the one source we have (and i do hope so much it's all fake) seems to indicate that this is the lead device ("flagship", they call it).

Yes, a good question is the context of the term lead. This sounds like lead as in 'first one', and not necessarily lead as in 'biggest baddest'.

Well, I skipped it, because it's not that big a deal -- same information, it's 10% smaller, so just hold it 10% closer and get on with life. I'd GLADLY put a 3.5" 800x480 screen in my N810 to make room for a d-pad; that's just a useful trade-off.

The crime here is shrinking a device that was a perfectly acceptable size, and thus forcing a screen-size shrink that's not part of a useful tradeoff.

I'm holding out hope that at least there's a little d-pad on the back somewhere.

EDIT: right now, there's 4 of us. Snoshrk only made one vote, but the rest of us made at least two, so we clearly knew it was multiple choice.

• Benson
• bergie
• codeMonkey
• Snoshrk

I truly hope that this is just one of the many "devices" that Nokia produces with Maemo 5 on board.

I would be quite happy if they stuck with the N8's form factors. Imagine your N800 or N810 with the new processor, camera, and OS.

In this way they would have perfected a device that many of us have been lugging around for over 2 years now. My extended family has gotten quite used to my N800 lying around and even 6 or 7 year old nieces and nephews will pick it up and begin to interact with it with out supervision...

In other words, the tablet has become an appliance in my world that now exists along with my cell phone.

If this device is the only one offered in North America, Nokia may loose existing customers like myself who can not use the cell phone because of coverage or an existing service provided on an unsupported network, Nokia will now have to compete on the same turf as an iPhone and a Palm Pre for a now smaller piece of pie, and Nokia will instantly create a new opportunity for a competitor to fill the void they provided by abandoning the N8** form factor.

A piss poor triple play if you ask me.

It also makes Android look even more attractive.

Hey... That's not 10%. It's ~37%. Half the diagonal means quarter the size.

Agreed on that one, within the context of this being an N8x0 replacement which I hope it isn't

Edit: Got my calculator bass ackwards. So. 4.1" is 37% larger than 3.5", and 3.5" is 27% smaller than 4.1".

Sure, if you're talking area, but linear dimensions scale inverse-linearly with distance, and area dimensions scale inverse-quadratically, so it comes out the same. 10% smaller diagonal = 10% closer.

Actually, of course, it's not 10%. Running the math instead of hip-shooting, it's almost 15% smaller, so 15% closer, but still plenty workable, imho, as long as it's being traded off for something more useful than "it fits in the pockets of micropants I don't have".

I do hope they come out with a bigger, clunkier, but more capable Maemo Communicator to fill the N8x0 slot, and I'm actually pretty sure they will -- I'm just concerned that it won't be in the Fremantle launch line-up, so the "N900" may have to do for a year or so.

Alas, closer is not really an option for me, 10 or 15% Damn you people with no arm-lengthening dioptries ! But seriously, I noticed people already using the N810 by holding it real close to their eyes, certainly closer than they would do with any book or things they use for a prolonged period of time. Decreasing that distance further sounds like a recipe for myopia to me

It doesn't. Area size is proportional to the square of the diagonal (quadratic, not linear).

Err. I believe I said the same thing ? Square of half is quarter.

"But seriously, I noticed people already using the N810 by holding it real close to their eyes, certainly closer than they would do with any book or things they use for a prolonged period of time. Decreasing that distance further sounds like a recipe for myopia to me"

See, but if you are already myopic, you don't need a recipe. For me, the N810 is like going to a drive-in movie, with the screen wide in front of me. I'm glad to hear that other people are also doing it.

(I do it with my eee too, lying on my back with the keyboard vertical, propped on my chest. It takes a bit of practice to learn to type that way, but it can be done.)

I see that someone says that a better-sized N900 may be a year or so away. As the REAL N900 recedes into time, I get less interested. Anyway, I'm a Sprint customer at this time, so I probably can't use the soon-to-be released N900 as a phone, especially with my cheapo $30 a month Sprint plan.