Hands on with the Nokia N800 Internet Tablet (next in the Nokia 770 series)
“Disconnect” on IRC (#maemo on freenode) bought a Nokia N800 this morning. Here are excerpts from his findings so far:
[12:24] Did anyone pick up an n800 yet?
[12:25] Disconnect is playing with it
[12:25] jtokash: i did, we’re trying to get an xterm running
[12:25] does it actually have dual mem slots?
[12:26] yes
[12:27] one in battery comp (mmc/sd) and one outside behind stand (same)
[12:27] 192M usable int storage
[12:31] omfg youtube works
[12:31] * Disconnect was not expecting that
[12:36] and youtube is way low framerate
[12:36] audio has some glitches
[12:42] Disconnect: try to open /dev/dsptask in a browser, does it show any files there?
[12:42] Disconnect: so we can do RAID1 over sd
[12:43] lol
[12:44] “some random v6 processor rev 2 (v61)”
[12:45] 320bogo
[12:45] no clock info in cpuinfo
[12:45] What’s the bogos on the 770?
[12:45] armv6 usually means vfp included
[12:46] and no more alignment problems
[12:46] and SIMD for ssvb 🙂
[12:46] yah vfp
[12:46] 125.76bogo on my 770 atm.
[12:46] So, potentially twice as fast.
[12:47] Disconnect: so, how did you get one?
[12:47] compusa
[12:47] Ah 🙂
[12:47] Disconnect: how much did it cost, btw?
[12:47] I guess you might be the first customer
[12:47] $400
[12:47] Hmm.
[12:47] same as reported
[12:48] gonna try to get kb working
[12:50] bt kb works out of the box
[12:50] 128M ram still
[12:50] Disconnect: there’s a “Bluetooth” applet in Control Panel, I believe?
[12:51] yah
[12:51] and a “hardware keyboard” one
[12:51] Cool
[12:51] * Disconnect is gonna try R&D mode
[12:51] Disconnect: 770 has 64mb
[12:51] ah
[12:52] does the included headset have a microphone on it?
[12:52] ok so 128 now
[12:52] and yah i think so. checking.
[12:52] looks like it
[12:52] nice
[12:52] and a clicker
[12:53] anyone want to try gchat audio/video?
The eo v7110 UMPC vs the Nokia 770 Internet Tablet
Having owned both the eo v7110 UMPC from TabletKiosk and the Nokia 770 Internet Tablet, I went back to ThoughtFix’s archive and read his comparisons of the two devices. I found myself agreeing with a lot of his individual points. However, as I noted in a previous post, I vastly prefer the Nokia 770 for the tasks I usually use devices smaller than a laptop for.
Some points I would add to the comparison:
– Bootup time: 770 is the winner.
– Return from ‘standby’: 770 is the winner.
– Resuming a Bluetooth connection: 770 is the winner.
– Storage Space: The eo wins.
Nokia N800 in the flesh!!! An update to the Nokia 770 Internet Tablet
Stefan Constantinescu found a flickr album of N800 photos. NICE.
Stefan’s Blog, with the photos arranged nicely.
The original flickr photo set.
Details from the back of the box:
– VGA (640×480) webcam
– Integrated Stand
– 4.13 inch screen (same as the 770)
– Stereo Speakers (770 has mono)
– Microphone has moved to the top.
– Audio jack and mini usb port have moved to the right side. (FANTASTIC!)
– Requires mobile phone (with bt) for cell connection.
– Wifi and BT
– It looks to me based on the flickr photos that the n800 comes with a sleeve. I’m not so sure that’s an improvement over the sliding shell. I like the shell because it attaches to your 770 even when you are using the device. Nothing to lose!
Since the screen sizes are the same, I grabbed a picture of the n800 and the 770 and scaled them until the screen sizes matched. That resulted in the following comparisons that should show the size differences. Basically, longer but not as tall. Too bad we can’t see exactly how thick the new one is, though some of the shots make it look basically as thick as the 770.
The n800 photo is sourced from the flickr set mentioned above. The 770 photo is from flickr, too.
If you haven’t been reading ThoughtFix’s regular updates on the new model, here are some links:
Two Mini SD Slots, Retractable Camera, Built iIn Stand – ThoughtFix relaying info found on ITT forums.
Most likely no cell or GPS. – ThoughtFix on the FCC docs.
Well, here are my wishes for the new Tablet:
– A version of the sliding cover that has a chicklet keyboard built in.
– A turbo button that makes the CPU care more about speed than battery life – would be useful occasionally.
– A more powerful processor in general.
– Same size and shape. Looks like I mostly got that wish. Hopefully, it won’t be thicker!
– Same price (or cheaper)
– Browser Compatibility with Google Video, YouTube.
– Browser Compatibility with Google Reader. Although ReaderMini.com is pretty damn close!
– Tilt Sensors (I’ve been a big fan of tilt tech since WarioWare Twisted!)
Update: Engadget’s comment area for this topic is interesting. The commenters are really hitting on the important question: Have the RAM and CPU increased? I hope so. If not, I’m not going to be able to justify buying the new version!
ReaderMini.com version .6 is up!
After a very late night of coding, version .6 is up! New since Tuesday: New buttons: Mark All Read for the current feed and View unread posts only. Also, lots of new images and colors to freshen the look. The sidebar can now be collapsed to give you more reading room for your feeds. You can see a list of your starred and shared items. For more, see the list below.
So, get on with it! Check out ReaderMini.com!
Dev on this project is going well. The next big change will fix the bug that requires you to occasionally refresh your browser to re-enable certain buttons.
Changes in Release .6 – 1/3/07
- Mark Feed as Read button. NOTE: The Google Reader API and Google Reader currently do not allow an item to be made unread after you’ve blasted the feed with Mark All As Read.
- Fixed: Read, Starred, Shared now work in reverse to mark an item as unread, unshared, not starred.
- “Show Unread Posts Only” button.
- Added a Favicon. It’s an orange flag from this set of free icons: http://www.famfamfam.com/lab/icons/mini/
- Added placeholder icons to feed item buttons (star,share,read/unread) from http://www.famfamfam.com/lab/icons/mini/
Changes in Release .5 – 1/3/07
- Sidebar and Content Pane are now connected by a collapse-divider. Click it to hide the sidebar.
- Moved color and font information out of main css file and into a ‘theme’ css file.
- Fixed: Margins aren’t screwy anymore.
Changes in Release .4 – 1/3/07
- Cleaned up the demo account’s subscriptions.
- User’s email address is now displayed in the header.
- Added starred and shared links to the feed list so you can browse the items you’ve tagged that way.
- Feed category titles are now highlighted to make them distinct from feed titles.
- Stale feeds are no longer hidden by default.
- Feed titles in the feed list are now more organized. Unread count comes first and feed titles no longer wrap.
Changes in Release .3 – 1/2/07
- Thanks to Jonathan Greene, Gregory Auld, keesj (in #maemo on freenode) and fietske (on Google Groups) for feedback/suggestions.
- Fixed: Mark read/starred/shared buttons no longer stack up.
- Fixed: Feed List no longer loses items.
- Fixed: Nokia 770 users can drag scroll the feed contents.
- Feeds now default to hidden if they are stale (no unread items).
- New Layout. Handles browser resize (including 770’s full screen mode) wonderfully.
- Fixed: Buttons are bigger, in general, for touch screen use.
- Font has changed to Bitstream Vera Sans where supported. Degrades to Arial if not supported.
- Fixed: When an item is marked read, the unread count for the feed is decremented.
- Fixed: Feed categories are now alphabetical.
- Fixed: Action words now, for feed item buttons (star,share,read).
- Lots of divs have been set up with classes and ids in preparation for beautification.
- Release Notes and Known Issues appear when the application is launched.
Changes in Release .2 – 12/27/06
- Fixed: Items now link back to their original articles.
- Feed List and Feed Contents are in their own independantly scrolling areas.
- Fixed: Feed Contents area resets to the top when a new feed is opened.
- Demo account set up. Use x@gmail.com / x to login.
- Fixed: Page Reload/Refresh now works as expected.
- Mark Read, Share, Add Star buttons added for each item.
- Red/Grey dots in the header show active AJAX connections.
TODO:
- Next/Prev Page buttons.
- Bug: Deal with auth and command token timeouts. — if this moves into the cookies, have all feed downloads trigger a logout if the version cookie isn’t set (start setting that at login) so that users don’t get a bad experience.
- Next/Prev Item buttons.
- Setup a data version checker and log out ReaderMini users if need be.
- Integrate Google Reader Trends.
- set “flag-for-later” “flag-for-followup” label with button. (greghaspants)
- image loading toggle (will display:none block loading?) (greghaspants)
- put unread count in titlebar (greghaspants)
- put current feed in titlebar
- Mark All as Read button next to each feed in the feed list. inspiration
- Add a FAQ Page, including info about the API (mention Niall) also: authentication, goals, contact, other apps,.
- Move from authForInstalledApps mechanism to authForWebApps as soon as it is availalbe for Google Reader.
- Subscribe to feed button / dialog.
- Bug: AJAX requests don’t start the internet connection on the 770. Pop a dialog or put a request in an iframe.
- Bug: Image handling in Opera on the 770 might leak. After browsing several feeds with lots of images, images stop showing up. Workaround: refresh the browser. Solution: Find a way to clean up the images.
- Override the cursor keys for next/prev hotkeys?
- River view for categories.
- UI is not clean enough.
- Feed List should be drag-scrollable on the 770.
- Browser compatability warnings. Pop a dialog if AJAX fails.
- Incorporate some of the great ‘reading feeds on a touchscreen’ discussion points at this post (where’d that link go?).
- HTTPS login.
- “Blog This” button.
- “Del.icio.us This” button.
- Tag functionality.
- Degraded mode for browsers that can’t handle dojo and ajax.
- Gregarius backend – no reason that ReaderMini shouldn’t integrate with other Aggregator software.
- Keyboard shortcuts for non touch screen browsers (Sony Mylo)
- Outlook preview pane theme.
- Theme support.
- Get rid of “author unknown” text in some feeds.
- Optimize the updating of feed unread counters.
- Set the feed list to have overflow horizontally hidden rather than wrapping. Do a mouseover for the number of unread.
- Backend: use /reader/api/0/token?client=XXXX instead of /reader/view to get command token.
- Backend: change any lingering client=scroll params to client=readermini+version.
- Hide categories which have only stale feeds?? (greghaspants)
Google Reader Trends!
Reader Trends, added today to Google Reader, provides a lot of insight into a user’s feed reading behavior. For instance, the graphs of my reading habits are very informative and confirmed that I do most of my feed reading late in the evening and on weekends. I’m really impressed with the Trends page and I’m looking forward to seeing Google do more with our feed data.
I see two big issues, though. The first is related to it’s handling of read items. I don’t think it can tell the difference between a feed that you constantly mark as read without actually reading any articles and a feed that you carefully read each item, very aware that when you hit J(next item), you’ll be marking each article read. So some forum feeds which I rarely browse are mixed with ones I actually read a lot (like www.scobleizer.com, Make Magazine and Engadget) in my most read list. To drive this point home, I’ll note that the trends page says “From your 93 subscriptions, over the last 30 days you read 2,771 items, starred 143 items, and shared 140 items.” I have not scrolled past 2,771 items this month. Er…. HAVE I?
The second big issue (for me) is that the new Trends page is yet another piece of Google Reader that doesn’t work on my Nokia 770 which has a VERY CAPABLE Opera browser. The page loads, but none of the tabs work.
I spent a few minutes looking into adding the Trends information into ReaderMini (my mobile front end to Google Reader), but it looks like I’ll have to translate a lot of links and I may have to include a bunch of CSS to get it working. I put it on the todo list and I’ll hopefully get to it this month.
The ‘inactive feeds’ list is very helpful and may lead to a recategorization of my feeds.
Update: I agree with Steve Rubel. I’d like to opt in for the ability to share my personal Google Reader trends with others. I’d even love to put some of the lists and charts in my blog sidebar. Meanwhile, Andrew Parker links to what end up being an excellent resource for finding apps like this. He calls them MyWare.
John Tokash 