One of my minor issues with the N800 was that the directional buttons did not give a good enough tactile feedback, particularly the up/down buttons did not pop when pressed. Following Textrat's clear instructions I have removed the front metal cover to have a look at the cause of this unexpected behaviour.

DO NOT PROCEED UNLESS YOU ARE VERY CONFIDENT IN YOUR PRECISION MANUAL SKILLS, YOU CAN DAMAGE YOUR N800!!

The two button clusters are mounted on a single rubber membrane which rests on a white membrane covering the switches themselves. I lifted off the rubber and checked that the switches themselves had a perfectly equal response when pushing them. On the underside of the rubber membrane there are tiny nodes which rest over the switches. The reason why the up/down nodes cannot push in the switches enough to make a pop, lies in the two blue LEDs. These are just a touch too high and so do not allow enough displacement for the button. The simple (and reversible!) solution was to cut small pieces of cellotape and stick them over the switches onto the white membrane. Little squares of about 3x3 mm will do for up/down and a longish strip to cover left/middle/right. The buttons' response is equal now, problem solved. The improved response actually makes up for the small size of the d-pad, I am pleased with the result.

Again, you need steady hands, good eyes and no interruptions when doing this, don't blame me if you damage your device.

If you're going to do this, see my faceplate removal instructions in the "sunglasses case" thread.

Hm, up/down/left/right all give a satisfactory pop on my unit, no modifications necessary. Maybe I was lucky. Made in Finland, btw.

Mine was also made in Finland. It maybe that a slightly thinner white membrane or a touch higher LEDs were fitted in mine. I've got some PMs from a few people confirming the difference between up/down and left/right.

I've just got an N800 and I have less feel with up, but even less so with down. The left and right are more positive (equally) with a pop than up/down. Though it is almost so subtle I don't know if everyone would notice, particularly when you get feedback from the system sounds when pressing the buttons. My wife says I'm fussy! Though the alignment of both hardware keys, navigation 5-way and the escape/home keys below are joined together and seemed to float and move slightly by 1mm.

Rich

Your button symptoms match mine exactly (as well as your fussyness matches mine ) before I fixed it. You have 3 options: replace the N800, return for repair, or DIY (see above).

Hi

Yeah, or another option I just put up with it. In one respect I don't want to have a faulty unit, but if they are all like this, then is it a fault? I don't want to go through the hassle of sending it back and end up with another one the same, maybe they are all manufactured the same, but not everyone notices? Mine is made in Finland.

The buttons do work, just the feeling of them, 'down' is without feel and the 'home' button is slightly sunk, not flush, which sometimes makes it awkward to press.

I think some of it is design and the fact that the 5-way button and escape/ home buttons float and give slight movement, normally moves to the left, so visually from time to time, you see a greater gap to the right of the buttons, being fussy here

But like you went through, I've only got a day or so to decide, maybe a user poll or a Nokia guy can reassure me, Texrat?

Cheers
Rich

I have slightly modified the procedure because the cellotape (or rather the layer of glue under it) got thinner after a while due to the many presses. Also, I realised that if the cellotape squares are too big then the push of the nodes is not focused enough. This time I made the 5 nodes on the underside of the black rubber a touch higher, rather than sticking tape on the white membrane. I am cutting tiny squares (2x2mm) of self adhesive aluminium foil (remaining form another project) and use 1 layer for middle and two layers for up/down/left/right. I suspect that these will also get compressed after a while so I am still looking for the perfect material. I used some adhesive plastic film but it was too thick and locked the buttons...

Nokia should really improve the button design, the 770 or even my old Zaurus was way better.