I also use the D-pad a lot. I had also always thought that a thin scroll ribbon on the right side if the screen would compliment the D-pad nicely, but as you say, if it gets more finger friendly neither would be needed all that much (or missed, provided it worked well).

R.
==

I wish the power adapter jack was on the left side and a roller wheel was on the right side (like the wheel my old Sandisk MP3 player had).

Then I'm left wondering how I keep using it without a d-pad on the outside. What am I doing wrong???

You are the focus group and I claim my £5! I bet it was you who said the hard cover was a bad idea too!

I guess we all use the device in different ways... when reading news articles I like to use the d-pad down action to scroll through the page a few lines at a time.

If/when I get a N810 I'll be forced to scroll through documents either by dragging or using stylus/scrollbar as I won't want to pop open the keyboad each time to scroll and perhaps in time I, like you, will grow accustomed to not using the d-pad but this is not an argument to say it was a good design decision in the first place.

Yup. There's 3 choices we have in doing navigation&control with the NIT devices:

1) Dpad & "button cluster" (in quotes, because no such cluster exists on the N810)

2) Stylus

3) Fingers


For the NIT family, #3 simply isn't a viable option in most cases. It's just too clunky in the current revision of things. It's getting better. And there are a few places where it's even good (the RSS reader home applet -- it IS finger friendly, I just don't like it's functional limitations compared to the full RSS reader). But it's not good enough (not "finger friendly" enough) to be a good choice for general user interaction with the device.

So that means choosing between "buttons" (dpad+button cluster) vs "stylus". The stylus is a good choice for precision work .. drawing, etc. But it's sort of awkward, and annoying, to have to pull the stylus out, work with it, make sure you put it away, etc. It's so ... mid 90's (ie. palm pilot era).

With the N800, the choice was easy: if you don't want to mess with stylus, the dpad/button-cluster was a great way to do most tasks. You don't have to do anything special, like pull out the stylus -- you just start using the device, with both hands right on it. No balancing act, no right-handed bias when using the stylus (right handed people will be able to keep left thumb on buttons and use the stylus in the right hand; left handed people have to take their fingers off the buttons in order to use the stylus). It's an incredibly easy way to do most tasks.

With the N810, the choice isn't as easy. The reason is: it's now just as annoying to use the dpad/button-cluster as it is to use the stylus. You have to "get something out", take your thumbs further away from the screen (so it's harder to use what little finger-friendliness there is in OS2008), and the button-cluster is now spread out all over the place. There is no longer ANY convenient and simple mechanism for interacting with the device. All 3 options are annoying.

So, while, with the N800 I had an easy choice: go for the button method ... I find myself frequently jumping around between the 3 methods when using my N810 ... which means the N810 experience is confusing. My hands are all over the place (right hand reaching for the screen, going back to holding the device; left hand trying to both hold the device and use the dpad; stylus laying on my stomach, where I might lose it if I forget I had it out, so that my right hand can type on the keyboard, etc.). And, in order to most things that are useful, I have to open the keyboard. There aren't many things in life that I call "stupid", but the N810 user experience is definitely STUPID.

Due to the lack of finger-friendly GUI, the N810 is almost, but not quite, useless when in tablet form. And, yet, isn't this an Internet TABLET??

A product that is an Internet Tablet ... that is useless as a tablet. So, it's just a NI now? (Nokia Internet ______ ). That's a rather awkward product designation.

Maybe, if Chinook had been 100% finger friendly, it would have been ok to make this device design change at the same time as releasing Chinook. But Chinook isn't, so the timing of this kind of device design change isn't ok. The destruction of the best user-interaction method on the NIT family should have been accompanied by a fully-baked replacement for that user-interaction method (ie. the delivery of a fully finger-friendly UI and application set). Not coupling those two things is, without question, a mistake.


Since Chinook isn't finger friendly, the N810 should have left the dpad on the face of the device, and kept the 3 buttons of the button cluster in a single usable location (pref. on the right side of the face, but an N800 like arrangement of dpad and button cluster would have been acceptable).

If the linux based MIDs are finger friendly, and the next major OS release doesn't fix this, and/or isn't released soon, then it's going to open Nokia up to some rather one sided competition (and that one side isn't in Nokia's favor).

Pure hyperbole, John. Come on.

No no no no NO.

Software is mutable. Hardware (for the most part) is not. The OS can easily be made more finger-friendly. So can most websites I'll wager.

Granted, my usage leads me not to worry about the d-pad move (heck I like the smooth, uncluttered face now) but if enough people keep providing feedback about the usability experience it will (and has) improve. So don't blame the hardware for software shortcomings. Keep demanding UI improvements. Just because they're not in this version doesn't mean they won't be in the next.

This is one of the most interesting so far, the Digifriends MID
http://www.pocketables.net/2008/01/digifriends-mid.html
Clip on Keyboard with extension battery
Clip on Speakers
Clip on UCC editor (whatever that might be)
Runs Linux in addition to two other unmentionables.
WiMax, WiFi, Bluetooth.

The Sony Mylo 2 has on screen web navigation icons for finger touch scrolling. I don't think I have seen that on other products

One video demo I saw, maybe for the Toshiba concept, had browser scrolling set to react to screen tilt.

It is great to see fresh ideas and new thinking being applied to the form factor.

If you download this 40mb video,
http://www.gottabemobile.com/CES2008...msungMIDs.aspx
http://blip.tv/file/get/Gottabemobil...lagMIDs775.wmv

it gives a glimpse of the Clarion MID and Red Flag Linux on the Samsung Ultra. I would have preferred to see more MID’s on the piece but the Clarion looks far better here than in the photos I have seen previously.

Also of significance is Linux running on the Samsung which was until now, a Vista pre-installed device.