First Look: Nokia N900
Had a sneak preview of the Nokia N900, Nokia’s latest mobile device running on Maemo 5.
My first impression of the Nokia N900 is that it’s rather bulky for year 2010. Phone nowadays are much slimmer and lighter. (11.09 x 5.98 x 1.8 cm and 181 grams) But then, I guess it is hard to pack everything in a small package. And personally, I don’t know if I should call the Nokia N900 a mobile phone or a mobile internet device. I haven’t seen so much computing power on a smart phone before. Yes, you can make call with it. But does that means we should categorise it as a Smart Phone? (Philosophy discussion anyone?)
I guess the difference between the Nokia N900 and other Smartphones in the market is the Maemo Operating System. We have seen other Smartphones with better processor, but none have performed this well. I managed to run many applications without lagging. Pretty impressive. And honestly, multi-tasking is the way to go for mobile. And due to the free and open source nature of Linux and Maemo, porting applications to Maemo is a straightforward procedure. Because of this, there are many third-party applications available for the platform. Some applications are original software written specifically for Maemo, while other applications are straight ports of existing Linux programs.
And the N900 support Flash too. In fact, it supports Flash pretty well. I’ve never seen a mobile device load Flash this good. But some Flash sites are quite big in file size and takes slightly longer to load when you are on a 3G network. Still recommend WIFI when loading Flash content.
The slide out keyboard is pretty alright to type with. Kinda reminds me of the N97 mini keyboard. The SPACEBAR is quite small and placed at the side. Non-N97/N97 mini users might need some time to get used to it. The 3.5 inch touchscreen is resistive instead of capacitive. I don’t have any problems with resistive screen. But those who are used to the iPhone might have a little trouble trying to switch from finger to nails. Well, you can always pull out the stylus if you need to.
One thing to note about the N900 is that the Ovi map does not have free turn by turn navigation like other Nokia GPS devices. From what I understand, Nokia is working on it and that feature will be out on later date.
The Nokia N900 will be available in Singapore from 27 March 2010. You can pre-order from now till 26 March 2010. Suggested retail price is S$999.
Related posts:
2 Comments »
Leave a comment!
The phone says N00.
Is that because it is a test phone?
BurnZ: Wow, you got sharp eyes. Yeap, that is a pre-production unit. It’s common for companies to have a generic model number on their prototype.