Let me put the "normal use" into context:

I don't use any virtual memory, and I can't see any evidence of the tablet behaving oddly or doing anything it shouldn't. No slowdowns, no crashes, no "why did it do that?" moments. The tablet is actually one of the most stable devices I use, which is part of the reason I'm a big fan.

To be fair I very rarely multitask, and like I said before I only use the built-in apps or the occasional app from maemo.org/downloads. I'm not anywhere near pushing the tablet to its limits. I try to keep the tablet as "plain vanilla" as possible because I use it in the ITS videos.

If you really did need virtual memory just for basic operation, surely I should have noticed something going wrong by now, after over half a year of ownership?



I don't get it...

I suspect a lot more "normal" people multitask than you think, and, honestly, where's the harm in enabling it? Why bank on "Well, hopefully they wont push the limits at all"? Better to assume some of them will and recommend using swap when, at worst, the ones that don't wont see any harm (with 2GB SD cards running in the $10 range, 128MB is a drop in the bucket) from it and may even see some speedup.

Fun with minimum character thresholds.

I couldn't agree more. I use my N800 like a mobile office and a multi-tasking "iPod Touch." All I need is my cell phone and the N800 and I'm in the office. My laptop is getting lonely these days. I have a 2GB in the internal and a 4GB in the external. The internal doesn't really have anything on it and the external has my tunes. Next, I'll get an 8 or 16GB for the internal and just put everything on it. Maybe put movies I want to watch on a trip on the external?

Recently I took the N800 to a media seminar at a university. Students go from desk to desk asking questions about our various fields. The N800 drew more attention that me. lol As it should be. I was able to play examples of my work. But, the media people were all over it. My friend with an iPod Touch was showing how he could flip through his album covers and I was showing how I could be listening to an internet radio station, check my e-mail and surf the web at the same time.

Enjoy!