E7's Symbian browser does that too. Doing the wait thing is actually faster, because it doesn't do as many partial renders and because it no longer loses as much time seeing if user did something.

User input is not queued, like on Windows (mouse clicks are queued) or any other PCs (regardless of OS) where keyboard is buffered. When doing multitouch, it's hard to save the input, since there's a lot of it, and because the phone might not catch up to user anyway.

As a result, to actually ensure UI responsiveness one needs to kind of reserve some resources. Not literally, but there is polling involved and it takes precedence over rendering.

Also, partial rendering is also more complicated. As page loads, page changes. HTML in modern sites no longer flows top to bottom, for example a table could be split in 2 columns, the first one is long and rendered and, the second one (declared at 40 pixels) contains the word "Maemo". It's larger than 40 pixels and all known browsers choose to re-flow the columns rather than cut text, meaning all that was rendered must be re-rendered.

Steps can be taken to alleviate this, such as reserving placeholders for images, and holding reflow, but overall it's less efficient.

It gives the user a sense of speed, because it typically doesn't have the users hold in a "wait for it" pattern, user could read content while it's being re-flowed, after all.

However, let's be honest. We read reviews, comparisons and benchmarks. And in a benchmark, it's who's first that wins the "better browser" award, and it's that result that spreads the (false?) belief that X browser is better than Y.

It's understandable, if not the best user experience, and if one does it they all have to.

There are browsers out there that don't really care about sales of devices, and those have a different approach. Like Opera Mobile.

Androids are funny. I have seen 3 Optimus One P500 phones on my friends and the experience differs considerably. Mine, e.g., has a very insensitive touch, but is faster on the web. Very weird. All phones have little to none apps installed from new (3 were girl's phones, and had 2 games and pics on them - nothing else).

At least iPhones are comparable. Never noticed a difference. Which is saying something, since some have hundreds of apps and others have 3.

I'll have to say that there is a good chance it will come to E7 just fine. I also read the Nokia (blog? forum? news? can't remember) release notes for S Belle and I distinctly remember them saying that the enhancements would be coming to phones that now run S3, like N8 and E7 and X7 or C7 or something.

Can't find the link, still, I wouldn't worry.

As for power, let's be serious. A 30% decrease in CPU is barely noticeable. It would take a long time for you to figure if your well-known phone (N900) was running 700 or 900 - definitely not something you'd know just by looking at it. E7 has a 700 MHz CPU and the new ones have 1000. To be useful 1GHz must be butter-smooth (otherwise older devices are smoother) which means that by any standards 700 MHz should be sufficient with a little optimization.

I can't believe that a few UI enhancements would slow down the UI so much it would drag its feet on 700 MHz. If it would, then operating the UI on a 1GHz would take 70%+ of capacity making the phone unusable while the user interacted with it.

Remember, this the OS and UI we are talking about, not an intensive operation. It needs to be less than a large drain on resources, otherwise that 9 days standby is going straight to heck. I can fiddle with the device 48 hours, but Maps will drain it in 4-6, so it stands to reason less than 10% of device capacity is used in menus, animations, settings, etc. That includes linear drains like screen and wifi that go on just by being unlocked and idle.

It's not like an enhancement to that would peak the E7.

On an AMOLED, image displayed is paramount. Using black menus gives you maybe 24 hours, while a white web page drains it in 6. Having an animation on the screen means that not only device solely idles, but also that there is a significant drain by the screen.

I'm guessing it's a low contrast, colored screen to save power, but I'm quite sure it's not draining as much as a screensaver.

You did say "white clock". I don't have a white clock, I do have a thin-line-outline-of-a-clock screensaver and a less-thin-outline-of-a-clock when I push Menu - but that disappears in 3 seconds unless unlocked.

If you really mean a white clock then very possibly the clock is more draining.

Like I said, there's going to be some of that on my phone soon. It's just that I'm jammed in a save battery loop from my N900. I routinely make it home with 60% battery.

As for OVI installs, I have a few I like: Games (HAWX, Sudoku, several Angry Birds, Monopoly, Assassin's Creed, Settlers, Worms, SPB Brain Evolution), GPS(LiveVew Beta Labs, Compass, Parking2), Net (Opera Mobile and Mini, AccuWeather+widget), a few social apps, including several chat, FB, Skype), Imaging and multimedia (Nokia's second photo browser - hint: it's just like Cool Iris, 3D image, barcode scanner, Panorama), Youtube downloader, Screen Snap, Angle Meter, Decibel Meter, Force Control (If you saw the android 5-icon toggler, it's that), Energy profiler, Battery Monitor, Situations, Swype, NightLight and, of course, SPB Mobile Shell (free).

To name a few.

Plenty installed, my home screen are nearly full and I'd have more but I'm just not a fan of a few things others are crazy about: driving games, GPS tours, silly fart apps, etc.

Store.Ovi.Com has plenty to show for itself. Tell it you have an E7 and it will gladly show a list of stuff for you to do.

And it hasn't slowed a bit. Warning: it takes longer to boot. Take-a-shower long, from power to all-butter and all-widgets updated. You thought N900 was slow to boot.

HAWX is my favorite. I remember when "f18.com" was not a site, and when you needed a boot floppy to run the game. I also remember it was 2D, had virtually no sound, and relied on all PCs having the same CPU to run. The fact that the 3D, accelerometer controlled version is on my phone, glitchless and with cutscenes reminds me how good I have it.