First post here, just thought I could say something to help you.
I'm a noobie, heck, less than a noobie, when it comes to Linux or anything envolving codes, never could understand them. So when I got the N900, I was kind of worried how it was gonna be for me, but let me tell you that it does not make a difference at all to know it or not. Sure some people are getting more out of it but for me it is a perfect little machine.
The camera is great, video recording great as well. It was able to play anything I had without the need to recode, mainly .AVI, .MP4. Music is great, the speakers are loud enough. E-mail, Skype and MSN are very easy to set up and use. The internet is great, for me the Mozilla browser has a lot of bugs, but MicroB works flawless.
Ultimately (sp?), it is your decision to make, and as others have said, if you can wait, wait. If not, consider the N900, as it is a very powerfull little gadget.
BTW, as of now I've being without a computer (desktop or notebook or netbook, nada!) since december and this little guy has saved me I don't know how many times already!
Haha. I don't see that many bugs with my piece of N900. It feels like it's more coz maemo community makes it more visible to the public than other phones imo. Oh, yes, it definitely is a great piece of land btw.
My advice. Buy it if you like what it can do now and if you want/need one right now.
If not, wait weeks, months, years until something better comes out.
Oh. Here's something I wrote on a different forum today which might be interesting.
Maemo5 OS on the N900 is one special OS.
- Can play nearly all video/audio codecs that's possible on a linux desktop PC.
- Such as ogg, flac, ac3, xvid, x264, wmv, rmvb, aac, mp3, wav etc
- No need for itunes. No need to re-encode videos.
- Gmail works great. Even from the browser via Android version of Gmail.
- 32GB built-in and can go up to 64GB once 32GB MicroSD comes out.
- No need for hacking. It's fully open to the user with root access.
- Full access to all the OS files including the kernal. Even over ssh.
- True real-time active multi-tasking. Not pause/resume.
- eg. It can even play a normal 700MB xvid avi file in the background while you browse the web / sms etc.
- Up to 9 virtual desktops. (4 officially, up to 9 possible)
- The best integration of internet chat such as skype/msn etc.
- Full desktop version of OpenOffice and Gimp.
- Many more full desktop linux apps. (openssh, truecrypt etc etc)
- It's the only phone that actually can run direct recompiled desktop gnu linux apps.
- 3rd party full turn-by-turn voice navigation is available. (Sygic)
- Awesome mozilla based web browser. Firefox Mobile available also.
- Excellent hardware keyboard. Fully remappable. (4 layers per key)
- Battery life is good imo. Lasted me 2 full days with ~45mins talk, some internet browsing.
- Tons of new apps appearing / improved everyday at maemo.org
- VERY customizable. OS is pretty much desktop linux with mobile gui on top.
- You can create your own scripts for nearly anything just like linux.
(and create desktop widgets that show its output or initiate the script)
- New PR1.2 update with HUGE amount of changes should come out within next few weeks.
- Great still camera. Has flash. Record videos at 800x480 even with flash in torch mode at night.
My priorities were:
- Play nearly all SD-res video files without the need for re-encoding.
- Be as desktop PC-like as possible with nearly no limits. (geeky)
- Proper and super effective true multi-tasking with running background apps.
- Great community with lots of new apps/mods/themes developers.
- Hardware keyboard. This is a must.
- 3.5mm earphone socket. Good video camera.
Anyways, I see no competition to the N900 imo currently. Tell me if there is one and I'll swap to that. N900 will get better over time with MORE apps also. Especially considering it'll support Qt 4.6 which new Symbian 4 and Meego OS will support. Which means new app support for quite a long time.
How can you play videos in original format like avi??
is there a way that my carrier can lock the n900 in his network?
I've ordered mine and it's supposed to arrive any day now, but when I read the contract it sad that the device is locked in their network. I didn't payed to much attention to that, but now that I thing about it, if I flash the device it will loose the original rom and I might loose the warranty.
Question to all of you users out there... If you did not own a n900 right now, and were looking to buy one, would you get one now?
I've been wanting to purchase one of these devices since I saw the n810, but I waited as the n900 was set to be released in a month. I waited, couldn't get one as they were unavailable, then financial issues arose and it got pushed to the back burner.
As of today I'm looking into the n900 again, however with this news of MeeGo, and *if* there will be a 910/950 or some other hardware update this year, I would hate to buy the 900 and see a new device come out months later. I don't need to review all the features and what I need in a device, the concept of the n900 (and later models) would work for my needs.
Now, what would you do? I'm sure there are a number of folks who still have and use the 7xx/8xx devices but myself I migrate to a new device and the old one sits in a drawer (my Axim x3i is a weak mp3 player used twice a year now).
