Darn.

Here's the story: a while ago I installed the power kernel and the settings and everything was fine. Fast forward to a few days later and the free space in rootfs is 0B, as a direct result of the many apps I installed. Initially I wasn't bothered by this, but as the device kept notifying me about new updates, I decided I have to do something. In my desperation of freeing up as much space as possible, I recklessly uninstalled certain components of the kernel using the app manager, completely forgetting that I should have used the uninstaller of the kernel...So as you can imagine, the phone didn't boot up anymore.
Naturally, I tried to flash it, but... but because I installed the bootloader to test out Android, when I slide out the keyboard to press 'u', the bootloader menu appears.
As you can imagine, I now have an expensive phone that doesn't boot up and cannot be flashed.

Any help or even remotely useful suggestions will be greatly appreciated.

Isn't the point with pressing "u" to do it with the phone turned off and then connect the USB cable?

As I said, because I have the bootloader installed, it kicks in automatically when the phone starts up. Unless you can suggest a way of pressing it without sliding out the keyboard, well....I don't really see any other way of getting around this.

I must be missing something here. Will my turned off N900 start if I slide out the keyboard?

I'm in no mood to try right now, but I'd be surprised.

Yes, you are missing something. I guess I should've made it clear: the bootloader is a menu designed to appear when you turn on the phone so you can select the location to boot from, but the programmer who wrote it made it so that it only appears if you slide out the keyboard.

To make the device enter USB mode so you can then flash it, you must press 'u' while it is off and then connect the cable. But I obviously need to slide out the keyboard to be able to press it, which causes the bootloader to appear on the screen.

O-key?

So, sliding out the keyboard, holding down "u" and connecting the cable will wake the bootloader on a turned off N900? This is what I find hard to believe.

I must have misunderstood the flashing instructions. I haven't had reason to do it yet but read enough threads about it to understand that I'll need to sooner or later.

And if sliding out the keyboard is the trigger for the bootloader, why not slide it out first and then power up the device? Or is this what you are describing?

I remember the bootloader bit, I got around it by pressing u without opening the keyboard till it snaps into place.

Remove the battery, connect the cable with the battery out, run the command, insert the battery.
afaik, nolo goes into flashing mode for less than a second at boot, so it flasher will detect the device and start flashing (no need to hold u when doing the above)

I don't understand, how exactly did you press it without opening the keyboard?

Slide the keyboard out 3/4 of the way, the "u" button will be visible but the screen will not be in the "open" state.

I had a look at my own N900 and it's not too hard.

Thanks... but now it completely refuses to start up