Display
Rating: Pretty good, 5 out of 10.
Personally, the N900 display its too small for me, but I like larger screens. I must be the only person in the world who liked my venerable old HTC Advantage (which bought the farm after it took a header into a swimming pool). That form factor was large enough to serve as a GPS car device, a proper ebook reader, and a decent phone with a bluetooth headset.
The touch functionality of the screen is good, once I figured out how to turn off the vibration. Fast response, didn't have a problem with registration.
The screen is not a capacitive touch screen, so you do not have multitouch ability. I personally like styluses every now and then depending on the app, which you don't get with a capacitive screen, so I don't mind the non-capactive touch screen.
Here is a slight annoyance, but I am going to rant about it for a second. The N900 has that annoying 'vibrate when you touch the screen' feature that was enabled by default. I can't understand what user testing group thought this was a good idea, but its popular these days. The functionality works like this: Every time you touch the screen, it vibrates slightly to give you a sense of feedback. The puzzling thing for me is, I already know when I touch something. See, the nerve endings in my finger sends electrical impulses to my brain through the spinal column, a complex delicate sensory system which evolved from millions of years of evolution. This inane shaking feature gives me redundant feedback, because the device shakes even when you don't hit a meaningful input area. For instance, in a calculator, you would want to get feedback if you actually hit a key. On the N900, you just get feedback if you touch anywhere on the screen, I guess to confirm that YES, you actually did manage to hit the 3.5" display with your fingertip, and NO, your spinal column really isn't sending false signals.
This aside, the display is a very bright and crisp display, but seems a bit small given the form factor of the N900.
Thursday, January 28, 2010
Nokia N900 Review: The Web Browser
Web Browser
Rating: Respectable. 6 out of 10.
The web browser is pretty good, somewhat better than what I would expect from a modern phone. Maemo supports flash, though so does the Touch with the SkyFire browser. Similar to the Touch, the N900 could not run Hulu in a satisfying way (frame rate was too low and inconsistent). The iPhone does not run Hulu at all, but that's not that big of a deal, since watching a choppy movie on tiny small screen is rather annoying, and "almost usable" is still "not usable".
Data entry in the N900 browser is very annoying. You have to 'double tap' to get the screen large enough to enter text into a text box, and then enter a special 'slide from the side mode' to switch from 'drag' mode to 'select' mode. I was never able to drag over text and select text very well in the web browser, I guess I never got the hang of it. This is very intuitive on the Touch and the iPhone.
The N900 screen is a little too small to consider this device useful for anything other than emergency browsing. At 3.5", it's the same as the iPhone and slightly smaller than the Touch HD2. However, for some reason, the display feels a lot smaller to me than the iPhone, maybe its the form factor.
For me personally, the overall browser experience on the iPhone is much better with a more intuitive interface. The two finger operations were much easier for me to use when I was walking around and using the phone on the go. The whole 'give your N900 a swirlie' to zoom is gimmickie and only sometimes works for me. The N900 had a slightly better browser look and better speed than the Touch, but each had their own little annoyances. The Touch's slightly larger display actually makes a pretty big difference (or maybe its the form factor... ultra thin and wide seems to make the screen feel bigger). And i never have to give the Touch a swirlie.
Rating: Respectable. 6 out of 10.
The web browser is pretty good, somewhat better than what I would expect from a modern phone. Maemo supports flash, though so does the Touch with the SkyFire browser. Similar to the Touch, the N900 could not run Hulu in a satisfying way (frame rate was too low and inconsistent). The iPhone does not run Hulu at all, but that's not that big of a deal, since watching a choppy movie on tiny small screen is rather annoying, and "almost usable" is still "not usable".
Data entry in the N900 browser is very annoying. You have to 'double tap' to get the screen large enough to enter text into a text box, and then enter a special 'slide from the side mode' to switch from 'drag' mode to 'select' mode. I was never able to drag over text and select text very well in the web browser, I guess I never got the hang of it. This is very intuitive on the Touch and the iPhone.
The N900 screen is a little too small to consider this device useful for anything other than emergency browsing. At 3.5", it's the same as the iPhone and slightly smaller than the Touch HD2. However, for some reason, the display feels a lot smaller to me than the iPhone, maybe its the form factor.
For me personally, the overall browser experience on the iPhone is much better with a more intuitive interface. The two finger operations were much easier for me to use when I was walking around and using the phone on the go. The whole 'give your N900 a swirlie' to zoom is gimmickie and only sometimes works for me. The N900 had a slightly better browser look and better speed than the Touch, but each had their own little annoyances. The Touch's slightly larger display actually makes a pretty big difference (or maybe its the form factor... ultra thin and wide seems to make the screen feel bigger). And i never have to give the Touch a swirlie.
Wednesday, January 27, 2010
Nokia N900
I just purchased a Nokia N900 a few days ago and created this blog to document my use of it.... I'm afraid this won't be a very positive posting, I have had nothing but troubles with this phone.
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