Might Get An N900 - Worth The Cash?

[kingoddball]

Hello!

I'm looking at getting an N900. Are they worth getting one?
I have been looking into it, and it looks like a good (kick ass) device. Similar specs to Pandora without the nubs.
But it has 3G, 5MP camera and all the other goodies - and whats makes it better.... IT'S AVAILABLE!

I was looking at getting a Google Nexus One, but after looking into it, I won't get it. Not good enough from what I see.
I am going to replace my iPhone - The N900 could be all in one...

 

[skeezix]

It's a great dvi e. Rough around the edges but perfect for hacking on. Likeiphone it's a great platform but terrible to game on without external controllers

no one device can do it all, true story. Pick your best 3 or 4 features and any one device can do most of them, but not one of them

jeff

 

[dflemstr]

The N900 OS (Maemo) is kinda rough-ish; it has some sharp edges so to speak. I'd wait for Meego devices to come out, personally; Meego will use the Maemo framework with the Moblin UI → a much more stable combination.

 

[renwils]

The N900 OS (Maemo) is kinda rough-ish; it has some sharp edges so to speak. I'd wait for Meego devices to come out, personally; Meego will use the Maemo framework with the Moblin UI → a much more stable combination.

I'm interested in Meego, but since Intel's involved, would that mean it won't run on ARM devices?

 

[transmition]

I love my HTC G1. Costs quite a bit less than the N900 too.

 

[rabidpoobear]

I would think Nexus 1 would be best. It's got hella high specs at least.

 

[dflemstr]

The N900 OS (Maemo) is kinda rough-ish; it has some sharp edges so to speak. I'd wait for Meego devices to come out, personally; Meego will use the Maemo framework with the Moblin UI → a much more stable combination.

I'm interested in Meego, but since Intel's involved, would that mean it won't run on ARM devices?

Since Nokia is involved, and Nokia doesn't sell Intel phones, it means that Meego will run on Nokia phones for sure.

 

[mitosis]

As the owner of the n810, I might give you a little advice here.

Get it if you need a phone/pda, but gaming is not the focus of the maemo community, nor are the controls there for gaming.

Also, maemo always has been and always will be a little rough around the edges, especially since they dropped support of the older tablets (n770, n800, and n810) from the latest version of the OS and hardly anyone in the maemo community actually owns a n900 yet... so there's a crippled developerbase who own a bunch of devices for which they still WANT to improve the operating system but don't really have a choice in the matter since nokia has abandoned the older devices and OS.

Expect them to abandon the n900 in the same manner after a few years.

If I had the money to get a fancy smartphone right now, I'd probably get something else... maybe an android phone so I'd have some variety to experiment with...

I'm sure a decent amount of the software on the n900 will be ported to the pandora... don't quote me there but I just know... I feel like I shouldn't say this for fear of being flamed but, they're very similar devices.

 

[OrR]

Consider the Palm Pre. It's a bit cheaper, has an amazing UI (multitasking, multitouch gestures) but is still a pretty open standard Linux system. The screen is smaller but if you are already getting a Pandora, it's the perfect companion, IMO. There is quite a bit of homebrew development going on, too. For example, the open source community has made made a lot of patches to fix and improve things in the OS. Installing these is really easy through a standard installer. Palm is also pretty liberal about what they allow on the device, so far. If you want gaming, ports of iPhone games are just starting to trickle in, for example Need for Speed, The Sims 3, X-Plane etc., so you pretty much get exactly the stuff you probably won't see on the Pandora, which is multitouch, accellerometer and big brand games.

 

[krosfyah]

I've been torn between a N900, 3GS and HTC HD2 for a while but I think I've finally decided to go for the N900. The 3GS just isn't different enough to my current 3G to get me excited and the HD2, as gorgeous as it is, is based on that awful OS. With current contracts being a ridiculous 24 months long for a decent deal it's a bit of a nightmare committing to any particular device.

I'm sure there will be plenty of better phones out this year but for right now the N900 is probably a good bet.

 

[Nova]

Consider the Palm Pre. It's a bit cheaper, has an amazing UI (multitasking, multitouch gestures) but is still a pretty open standard Linux system. The screen is smaller but if you are already getting a Pandora, it's the perfect companion, IMO. There is quite a bit of homebrew development going on, too. For example, the open source community has made made a lot of patches to fix and improve things in the OS. Installing these is really easy through a standard installer. Palm is also pretty liberal about what they allow on the device, so far. If you want gaming, ports of iPhone games are just starting to trickle in, for example Need for Speed, The Sims 3, X-Plane etc., so you pretty much get exactly the stuff you probably won't see on the Pandora, which is multitouch, accellerometer and big brand games.

He's upgrading from the iPhone though, and the Pre doesn't seem to offer anything above what a jailbroken iPhone does. All fanboyisms aside, I'd say that the two phones are level pegging. If you discount the much-touted multitasking of the Pre, which in my opinion is highly overrated.

I personally love the look of the HTC HD2. If only it weren't running bloody Windows Mobile.

 

[twent4]

I was also considering the N900 for a while, but then realized that they made it operate on some really odd frequencies which really limits your choice of a carrier. As for the device itself, looks pretty sweet to me, and glad to see Nokia doing the linux thing too. I ended up getting the N97mini because the pandora should be the only linux portable i'd need, and the free GPS nav is a nice bonus.

 

[kingoddball]

I've been torn between a N900, 3GS and HTC HD2 for a while but I think I've finally decided to go for the N900. The 3GS just isn't different enough to my current 3G to get me excited and the HD2, as gorgeous as it is, is based on that awful OS. With current contracts being a ridiculous 24 months long for a decent deal it's a bit of a nightmare committing to any particular device.

I'm sure there will be plenty of better phones out this year but for right now the N900 is probably a good bet.

The 3GS is massively different from the 3G (internally)..
It's virtually the same specs as the Pandora and N900. If you can get a jailbroken one then you'll be happier. ZodTTD has even ported an N64 emulator for it! (N900 doesn't have one. Not even a playable PSX emu)

 

[krosfyah]

The 3GS is massively different from the 3G (internally)..
It's virtually the same specs as the Pandora and N900. If you can get a jailbroken one then you'll be happier. ZodTTD has even ported an N64 emulator for it! (N900 doesn't have one. Not even a playable PSX emu)

Don't get me wrong, the 3GS is a great phone (my wife has one). It's just that when I upgrade I usually want something that feels significantly different in my hand otherwise there's no excitement. My 3G has been jailbroken from the day I got it 18 months ago and I have enjoyed it thoroughly. In fact, I'll probably keep using it as an iPod even after I upgrade.

Having looked around a bit since my last post I'm actually debating whether or not the Xperia X10 will be worth waiting for now. I think it's due at the end of the month.

 

[OrR]

He's upgrading from the iPhone though, and the Pre doesn't seem to offer anything above what a jailbroken iPhone does. All fanboyisms aside, I'd say that the two phones are level pegging. If you discount the much-touted multitasking of the Pre, which in my opinion is highly overrated.

I've been using the Pre for half a year. In day to day usage, comfortable multitasking is a huge difference. Same is true for the physical keyboard, it's so much better than a touchscreen keyboard. Regarding internals, the Pre offers pretty much the same as the 3GS but that's a big update to the 3G. The iPhone wins by having more apps, that's an area where the Pre has to improve (and Palm is making an effort to). I couldn't live without tabbed browsing and for the same reason I couldn't live without a good multitasking UI on my phone.

 

[gibberish]

my housemate has one and despite all its buttons, playing any kind of emulated games is a nightmare. so if you intend on using it for that at all, then dont bother.
some touchscreen style games like freeciv work pretty well though.