Hi my n810 is on the way shipping to me and i would like to know is its GPS free??? or do you have to pay monthly fee for it??? from the research i found that the N810's gps is very slow, at this point, are there any solutions to improve it reception ability?? thanks much!

im considering to return it if the gps isn't free to use and get a nokia e71 or N82 instead, they almost has everything thing that N810 had, only draw back is the small screen that is inconvenience for web browsing.....should i change it to e71/ N82 instead of keeping the N810?

p.s. i do know that N810 is not a cell phone

GPS time to first fix is slow, very slow, but once it's fixed, the signal is strong.
Time to first fix has much improved (at least for me) with A-GPS introduced in Diablo. A-GPS allows the GPS to know which sattelites should be in sight, which reduces a lot the time of search.
With A-GPS enabled it's fairly descent, as far as I know about GPSs.

About the monthly fee now.
You've got 2 options:
1) The included Wayfinder app (aka Map), which has a monthly fee (the price is ok IMO). It's a closed source app with propriatary maps included. That's why you have to pay.
It does a very good job at navigating and I recommend it very much. Simple to use and fast.
2) Maemo Mapper. It's an open source map viewer. It's free. Unlike Wayfinder, it doesn't include maps. Maps have to be downloaded (from google maps or openstreetmap for example) on the go. To use it as a real navigation system, you have to be connected (through your phone) to the internet so it can download maps and routes.
It is an awesome piece of software, which does good navigation and has a lot of options.

If you have a good data plan on your phone, use mapper. If you don't want to rely on an internet connection, use Wayfinder.

My 2cts.

The GPS itself is free. It may take some time to acquire an initial lock, but once it has a lock, it's stable.
For the latest firmware you can download and install the A-GPS software which helps speeding up the initial lock time.

If you need navigation and voice guiding you can pay a fee to unlock the Wayfinder navigation features of the maps software.

isn't there any way to get the maemo mapper to work w/o the internet? ex: can i download the map from a start point to the destination before travel and use it on the road ????

Yes you can, and this is in fact the way I mostly use MaemoMapper. You can even download route while at home, and it will guide you through the path without having Internet connection. The catch is that if you do get lost from your route it can not recalculate you new route.

can u download the map of whole USA and store it on a 6GB mini sd card?? in this way it will have to full functionality of Wayfinder ...

You comparing to Wayfinder without paid license? Yes, it would be very similar in functionality.

Is there a way to display altitude in GPS? I know the GPS system is designed to,provide ,4-D info but see no option to display.

Is there anyway to use Wayfinders or the maps downloaded from the Maps software with Maemo Mapper? Oh and what about Road map? It isn't as good? The maps are small and the whole US maps are about 2-4GB. Is the software still being worked on? Does anyone know how to make a route with it or is it not possible yet?

Running "maps" the applet bar will display Gps icon that changes when appearance when the GPS locks. Click it and select location. All the numeric stats are shown including altitude and speed.