Should I do it? I've always admired the n900 (look when I joined!), but didn't have enough money to buy it when it was first launched over two years ago.

I steadily lost interest in this pone up until recently when a friend offered it to me for about $230 barely used (but the stylus is lost).

Nutshell, m question to the community is: Worth it? Is the n900 still relevant in 2013? or will I be disappointed?

Ps. I have never owned a smartphone.

You won't be dissapointed, it's a touch screen smartphone (even more than a smartphone) with a qwerty. IMHO it doesn't lack anything except the speeds that these days dual core and quad core phones can offer, but I still prefer the N900 (that's why I haven't swapped it yet).
You won't have lots of apps and games like the other smartphones with android (you can install android on N900 though, I assume you know this)... If this doesn't bother you, you should get it.

It's a great phone. But would be nice to know more of your use cases.

Why do you want to buy n900 and not something else?

I think that for $230 you might want to check better alternatives...
The N900 browser is dying and getting slower and slower with nowadays websites, while other phones like the google nexus offer faster & smoother browsing and might just cost the same.
On the other hand - N900 handles multitasking on a whole different level - but is also showing it's age and lack of polish there.

For example you can't browse a site and listen to music without major slowdowns, and that pisses the heck out of me. Edit: please read this http://talk.maemo.org/showpost.php?p...0&postcount=53

If you tell us what will you do with a smartphone, I think we can give you better answers.

No it's not. Not for that kind of money and not if you're looking for a phone. The N900 is a lousy phone for many, but a great, what?, a fabulous pocket computer for others.

But if you're looking for a phone with a bit of a computerish touch to it, you're better of getting an N9 for that kind of money. Lacks the hwkb, though.

I'm a bit of a techie and so was very intrigued with maemo back in the day. It, at the time, looked like it had a bright future but I digress. The community still looks very solid & supportive now, and there must be some reason behind that.

I also liked the openness of the n900 hardware, but these are all things that I've read about on paper and never really experienced, save for a jailbroken ipad.

In short, finally getting something that I'd wanted a while back coupled with the fact that I've been using a touch & querty featurephone for the past year, which I'm used to, is the reason I'm considering the n900.

I'm just worried about whether I'll be having significant lags or feel relatively outdated when I get it.

I'd like to be able to browse while listening to music. I don't own a tablet anymore and therefore carry my laptop everywhere, which I'd like to stop doing or at least reduce its frequency.

I'd like my smartphone to converge functions and provide some multitasking. The internal storage is a big plus.

Check what is broken (in SW) on your device. Did you install by chance crappatch and/or batterypatch? As browsing while listening to music works perfectly here. Actually when I am traveling I use it to listen music through my car's radio while running SygicMM. Navigation is way heavier than browsing, but still it works ok - no stuttering or something.

By today's standards the N900 lacks a capacitive screen with gorilla glass, raw processing power, RAM and maybe a larger screen.

Other than that, the device kicks serious ***

Definitely relevant but unless you really want a physical k/b or a resistive screen I'd say go with the N9, same idea but more power/better looks/slicker user interface/more apps(marginally). You may pay a bit more than $230 for a used one though. I wish I didn't have a N900 already so I could get one myself

Also if you're in US with ATT you won't be able to get 3G speeds with the N900.