simple solution for getting google contacts to your device:

www.nuevasync.com

Have you tried pulling the battery out and putting it back in &&&&& Charging it using the phone charger instead of the USB cable. Not sure if you know this a lot of front port on PCs dont have enough power going through them to charge the N900. Especially when the screen is lit. & if you haven't got the charger try plugging it into the back of the PC. Remember some usb adapters that you can use to charge your phone won't work because it transmits data down the wrong line(s)?.?.? Or something like that which makes it beleive it's a computer which won't charge but will show the light glowing. I'd reccomend this before flashing could save time.

Just charge the phone with the wall charger, if you bought the N900 as new, you should have the manuals - please do read them, atleast the first steps... The charging process is already described in this thread somewhat. After a full charge, just try to start it up.
The phone probably did not have enough power at your first sync, and your comp did not provide enough to charge it, so overnight it emptied the battery. This might have messed up something in your phone, but I hope not.
Also, the sooner you update to PR1.3 the better - I suggest that you try to flash the phone even before you install anything else. 1.3 has improved lots, usability and google sync support is improved. Also Ovi Suite support is better.

As I said in my first post:

"So, I plugged it into my wall usb cable for two days (I had other stuff happening and couldn't get back to it)."

Wall usb cable=wall USB charger (in case that wasn't clear).

So, yes, I have charged it on the wall USB charger. It's still been unwilling to boot up since after charging on my wall charger.

Finally, I have removed the battery and let it sit for 30 minutes one period, and an hour for another period. Maybe I have to let it sit longer? But, an hour seems like it ought to be enough for any lingering electricity to discharge.

Update:
I charged on my wall USB charger again last night. It's still won't go past the sequence of the black screen with the white dots. I do notice it makes a very quiet "ding" or "chirp" noise before the screen powers off. Not sure if that's important.

I can't use my old laptop, it's on the fritz right now. My new laptop has been loaned out for a couple weeks. So the only computer I can use to communicate with the phone is my work PC (Windows XP). I don't have admin rights on the work machine, nor would my superiors be comfortable with me using a linux livecd at work.

Is there something I can do to troubleshoot the issue on Windows XP without admin rights? The Windows flasher at http://tablets-dev.nokia.com/maemo-d...-downloads.php requires admin privs to install.

My advice is for you to try and use someone elses computer maybe a parents or a mates??. As for work i doubt you'd be able to use the work desktop abnd get away with it. Unless your in a secluded area of course. If you know what your doing and how to flash you'd beable to get throught the whole process in about 10 mins. But you have to be super stealth like 007 lol.

Thank you to everyone who tried to respond. I finally gave up and sent the phone back to Amazon. They mailed a new one and it's working fine (so far, still on the first day of fiddling).

It's a nice little unit now that it's working. It will take some getting used to.

I really hate the screen protector. This is my first phone to have a scratch-prone screen. If that's the worst of the experience I think that will be a good sign .