Hey everyone... I've been following reviews of the N800 since its introduction, but I have lots of questions that the reviews are leaving unanswered. For the past several years I've been a happy Mac user (a few of you may know me as atomicbartbeans from AppleNova); my computer use consists mostly of the interwebs, photography, IM, email, and music... nothing too processor-intensive or complicated. This is why I'm really starting to like the N800: it seems to be a competent alternative for lugging ye olde lappy around.

Right now I'm about $40 short of affording a N800, but I'll have plenty enough within a week (I'm a high school senior working at Burger King), and I need to make a decision. Sooo, that's where you guys come in; this forum seems like an awesome place to play the newbie. I know that I'm asking lots of questions, but even answering a few of them would really help.

Now, in no particular order...

1. Just how solid is AIM contact support via Jabber? This morning I set up a transport server with my Google Talk account; I played around with it using Psi and it seems okay, but how well does the N800 support the various nuances of instant messaging... Away messages? User profiles? Notifying me when somebody sends an IM and I'm in another application? Adding/deleting buddies? Maybe file transfers?

2. Can the web browser upload from/download to mounted SD cards? It would be really neat if I could walk around snapping pictures with my Casio Exilim, then swap the SD card into the N800 and upload them to Flickr. And a related question: does the N800's image viewer have the capability to resize images and save them? If not, it's no big deal (I can resize them on the camera), but it'd be really neat if I could scale down huge images on the device itself.

3. How good is text input? I'm kind of expecting it to be roughly on par with a Palm OS device; am I getting the wrong idea?

4. How solid is the WiFi configuration UI? My town is full of open networks, but walking around means switching networks often... how long does it take to select a network and connect? Is there an option to automatically select and connect to any available networks? Also, my home network is WPA-encrypted; does the N800 support WPA?

5. How does power management work? Or rather, does the device have a "sleep" command or do I have to boot it every time I whip it out?

6. Could someone please post a screenshot of the N800 (or 770, I s'pose) rendering Digg?

7. Does the included media player have a mode for sitting in your pocket and playing music? For this to happen, the display and touch screen would need to shut off (to save power and prevent accidental input), and the d-pad would stay active to change songs and pause. Maybe this is just a pipe dream, but it would really come in handy for when I don't want to lug around ye olde iPod.

8. How good is VNC support? I know controlling a "real" computer from the N800 would be a little cumbersome due to the relatively small screen, but it would be really handy to check up on the iBook while out of the house.

9. Does the N800's UI feel sexy? If you use OS X, you'll know what I'm talking about... it would be really helpful if you guys kept a page of UI screenshots.

10. When will somebody write an app that allows the N800 to take still pictures? As of now, this is the biggest thing turning me off from making a purchase... what the hell is Nokia thinking; designing a svelte, integrated camera that doesn't (yet) take VGA-quality photos?

11. Does the device have an editable hosts file? I really enjoy surfing ad-free...

12. What advice would you give to a new member of these fora? Any posting guidelines, traditions, infamous members, rules of etiquette, or inside jokes I should know about?

13. How many of you guys actually post here from your N800/770? I noticed that this site is the proper width for viewing on a 800-pixel-wide screen...

Thanks for reading my sort-of-long post... and thanks in advance for helping me out!

Holy cow... lol. That's quite a laundry list.

I'm not being facetious or dismissive, but all of your questions are already answered in various posts here. Yes, finding them is a lot of work on your part, but answering them over and over again is a lot of work on everyone else's.

Offhand I'd say you'd be satisfied with the N800, with minor caveats (such as the current lack of a custom-fitting hard cover). The GAIM client has worked well for me with AOL, MSN and Yahoo (just not for sametime). I don't consider the UI sexy, but the functional aspects satisfy me and appear to satisfy most users. If nothing else, you have a return window so give it a shot!

EDIT: specific to the camera question, the feature is first and foremost a webcam, hence that functionality satisfied first. There's nothing keeping developers from adding still shot capability, but you will be dissatisfied with the results. Quality of images was sacrificed for general usability.

3. Virtual keyboard: I would say the N800 is better than the Palm vk, as there's a numerical keypad right there, and word completion (with configurable two-language support - good for me, I can enter text in my native language or English without having to reconfigure)
3. Handwriting: Don't know (I can't handwrite, full stop). Presumably Graffiti is the better one, but I wouldn't know.

4. WAP is there. I tend to sit down, so won't comment on walking..

5. The power management is excellent, IMO. Leave it on. Screen goes off, wi-fi stays on, it doesn't suck power! (Which, from my PDA years, is astonishing to the extreme.)

6. Don't have a screenshot app installed, but digg.com looks very good, just as on your desktop (1/3 of the right-hand info column needs horiziontal scrolling to be seen, when the display is in 100% zoom mode. 80% zoom shows more than full screen, but will need a kid's eyes to watch (go close enough).
Slashdot isn't as good, because Slashdot has all text in a narrow column at the center of the screen, and we don't have screen rotation in the N800 (yet?) Slashdot is optimized for portrait screens, not landscape. I prefer the mobile version (slashdot/palm/), also because I tend to read it where I only have phone connection (where I pay by the byte).
There's a mode in the browser that can squeeze all text into the display, however much you zoom, this works great on some sites but for Slashdot it doesn't.

7. Just lock the keys and screen and stuff the N800 into your pocket. I have the internet radio (over wi-fi) in this mode as I'm writing.

11. It's got an /etc/hosts file, can't see why it couldn't be edited. It's Debian, after all. As for ad-free surfing, just install privoxy (it's an available package). Then set the proxy (down in the 'advanced' settings) to 127.0.0.1, port 8118 and you have privoxy filtering. However, proxy has to be set on connection setups, there's no option in Opera (as I know of), thus it can only be used for access points where you have stored the setup (e.g. home, work, BT/mobile phone).
I have it set on my BT/Phone connection setup, to save on amount of data downloaded through gprs, and for work I have two configurations for the same wi-fi network: One with privoxy, one without.

13. I don't.. haven't tried, really. Mostly because the volume of new posts is so high here, I keep dozens of windows open. But I've also heard that ironically itt isn't the most N800/770-friendly website out there.. (unlike e.g. google mail, which is excellent.)

Thanks for the info!

Yeah, I should search the forums rather than asking already-answered questions; you guys are so helpful though.

The following are based on personal knowledge of the 770 augmented with some knowledge of the 800.

1. Just how solid is AIM contact support via Jabber? GAIM works nicely. The built-in client does not quite handle the nuances of AIM, and you can blame some of that on Jabber transports and some of that on the client.

2. Can the web browser upload from/download to mounted SD cards? Easily.

3. How good is text input? My handwriting is barely legible to begin with --- the virtual keyboard is worlds better compared to the PalmOS and Windows Mobile built-in equivalents. The thumb keyboard works fairly well for short e-mails.

4. How solid is the WiFi configuration UI? Network connection configuration is straightforward. WPA PSK is supported and works fine. Automatically connecting to networks is a configurable feature.

5. How does power management work? There's hard-off and sleep modes: waking up from sleep takes a fraction of a moment.

6. Could someone please post a screenshot of the N800 (or 770, I s'pose) rendering Digg? I don't have the screenshot app installed at the moment. I highly recommend Skweezer (www.skweezer.com) for all noisy pages: you can try it out on your PC and get a pretty fair idea of how it'll look.

7. Does the included media player have a mode for sitting in your pocket and playing music? The screen lock also locks the keys, but the music player will continue.

8. How good is VNC support? Flawless, although some 3rd-party VNC servers that have caused trouble in the past.

9. Does the N800's UI feel sexy? Defining sexy in those terms, yes, some applications and components are very well designed. You'll spend a vanishingly small amount of time dealing with the OS/UI compared to the amount of time you'll spend inside the web browser. Canola's probably what you're looking for.

10. When will somebody write an app that allows the N800 to take still pictures? The developer codes were just distributed over the last week. Development for the N800 has barely begun as a result --- this will change as shipments arrive!

11. Does the device have an editable hosts file? Yes, but Privoxy is a far more elegant solution

12. What advice would you give to a new member of these fora? Read the 800 and 770 reviews and avoid repeating any complaints mentioned. By and large, the forum is made up of reasonably satisfied 770 users: bashing the device, especially about features it wasn't intended to have, is a quick way to get dismissed. The natives are much friendlier and generally more responsive than those of most forums I've had to frequent, and I'd like to see it stay that way

13. How many of you guys actually post here from your N800/770? Not since I had to return my bluetooth keyboard.

Aleksandyr, thanks for your help... this thread is proving quite informative.

I just have a few more questions whose answers couldn't be found elsewhere on these fora...

14. Will Gaim/Google Talk alert me (audibly and/or visually) if I receive messages while in other applications? A typical scenario would be browsing the web with several IM windows open; I don't want new messages to pile up without being notified.

15. Are the icons on the left-hand side of the screen editable? I really don't care much about the N800's built-in email app or contact list, and I'd much rather have an icon for Gaim there (in addition to the web browser).

16. Is there a system-wide cut & paste service? Pretty self-explanatory...

17. Are links in Gaim (and Google Talk) clickable? For example, if somebody IMs me a link; does tapping it take me there in Opera?

meep... did I say something wrong?

Soo, I ordered the N800 today ()... I guess I'll answer these questions for myself when it comes tomorrowish.

Does "next day shipping" really mean the *next* day?

Should be here in about 12 hours (order placed at 3:45 this afternoon), although i won't get home until ~3 PM EST.

Bleh, one more question... how do I reflash the N800 to the newest update using my iBook? Nokia's software update program doesn't mention any OS X compatibility...