Man, i guess i was wrong about this product :

http://www.handhelditems.com/transmi...-p-125627.html

It's not their fault, they claimed it's compatible for IPhones, not for N900, i just thought it would work for N900
Well the FM transmitter works, but there are other problems :

1. N900 is too fat. lol. The holder is just not strong enough to give stable support when you're pressing the touchscreen.. The holder is a bit weak IMO..
2. You can't charge using the USB slot because the USB type is different, thus there's no way to charge using this thing
3. The audio quality seems to be worse than the built in FM transmitter.

Oh well hopefully i can sell this to my friends

I have got a passive Brodit mount. At the beginning it was fine, but now the power button is pressed when i insert my N900 complete.

I have got a passive Brodit mount. At the beginning it was fine, but now the power button is pressed when I completely insert my N900, too.

Well my PDAir case and windscreen mount arrived today from Hong Kong. Initial impressions...

The case itself feels solid and like a quality product, it comes in a nice presentation box with a removeable belt clip attachment.

The case is hinged along the bottom edge. I can see why they've done it, because the top is mostly open but it's a little annoying as it hangs down. The case must be open if you wish to slide the screen up, the phone is still held securely in the case even when it is open.

The belt clip attachment itself is a little annoying as it protrudes by about 1CM and makes it a little awkward to hold, it also protrudues about 2mm too far to line up with the little stand so the phone wobbles while typing or touching the screen. It's an improvement on just the camera stand which makes the phone fall over when you touch the screen. You could probably file the edge of the belt clip to a little flat angle and make it into a very good stand.

The belt clip supplied with the case is incompatible with the windscreen mount. The windscreen mount comes with a special octagonal one. I'm guessing this is to hold the phone stably. It seems to hold it fairly well though I have not tried it in a car yet.

Digression but today I also had a decent car audio install done, and sadly it's shown up just how crap the analogue output on the N900 is. I'm going to stick to burning MP3 CDs until I get some head unit that can use USB mass storage.

With careful positioning of the windscreen mount it may well be possible to use this for recording video while driving, you have to bend it to the extreme right of the phone though, at which point it may not be stable enough for filming. If you can handle having the suction cup in view on the edge of the screen, filming should be fine. Just need an app now that does a continuous loop style recording, discarding footage over 10 minutes old and providing a "that **** just pulled in front of me and slammed on the brakes" button to archive the footage to a safe location.

I took some pictures, please excuse the poor quality but I was using the works Nokia 6303 which has a terrible camera.

Well I took the car out for a spin with the phone mounted. As I suspected the mount vibrates too much really, however with something to stabilise it (I'm thinking a blob of blu-tac) then I think it should work.

I took a run down a single track lane in the evening, still daylight but not much. The lane is full of ruts and potholes and dark sections due to being completely covered with trees, to see how well the camera reacts to changes in light.

The first video is in "Automatic" mode (ie. day mode) and worked reasonably well: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PuZevxNOYKk

"Night mode" seems to mean lower frame rate and longer exposure. This exacerbated the effects of the vibration, it looks pretty cool but it's not particularly useful: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0Qaxs41swI

Lessons learned:

Vibration really ruins the image quality.
The few static shots show that the picture quality could be quite good once the vibration is dealt with.
The audio quality isn't bad at all.
The projection headlights work much better with the N900 cam than the halogen high beams. HIDs would probably work better still.
In order to mount the phone where it isn't obstructing my vision, a lot of screen space is lost to the dashboard and wiper blade. This can be fixed by cropping the bottom and calling it "ultra widescreen".
Also as a result of this the phone is positioned quite far forward giving a narrower field of view and can't show where the driver is looking. This doesn't matter if the intent is to defend against common insurance scams though.
I need new brake discs (that's what the squeeling is. They are still safe and legal though)
I also need to clean my windscreen.
Caerphilly council really need to resurface Troed-y-rhiw Road. No wonder everyone is buying 4x4s you need one just to clear the bloody pot-holes.

All in all, I think it warrants further investigation. I'll come up with way to stabilise the mount and try again soon.

Fixed the vibration issue with the PDAir mount using an innovative and inexpensive vibration dampening product:



Now that that's sorted, you can get a decent recording:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6_uA59FtVHw

Biggest problem is numberplates are still not readable, and probably never will be. But with the addition of accelerometer data and GPS data (which is timestamped) it should be enough for insurance purposes.

Has anyone seen one of these?
http://www.kidigi.com/product_lv2.php?pid=1128

Looks interesting....
Link to store
http://www.4u-mobi.com/onlineshop/on...t.php?ssid=428

hmm..

Portrait only
No access to keyboard
No access to headphone socket (ie. to use as a music player or for hands free audio)

Fail.

Might be ok if you use bluetooth handsfree / music though.

Looks like it has a swivel, and the audio jack is on the charger. As for keyboard I think you are correct.

Rotating that 90 degrees would make me nervous. Turn right too hard and you may end up picking up bits of N900 from the side of the road, or at least hitting your passenger in a painful area (RHD cars only)