Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

I love your posting, btw. :) Particularly the "authentic Commodore 64" experience. ;)

I've been saying this all along--Nokia had the opportunity to be at the FRONTIER of a market segment that they could take the credit in saying that they recognized and needed to exist--INTERNET TABLETS! They were THERE! They KNEW people wanted tablets.. they started small, but there weren't ANY large tablets at the time and the 770 and N8x0 screens were bigger than anybody else's at the time and YOU COULD BUY THEM.. they EXISTED.

Without looking it up, I seem to remember looking at the first pictures of the N900 and I'd described it back then that they released this bastardization of the Maemo family, made the screen smaller, took away the d-pad, moved the speakers around, gave it a cellular radio... waitaminit... this is no Internet Tablet... it's a TRAP! People laughed and thought it was a cute pun. Well, it was.. but I feel like it was also an astute observation. I had then gone on to point out that Nokia decided to turn their lead in a NEW market segment that they had carved for themselves and instead decided on YET ANOTHER ME-TOO PRODUCT to compete with the iPhone. God, I hate when I'm right about these kind of corporate idiocy things.

I prefer a true open-source Linux device, and I've been saddled with half-*****ed open-core stuff like Maemo and Android. Of the two, Android was the one I didn't think I could take seriously as a portable computing platform but it's managed to pull out surprise after surprise over the past year--whereas Nokia has failed to impress in the same way even in its own heyday at the top of the tablets. Way to go, Nokia, you f*ckwits. Don't screw up MeeGo. This might be your last chance to remain relevant enough to stick around once people decide to upgrade from their cheap, old Nokia "smart" phones stuck in ovi-limbo to an actual handset device with a real application-running OS.

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

Amazon.de is about the only place perhaps. Well that and directly from them. But no sales outside of Germany or Belgium thus far.

As it stands, it might not even be a MeeGo certified product. That's been brought up in these forums a couple of times.

So yeah... no sales in the US yet. Might as well be called the JooJoo.

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

Interesting - but..

1) It's a Motorola so will be locked down and start to malfunction in new and strange ways after a few weeks.

2) Buy the time it is available it will have been superseded by two or three other things.

3) No HW keyboard. I know it has a dock but FFS I have a laptop for that sort of ****.

Next......

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

Yet you have a N900, a pocketable computer with a hardware keyboard. Wouldn't that be redundant?

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

1) How does a Motorola malfunction in new and strange ways after a few weeks? I mean.. I've got a Motorola Droid. It's run pretty magnificently so far--a lot better than i had expected it would when I got it as my first Android device. Impressively so. So, again.. how?

2) I'm sorry--I can't "buy the time"... perhaps by the time Nokia puts out their new MeeGo devices it will have been superceded by two or three HUNDRED other things. You brought up the point, lad. Don't hate the players, hate the game.

3) Indeed, you probably DO have a laptop for that sort of thing. But I'll bet you can't undock your laptop's CPU and still have a small, but high-resolution, screen that you could continue to work with, look things up and run out the door instantly if you had to. I think the idea is to make the same device as useful as possible--not to say, "I've got yet another device to do that other function!"

Ahem. Next!

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

Dock to get a keyboard going, running mobile apps on a comptuter screen... what the hell is the point of this device? Throw in the hugely underpowered battery (1900mAh) and a version of Android not meant even for tablet use, then I just don't see 1 and 1 coming together with this device.

Don't let the seemingly high specs and "computerphone" marketing fool you. Come on, this phone is rediculous in the most negative sense imaginable. I think anyone buying this device will be so sadly
dissapointed.

BONUS critique: List to yourself the things that the N900 does that the Atrix needs a dock for.

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

Mind you, we still don't know all of what this dock is supposed to do, but my guess...

HDMI output to television?
Full-size, comfortable QWERTY keyboard?
Out-of-the-box mouse support?
Ethernet port in dock for speed?
High resolution screen?
Peripheral ports (host mode USB, printers, etc--hey, I've seen some customized Android devices support it, I wouldn't be surprised if a "laptop-like" docked system would be set up for it)

...but OH right--N900 can't actually DO any of these, can it? Well, I guess there IS output to television. There ya go, Jethro.. your little ol' toy managed to beat it at SOMETHING: genuine 1980's NTSC TV output!

Soooooo... wow.. worse than I thought. Not even Europe-wide. That's impressive in its own macabre way, in 2011. :P

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

You're right, on closer inspection its better to compare it to the N8.

The N8 has this as its own connector that also doubles as the USB OTG.

Just make it support BT mice and keyboards and no dock is needed!

WiFi is more practical and commonly available in public areas, if you're in your workspace then use your desktop!

To do what? Watch your SMS app? Once again: HDMI output as its own connector!

The N8 already supports external USBs so it can prolly be done again through a same connector.

Well why would you want to see Android two, point ... -_- ... yawning to jawlock two in mega high-def? Just transfer the damn movie over a cable to the desktop you have there or play it from the device!

This device just has backward ideas behind it:

"Mobile apps on PC screens, so you can use your phone through your PC"
>> I thought we were trying to leave our laptops and desktops at home so we could do everything on our phones!

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

This is a killer feature that many people are looking for.

I used a laptop for many years as my main PC but it can be awkward travelling with it nowadays (e.g. security at airports). I also had a PalmPilot Tungsten PDA and was inconvenient keeping my data synched with both of them

I imagine many people have this problem and something like Motorola's device is a big step to solving this.

It's a great idea - one device and place where your data is stored and the ability to "morph" the device into different use cases - at home plugged into tv /monitor/cat/dog using it like a laptop or when you are travellng the same device can be in your pocket.


It was one of the reasons I bought a n900 - a computer I can take anywhere and use at home for general use via TV and keyboard.
The n900 barely manages this and was a PITA to finally get working.

Re: n900 looks like a toy compared to this
 

Well, I was wrong to use complete generalization on my first paragraph; but the point I was trying to make was on the second paragraph.

ps: btw, I did not mean the developer community as 'customers' in my original context.