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- - NITs - what are they good for... ??? (https://talk.maemo.org/showthread.php?t=20858)

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by benny1967 (Post 190513)

This so so funny. Reading all these "What is it good for?"-discussions and then comparing it to my own experience...

I still have my good old 770, mainly because the N800/N810 isn't sturdy and portable enough. I could join in and enumerate what it cannot do, what it does badly, where there's room for improvement... Blah!

Matter of fact is: It changed my life. It changed the way I use the internet.

Man, you took the words right out of my mouth. :D

I've also found over time that it isn't that unwieldy to use a VNC client on my 770 to use Firefox 2.0 on a PC in the basement when I run into a site that causes issues and I really want to do something.

In other words, not only does the 770 do a lot on its own, but I can also use it as a portal to my larger more capable machines in other parts of the house which have a lot more software.

I finally picked up a Stowaway bluetooth keyboard for my wife so she can use it with Pidgin on her 770 (she chats on the thing all the time), and it dropped right in with the commonly available bluetooth driver for OS2006. That makes most of the data entry issues go away for her.

I'm just glad Nokia made it reasonably open so it *can* be extended by free software authors.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by Benson (Post 190593)

Well, the OMP came out in 1993, for 3.5-4 years, actually.

Which '97 release are you discussing?

The newton 2.x devices. The 2x00 specifically, although the 120/130 fitted the awesome tag. Actually I think they all did in their way.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Benson (Post 190593)

A kilobuck for a PDA (a brief Google says $950 original price, anyway) isn't necessarily mainstream ready, but the MP 1000 would certainly qualify as awesome.

I never mentioned at what cost!

Quote:

Originally Posted by Benson (Post 190593)

The PalmPilots (Personal and Professional), OTOH, might make the mainstream-ready cut, but don't fit your word "awesome"...

Oh well, two device families, one for low-end, one for high-end... Yep, awesome it was. If only I'd had any money back then. :(

I didn't, but I managed to get them second hand a bit later (actually I got an OMP back in 95 - it was given to me.

There have been very few devices in my life where I have really been blown away by how completely awsome they were.
The Newtons were there. The psion series 3 probably was too.
I love my NIT, but it doesn't really fit in that catagory.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by ddalex (Post 190622)

Good points.... I have to stress out that I'm describing my _subjective_ experience. I'm not saying that others don't find these devices useful beside being lovely (and yes, I'm very proud of my toys :)). But my point is that we should focus on how to improve the experience of using this device, and pass to Nokia these desires. This sounds a lot like market-droid-speak, but it isn't.

So allow me to quote you in trying to make a constructive approach here (even if it may sound like bashing, and blame-throwing, it isn't; all of you guys, think of this as a post-mortem on the current status of NITs, and a discussion on where we want to take them).

Good point. But NIT's are not the ground-breaking devices they want to be, user experince-wise. We've had time to form an idea about what a PDA does, what a PMP does, what do you expect from a low-end and from a high-end laptop since years ago. In this case, it's not about reinventing the wheel from scratch, it's about taking all the wheel designs made so far and figure out how to make a new better wheel. I'd expect incremental inovation from a known base, not starting from 0 like Newton and Palm did. But it seems that the tablets do not capitalize on that knowledge.

So you say that two years and three iterations is too short to make a new device for a new market out of thin air. I say it's about enough, and the next iteration should be consumer-level. iPods went from nothing to millions sold in less than 2 years.

You speak of iPods going from introduction to millions of sales; that's what Apple does...

But MP3 players had been around for awhile, and were pretty much mainstream-ready; they just weren't mainstream for want of good marketing behind the good ones that were out. That two years was Apple being cool enough to make people want things they didn't previously, not developing a new category of device.

If Apple is taking the IT idea and running with it, it's a good sign that mainstream-ready is within reach. Of course, that's your whole point, that it's in reach, and Nokia's not reaching it.

Quote:

I'm not complaining that the tablets are not at consumer-level so far; but I hope that the next iteration will be at true consumer level; I invested too much passion, energy and interest in these specific devices to watch light-heartadly how it is gonna be surpased and killed by iThings that will lock devs (and myself) out of it. So what I'm trying to do is make Nokia listen to my and my fellow NIT users requests for improvement, and take action on them, so in the next iteration we will get a consumer-level tablet that is still very friendly to developers and OSS crowd.

I think they're understanding this better than you think, that they're listening to feedback somewhat better than you think, and that the next tablet will be cookin', so to speak. They've had a series of that hard luck that characterises life, which made a lot of software things slip and miss the releases they should have been in, but the hardware is unbeatable, and while the OS is an experiment, it's not the only one; remember they had substantial involvement with Ubuntu Mobile, which they're trying to learn from.

Whether they switch to a direct Ubuntu Mobile derivative, or apply what they've learned to make Maemo's development process more community-involved (which is more likely, but not certain), they're gonna get some of what you're after that way.

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I'm well aware of those pesky lawyers and their legal implications. My point is that the worst position to be in is half-closed and half-OSS. You'll annoy everybody and you'll be in no side. In my country we call this "haveing your *** in two boats will only get you drawned".

Yes it is, but at least they're not adding to the closed-source side with closed-source Java implementations... Using hardware with some elements licensed strictly is a lot different from using closed-source, imho.

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Two years, three iterations later, I think that this product line should take momentum. If not now, then when ?. NITs already competitors that are on more-or-less equal terms now, and which hadn't the two year advantage. I strongly suspect that if this line doesn't take off now, it will never get the chance again, even if this happens for simple economic reasons.

Well, I'd say it is gaining momentum. Watch the number of new users asking dumb questions in these forums. The N810 is seriously more popular than the N800, even with several distinct downsides and a price tag easily accounting for the improvements (IMHO). Why? There's either a shift in marketing or more marketing, it's got a more consumer-friendly (if less geek-friendly) feature set... I'm not sure of any other explanations, but it is more popular, that's for sure. I can't see the N900 reversing that trend.

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The guys and girls who built that did it good starting from nothing. It took them 5 years, yes.

They didn't start from zero; they started from other platforms. Other, not really applicable, platforms. They had PCs. We have cell-phones (with no touch screens) and PDAs (with limited functionality expected) and of course laptops (with no touch-screens, with full keyboards and processing power to burn). But Psions were really the only things I'm aware of that were close.

Quote:

But we (read IT community and designers) already have good ideas on how to proceed - why throw away and re-learning everything from scratch how to make mobile computing ? And spending another 5 years on that ? Maemo as platform is already 3 years old, and it's getting dated by the minute now. The moment Android comes alive on a HTC device, doing everything NIT does, but with better capabilites, NITs and Nokia will be in big trouble.

Of course, provided the price is comparable... But Android shows no signs of reaching that state anytime soon; OOo is running under maemo. Maybe not usefully for most people, and only with loads of Debian help, but Android's tossing all compatibility, so it can't do that.

Quote:

I'll repet myself, I belive that this is the latest critical point to change the mission of NIT and make it into a mainstream platform. So think about what should be next in NIT line and voice your thoughts.

I don't think it's a critical point, nor a mission change; I think you could better argue that it's urgent for Nokia to accelerate the existing plan by applying more resources. And naturally, I'd love that; I'm not sure how much effort is required for survival, but it's obvious that the more resources, the better the tablets will do. But we don't know how resource allocation is inside Nokia, and they may already be applying much more effort.

Quote:

Damn, running into limitations. Will follow up on next post.

Let's, and say we didn't! ;)

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by ddalex (Post 190636)

iPhone has better hardware

What exactly is better in iPhone's hardware?

Quote:

Originally Posted by ddalex (Post 190636)

But I can't drop a tablet in the same way on someone and ask them to see what's on tonite on the tele, because in 5 minutes they will scream in frustration. Still, I have yet to see someone unhappy with the way their iPhone works. eeePc is a NIT-like story, nobody that isn't a geek is using it.

Nobody screams when i give them my NIT. They just do what they need. Maybe its a miracle.
However i did see someone screaming with frustration when he couldn't copy/paste something on an iPhone.

Quote:

Originally Posted by ddalex (Post 190636)

Why do they have to be separate ? I want both the polish and the openness.

They don't have to, so get in the trench and help, stop with the whining already.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

if i could speak as a non-techie person. and i feel i am well qualified - i would rank myself as better than a normal end-user, but not nearly as good as someone off this forum (i normally post on the newbie section). i'm a student, and already have a phone so didnt need a pda, i bought this to browse the internet, and if i'm honest, it was goodish, but awesome when i finally got unlimited internet on my phone. awesome. i have high hopes for cheating in pub quizzes. also, my parents have moved to manila, somewhere in the philapines, and i have bought GPS so hoping that'll be useful.

to summarise: i can do minor techie things, not experienced at linux at all: i really enjoy the internet tablet - i wish it was easier to do certain things (dependencies piss me off) but overall as an average user (i'd guess), it does exaclty what i want it to. i had a pda and walked into a door and smashed it - i like not having to carry this everywhere as it's not my phone. i could complain about a lot of things, but with my initial expectations, i can't really complain.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

btw: in no way do i care what other people think, i was just giving my opinion, as i feel i may represent a cross-section of not-really-techie people who use this device. if not, i don't care, dont PM me or even respond in this thread. i'm a drinker, and won't care

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by ddalex (Post 190636)

And what do you prefer ? Somebody telling you that your baby is desfigured by a disease, hurt your feelings, but actually having time and work on a solution before it's too late, or you'd rather be told by everybody how nice and beautiful your baby is, feel all nice, cozy and warm inside, and end up with a prematurely dead baby? Maybe a harsh comparation, but I think we're moving to a turning point here, and NITs must not miss the consumer boat.

Hee hee, I meant "baby" in the sense of girlfriend. And she ain't disfigured, just a little battered up from falling out of my pocket when I bend over and having my 2 year old scribble pictures in Maemopad+. Although if I keep dropping her, she's gonna be prematurely dead :eek: Hurry up, N900!

I hope Nokia understands this: I'd rather have a niche product I can afford than a consumer product I can't.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bundyo (Post 190649)

What exactly is better in iPhone's hardware?

Capacitive multi-touch; in conjunction with a resistive screen for stylus use, this'd be pretty sweet on a NIT.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

So you want two styluses? :) Or planning on having long nails? :)

Of course there's the accelerometers, but I'm not counting them :)

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Hmm, I use my N800 at least 3-4 hours per day. Often more. Between general web browsing for news, checking emails, blogging, dowloading and listening to podcasts and/or music, listening to FM radio, jotting notes in Xournal... sometimes I IM chat w/ my sister or mom...

... I use it in the living room while the family is watching TV - so that I don't have to sequester myself in the den with the desktop; in the, uh, restroom on occasion - wouldn't dare lug the laptop in there; in the car to listen to music/podcasts via AUX plug on my stereo; at work I listen to podcasts/music/FM radio at my desk (THANK YOU NOKIA for the external speakers! DO NOT remove these on the next version)... sometimes I sit out on my back porch eating breakfast in the morning, or having a drink in the evening, and surf the net or listen to internet radio - or both at the same time!... I have pulled my tablet out of my pocket and used it in restaurants, movie theaters, bookstores, airports...

... and NOW I find out it is good for nothing? Damnit. Why am I always the last to find out?

Like benny1967 said - it's changed the way I use the internet.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

PS - this thing only cost ~$250. I've owned $1500 laptops that I have gotten less use out of. I got this for Christmas 2007, and have used it EVERY DAY since then. If I lost my N800 tomorrow, I have gotten easily my money's worth.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

although i am coming onto the NIT scene later then most (i picked up my n800 locally a few weeks ago in great condition for $140), you can still count me in on with the "it has changed the way i use the internet" group.

i have desktops, laptops of various sizes/weights and my nokia N95, all of which get used to access the internet at various times, but the N800 frees me from being at the computer desk or having a hot laptop on my lap. surfing on the N95 isn't that comfortable but it comes in handy every so often.

this forum has been a such a good resource, i find myself looking at this site more and more each day, doing research via searches and also checking out current threads. my NIT experience wouldn't be nearly as exciting without ITT.

NITs aren't perfect but half of the fun is trying to make the thing work how you want to use it.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

BTW are there any pocket devices with comparable screens that can do hi-res (no transcoding) video at the N800's price point? Transcoding has been par for the course in ny experience, but things change fast...

Posting this from the dentist's chair waiting for the dentist to check the holes where my wisdom teeth used to be...
EDIT: everything's ok!

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by qole (Post 190718)

A whole slew of PMPs. Archos, especially. They don't do much else, though. ;)

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bundyo (Post 190695)

So you want two styluses? :) Or planning on having long nails? :)

Nah, multi-touch is for higly-overrated finger gestures, and for rejecting extraneous input from other hand; allows time-overlapping thumb-boarding, chords in PyAno, etc.
(The resistive screen is necessary (and lacking, in the iPhone) to let you use a stylus, as capacitive screens only respond to fingers and specially formulated silicone rubber. I don't want to give up stylus usage to have multi-touch, but if I could have both...)

Quote:

Of course there's the accelerometers, but I'm not counting them :)

I suppose there's also the 3G modem built-in, if you chance to be on a suitable network.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by Benson (Post 190721)

You could eventually connect a DIY multitouch trackpad made using a web cam :) Or even one of those rear projecting monsters. So much for the pocketable form factor though :)

Quote:

Originally Posted by Benson (Post 190721)

I suppose there's also the 3G modem built-in, if you chance to be on a suitable network.

He said better hardware, we should be comparing the hardware that exists in the two devices, we all know what one has more than the other :)

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

I chime in just to say that I second the "it changed the WHEN I use the Internet" poster.
Thank you for that. It's really true.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by qole (Post 190718)

My Pepper Pad 3.

Granted, it needs big pockets, but it plays just about anything (save 720p matroska videos, that is) without recoding.

And if I do need to recode (because some idjit decided to use an arcane codec), I can keep the original resolution and bitrate.

In about a month I'll add the Pandora to that...

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Their lack of epson LCD controller baloney, so their interface could move at buttery smooth pace and get proper 3D acceleration. I hope n900 will address this shite.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by ysss (Post 190819)

Their lack of epson LCD controller baloney, so their interface could move at buttery smooth pace and get proper 3D acceleration. I hope n900 will address this shite.

As has been discussed about a thousand times by now. The OMAP3430 supports a resolution of 1024x768 on its built-in LCD controller. Nokia could go as high as 1024x600 and have no (hardware) issues with LCD bandwidth, 3D acceleration or hardware video decoding.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by GeneralAntilles (Post 190820)

Ok, good to hear that.

Anyhow, I'm still bummed that Nokia engineered the N8xx and N7xx series with Epson LCD controller (yea yea, to make use of 800x480 screens) knowing its limitations.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Well, the 3430 supports TV-Out, Image Signal Processor, and Image/Audio accelerator, am I entitled to hope seeing both analog tv ouput (SVideo, Composite) and DVB output ?
It could be handy to just be able to play hires movies on any TV out there....

But knowing Nokia, this will not happen. And I want it to happen :(...

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

As the initial poster, I'm fairly disapointed by the N800, and IT's in general.
I've used it primarily for web browsing. I think it never really lived up to the promises made by Nokia. It browsed the web, yes, but it never replaced a full blown pc as an Internet browser.

A few gripes:

- too slow
- too unstable
- repository hell
- bad -beta stadium- browser software for years
- small user base (too small and too early adopter to make a difference)
- no high res (debatable)

I'll give it a year (max. two) and then it's dead.
I personally haven't used it in months. Another paper-weight for my collection.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Frankowitz - can you please elaborate on the point "small user base"? Why do you think a bigger user base (that can make a difference?) matters?

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by ysss (Post 190844)

...Why do you think a bigger user base (that can make a difference?) matters?

better market, more sales, more resources allocated ... a better NIT ...

so it does :)

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Simple - it's the reason VHS won the day and (the technically more advanced) Betamax didn't. No one had it (but a few die hards). Just like the IT's.
My neighbour never heard about (and without me showing him probably never will) a Nokia Internet Tablet. But he allready saw an Asus Eee PC. Go figure.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frankowitz (Post 190848)

Simple - it's the reason VHS won the day and (the technically more advanced) Betamax didn't. No one had it (but a few die hards). Just like the IT's.

Bogus analogy. An internet tablet is not a media distribution standard, so it's not an either or proposition.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Unless Nokia starts selling these in a store they will die one day. Like my thing at best buy I was talking about a few weeks ago none of the workers had ever even heard of one. I havn't seen an Eee PC in stores yet but it is on BestBuy.com and circutcity.com even walmart has a small laptop like a Eee PC on there site. I would say alot of people shop at stores they know and not just online stores.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewfblack (Post 190851)

Unless Nokia starts selling these in a store they will die one day.

CompUSA has sold all of them, and the Best Buy here had the N810 on display. Not really sure I see the issue.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Well CompUSA in bankrupt, and I havn't seen any Best Buys that have them it might be only at certain Best Buys. I did get my Nokia from a store but it was a local computer store that had it with the GPS units which funny enough is what I was looking for that day. My garmin died on me when I was on vacation and went in looking for a GPS unit and they had both N800 and N810s on display with GPS. All I'm saying until you can got into a store in every town and buy one of these I can see a posiblity of it dying from not being enough of them out there.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by Frankowitz (Post 190848)

According to some show can't remember the name of it the reason VHS won over Betamax is Betamax would not allow porn movies to be released on there system. VHS on the other hand did. Since sex sales that is atleast part of the reason VHS won.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewfblack (Post 190860)

great, then i WILL integrate REDTUBE inside mYTube ;)

i'll sacrifice myself ... (not ddalex's virgin goat)

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

more exposure =(best buy,walmart,radio shack) mainstream use=(joe,jane 6 pack) more development however it may water down the said quality of development its fine if people dont appear to want the device to be mainstream (ga)however it may speed up improvements(im pretty content with mine)

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

personally I love my NIT and see nothing about it I want changed other then buying a new one down the road that is faster. It does what I want it to do. I just know they may improve hardware quality if they sold more which is why It would help to get more exposure.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

The devices have been in big box retail stores. The retailers did not understand the devices and positioned them improperly. That led to low or no sales, which led to no further stocking.

I won't get into the blame game on that one, except to say there is plenty to spread around.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Quote:

Originally Posted by andrewfblack (Post 190851)

I havn't seen an Eee PC in stores yet...

BJ's has them for sale in their stores.* They're on display with the other notebook computers.

I haven't seen an Internet Tablet for sale there, though admittedly, I haven't checked the Verizon kiosk. It's tough pioneering a new class of device.

* Individually, not in bulk packs of three or four, though that would be amusing.

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

texrat ok...i dont get out much...live too far away...do 99% of my shopping online..

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

Some completely miss my point or can't cope with the fact that their 'darling' device isn't sky rocketing world wide sales. I don't particularly care.
I answered the initial post.

Go cope.

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Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

You can tell when posters are suffering from ~~sexual~~ lack-of-news tension-- things get a bit snippy in here. :rolleyes:

Re: NITs - what are they good for... ???

The community does tend to be a little unfriendly at times.