The Nokia N900 has been the most eagerly anticipated handset to come out of the Big Finnish Giant for a very long time. With a mixture of expecting big things and a refreshing new move towards making Maemo more of a standard for top end N-Series (Nokia's flagship) handsets it's got a heavy burden upon it's shoulders already. Trying to deliver with such a burden is not easy. Apple nor Google had any of these burdens upon them with the iPhone or Android respectively. It could be a make or break point in the company's history, just ask Palm, Motorola and Sony Ericsson how that feels. Delivering to an expectant crowd full of critics, lovers, haters and enthusiasts is not an easy task, more so to keep everyone happy. Delays and setbacks to do not make it easier.
But, the N900 has started shipping and here are my impressions of it having spent 2 weeks with it;
Design Flaws
It's easy to spot design flaws on hardware when it's evidently blatant, but it's harder to spot them when they aren't as blatant or noticeable until one spends time with a device. From the silly little kickstand (which seems to be spreading to other non Nokia devices now) to the oddly placed lock slider and the 3.5mm jack and micro-USB oddly placed on the opposite side. I'm not sure why the design was changed, one only has to look at the N800 for inspiration - all the connections on one side and a very flexible and solid stand. Manufacturing costs and design constraints may be behind this, and it feels like the Maemo guys have had to work to a budget to prove their worth and get Nokia's chiefs to support them fully. Hopefully they've justified it and can improve on this in the future Maemo6 device. As the N900 is mostly a landscape device, I'd like to see all the connection options all conveniently placed on one side accessible whilst having the device sitting on the desktop facing the user.
Maemo
Maemo itself has matured and changed a lot since Diablo (which I'm running on the N800) mostly from a UI perspective, whilst keeping many familiar menus and improving on others. Clearly the improvement on the hardware and an update to the software has made using the device a lot more friendly. The Menus are faster, the browser is significantly quicker than before, but as I mentioned before there are inconsistencies in the menus, whilst some notifications need more work graphically - the yellow bar across the screen is nice, but I would think a nice box with a message and a OK / Cancel button would be more in-line with how users would expect to interact with the device. For the tech savvy one would assume tapping the screen would rid of this message, which it does, but a normal user might be left hanging for a while whilst waiting for an OK or Close option. On the whole it will take a user to get used to concept of tapping the top bar to access settings and menus when using this device, at times I found myself cycling through menus trying to find what I was looking for. Maemo is still work in progress in that matter and can only improve as these are software quirks which can and tend to be ironed out over the lifetime of an OS.
MID
The N900 is clearly an MID (Mobile Internet Device) - it is not a phone! If the landscape orientation of the device coupled with an OS designed clearly to be used two handed mostly isn't enough clear notice, then you're not getting enough vitamins. This is both a strong and a weak point of the N900. It will appeal to those looking for a MID with phone capabilities, but if making calls and communication in the traditional method is what your after, then sadly you should look elsewhere - Nokia's other N-Series devices or Android would be better solutions. But what the N900 does, it does pretty amicably. It's definitely one awesome MID. From playing music, watching videos, streaming content and browsing web it's top notch. There are no restrictions on where you can visit, nor what you can play (mostly) and as a truly open OS, those walls will only be knocked down to make paths to enable playback of MKV files for example. I've become accustomed to finding solutions for what I can't do on the N800 - only being restricted by hardware has stopped me accomplishing my goals, but with the N900 even those barriers will be broken in time.
Media Player
The built in Media Player does an amicable job in playing media easily. I did have hiccups trying to play some videos files, only to find out the resolution was slightly too high for the device to play. Other than this music playback is stellar, although it is missing an EQ. Access to video streams from Youtube, iPlayer from within the Media player would be a nice addition, but will come in time from 3rd parties.
Social Integration & E-mail
Although it does come with many options for Social Integration and E-mail solutions and many more options from the repository, I never found it as easy to use nor was it attractive enough. Yes it may have Facebook, IM, Twitter, Skype and many others to use, but using it isn't as appealing. With the great physical keyboard and very decent battery life one would think I'd be constantly interacting with all my friends via Twitter, Facebook etc, but with a lack of decent apps I had to use the web versions of those services. Integration in the phonebook is a great idea, one I applaud, but even I found it easier to visit Dabr or Facebook's website to check out what my friends were up to or the latest happenings. Having the option to do many things is attractive, but giving an appealing portal to make use of those services is even more so essential, something the N900 currently lacks.
E-Mail
I didn't manage to get the e-mail working on the N900 with the built in client, and after many attempts opted to not try any-more. It just could not connect to the servers even after making sure all login information was correct. I also checked the ports and SSL were enabled / disabled accordingly - something no normal user would fathom trying to do. Yet again another failure in communications within Nokia. They do have a nice Conversations app on the Symbian side which works pretty well, but it feels like no one actually tried talking to them to try and make this process easy. It took me 30 seconds to do this on the
HTC Hero previously - that's how easy it should be.
Accessories
One thing I was surprised to see was some nice in-ear earphones which have some nice bass to them, whilst the little adaptor for charging is also a nice feature. Mind, the EU charger that came with it was no good. I would like the earphones to by Y-slit rather than the around the neck sort, it gets irritating and isn't as cool to be seen in public with either.
Not Ready For Prime Time
If that title is not clear enough then you should try and trial one and let me know how it goes.
The N900 is ready for the enthusiasts, the tech savvy, developers and fanboys, but it's not ready for the Prime time, there are many software quirks which need ironing out. The UX needs working on in time to release a Maemo6 device. This should be used as a learning step towards making Maemo the OS to rule them all in 2011, yes 2011, Nokia won't get this right in 2010 either. It takes them far too long to improve on and will take time getting Maemo to be friendly to use, easy to approach and getting the N900 to go on a diet and lose the physical keyboard and trade it in for a nice capacitive screen which is up to the standard of the Hero and iPhone. The next Maemo device needs to be phone that does everything and not a MID that makes phone calls and sends SMS.
Would I pay £500 for an N900 for Xmas? I'd rather spend £370 on a HTC Hero and the rest of the cash on buying presents for everyone else.
