[NOVALUG] looking for opinions on the Nokia 770

[Stephan Greene]

On Tue, 12 Dec 2006, Nick Marshall wrote:

> Does anyone have an Nokia 770 Internet Tablet?

I do.

I bought it when they 1st came out (orderit it right after the /. story);  
I've since upgraded the image to the current (last summer) version and
purchased a 1GByte memory card shortly after I bought the 770.  Other than
a screen protector (cut from a PSP protector) and a carrying case
(Nintendo DS), I have not purchased any accessories for it.

You get a large PDA-size handheld tablet with a very nice screen.  The CPU 
is a little underpowered but the newer software makes good use of it.  
Memory is tight but the latest O/S has built-in features to let you create 
swap space on the external flash card which greatly improves performance.  
Previously, I had used some 3rd-party hacks to partition the mem card and 
edit /etc/fstab to use swap space on the card.  I'm satisfied with battery 
life and the stability of the platform and apps (it isn't rock-solid but 
it is quite good, esp if you don't burden it by running lots of apps 
simultaneously). 

Performance of the built-in Opera web browser is good enough - it works 
with Google mail, my employer's on-line timecard system, and many web 
sites.  I use it heavily as a portable webmail terminal, mostly in 
read-only mode.  I also use the RSS reader app to keep track of news and 
various web sites.  I use the built-in email client very little and have 
been back and forth on the media viewer/streamer.  Text entry is via 
either a virtual keyboard or text recognition.  Since I am unwilling to 
have my fingers and brain unlearn old Palm-style grafitti, I stick with 
the virtual keyboard.  Some people have gotten USB keyboards to work 
(takes some hw hacking) and several bluetooth keyboards work (some with 
some hacking).  I tried a BT keyboard, but prefer portability and returned 
it. 

Base O/S is Debian; there are a wealth of 3rd party apps at maemo.org.  
Internet Tablet Talk - http://www.internettablettalk.com/ has a wealth of 
info, suggestions, rants and flames. 

I find the display a little small w/o my reading glasses (50 yo eyeballs), 
you can enlarge text to make it more readable.  Some web sites, however, 
are very poorly designed to be viewable on this device (graphics take over 
the screen), YMMV.

Connectivity is via 802.11g wifi (WEP and WAP encryption supported), 
bluetooth (useful for using a cellphone for internet access) and USB (for 
file transfers, mostly).  If you get something like this, you will start 
wandering around looking for open wifi hot spots!  I find I use my phone a 
lot for connectivity, as there are too many places lacking open wifi (and 
I am too cheap to buy a t-mobile account for Starbucks).

I use my 770  alot on personal trips and it would have been a perfect 
travelling companion for me instead of a laptop when I was travelling a 
lot for business to check personal email and keep up on what is going on.

I would consider a 770 with the caveat that you might be better off with 
one of the cell phones with PDA or mobile computer capabilities, maybe one 
with a keyboard, with wifi and cellphone data access features.  The reason 
is the 770 is not sold as a PDA-replacement and depends on other systems 
for its internet connection.  The 3rd party PDA tools may not be what you 
want/need.  Something like Yahoo or Google calendars is an almost 
substitute, as you NEED connectivity to get to them.  To use the 770 to 
the utmost, you need ubiquitous connectivity (wifi or cell phone with 
high-volume or unliminted data services).  A cell phone with PDA and 
mobile computer capability gives you phone, PDA, and computing 
capabilities AND connectivity in one package. 

Hope this helps.  Happy shopping!

Steve

> 
> compusa has a $100 rebate for it
> http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=341114&pfp=external&tabtype=ts#moreinfo
> 
> I want to know just how usefull it has been for people before I buy one..
> 
> Nick
> _______________________________________________
> Novalug mailing list
> Novalug at calypso.tux.org
> http://calypso.tux.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/novalug
> 

-- 

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Stephan A. Greene     sgreene at patriot.net        ks1g04 at gmail.com
Herndon, VA
-------------------------------------------------------------------------