which one do you prefer? n900 or nexus s?

N900 any day...besides the NFC chip and the faster processor and RAM there is not much difference between the two..

much smaller form factor, capacitive touch screen, digital compass, and larger screen.
there are also massive differences in software. i would take google maps any day over anything that can run on maemo. the ovi store is abismal compared to the android apps store (not arguing quality, but there are a lot of great games on android that aren't available on maemo..).

i didnt want to create which is better thread but just wanted to findout about expriences of people who have both phones.

I'm testing one at the moment. So far, I like it, but there's not enough difference between it and my daily Samsung Captivate. I do own a N900 for traveling to certain places.

But around me, there's 4 people that have the Nexus S. To be honest, I prefer the Nexus S over the N900 - in almost all areas but build quality and keyboard...

my main concern is the sw only keyboard too

I use Swype... my speed with it is on par with a hardware keyboard by now. The standard Android keyboard (Gingerbread) I still find a bit clunky and slows me down.

It always gives me words that I'd rarely use