Can anybody name ONE MID/UMPC/Tablet device under $500 and still pocketable?

exactly

PLEASE TELL US SOMETHING ABOUT THE N810's SUCCESSOR, NOKIA!

is it faster? the same? what cool new stuff?

NIT's ftw.

I think a UMPC/Tablet has a 5" or larger screen and so not pockatable by definition.

The first we're gonna hear about it will be any FCC docs. Nokia doesn't comment on future software/hardware plans.

The only thing we had for the N810 were the prototype spyshots that showed up on Engadget during the summer and the basically useless FCC info. N800 was even worse, I don't think anybody outside of Nokia knew it was coming until it hit.

UMPC also comes with higher spec (harddrives, x86 cpu, etc) which in turn gives them lackluster battery performances. Technically not in the same class, although they may have overlapping functionalities to some crowd.

Pandora. Obviously.

Indeed.

Come july, nobody will care...

n800's are overpriced as hell; anybody found any for under $200 (that arent refurbs)?

Mmm . . . I don't buy it, not in the least. Don't make the mistake of thinking your personal views are shared by the rest of the world.

Assuming they stick with anything that's close to the concept renders, it's gonna be uglier than sin—not anything that I'd be willing to be seen with in public (and I've heard the same sentiments from more than a few others). This alone is gonna have a big effect on its desirability to most people (as you can see with the much-less-eye-offensive, but still stylistically lacking, N800).

Now, despite its aesthetic deficiencies, is the hardware impressive? Sure—OMAP3 is a force to be reckoned with, the controls look great, and (assuming it actually works out) OpenGL will be a major win, but the software is another area where things fall down (at least when you're doing a direct comparison to the NITs). It's gonna ship with what amounts to a game loader, nothing more. So that basically eliminates any interest from real consumers (and a large amount of power users and developers, too). Sure, you can (maybe?) install Debian on it, but that's not really something the vast majority of people are interested (and, depending on what's required, capable of) doing.

So, what you've got is a fantastic, but horrifyingly ugly, piece of hardware with pretty decent gaming controls and software that only really appeals to hardcore emulator players—it really doesn't compete all that well with the NITs.

Either way, July is a long way off, and I'd like to see what Nokia has up their sleeves first.

Quite so, but perhaps for slightly different reasons, i.e. not necessarily Pandora related.

According to this there will be 10 MID’s out before August
http://www.carrypad.com/2008/03/mobi...ebit-2008.html
and another 10-20 coming after that and before the end of the year.

including this one, Gigabyte M528,
http://www.umpcportal.com/modules/ne...p?storyid=1323

Korea is taking this market very seriously and has set up its own mobile internet device alliance (MIDA)
http://english.etnews.co.kr/news/det...d=200803210001

What will Nokia be doing by then? It will be interesting to see, of course, but I suspect that Nokia’s effort may no longer carry the same overwhelming significance to us all that it does at this moment.

AFAIK, there is no competition currently but it seems that it won’t be long before Nokia’s (squandered?) monopoly position comes to an end.

Yup. The Gigabyte/Aigo MID looks very compelling. If it has decent performance, battery, and a good solid standard Linux base (ubuntu mobile would be a good one) ... for a price comparable to the N810W and whatever Nokia releases next ... it'll be hard to pass up. Especially since there's no WiMAX here, but there is HSPA (the gigabyte page on umpc portal says it'll have HSPA).

I'm not so big on the Pandora ... the form factor might be good for gaming, but I'm not sure it's good for PDA/Internet-Tablet/MID general use.

But yeah. I hope Nokia isn't resting on its laurels wrt the MIDs.

The speculation that it is continues to astound me.