy one... lucky, because they had two. We each got one and charged them up in a Krispie Kream. That was the good news. The bad news was we had to drink the coffee while they were charging. *shiver* I also risked a doughnut. My Canadian system can't take that kinda sugar shock, I was flying.