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Nokia 770 Alive and Well
anon mouse-cow-aard writes to tell us the Register is reporting that the Nokia 770, originally scoffed at by many as useless, is doing quite well. There is even an open source platform development site, maemo, that offers quite a bit. It uses wlan for connectivity and has 'cpu transparency' so you can build apps for normal Debian (albeit with a custom set of libraries) and then run a sort of 'checkout' for the ARM processor, and it will run on the handheld. There is ssh and VOIP coming soon. Overall it is shaping up to be pretty cool.
Ok, Flash 6? How old are the rest of the apps? It may not be worth it. Just my .02 cents worth.
Applications (in 2005 software edition)
* Web Browser (Opera 8)
* Flash Player version 6
* Email Client
* Internet Radio
* News Reader
* Media players, Image viewer
* PDF viewer
* File Manager
* Search
* Calculator
* World Clock
* Notes
* Sketch
* Games
Whups...the cross-compiler SDK link in the above post should be http://www.pepper.com/linux.
PepperHacks - Hacking the Pepper Pad
is there any particular reason it can't/couldn't be set up to talk to a VoIP carrier like Skype?
Skype is closed-source. Until a binary is released that is compatible with the Nokia 770, it will not be possible to run skype on it.
I pre-ordered the Nokia 770 back in November. My ship date was supposed to be the 14th of December, but around the 18th, still no 770 nor any email.
I called Nokia USA and they told me that my credit card company was rejecting my charge. So I call my credit card company to ask why they are rejecting it. They asked who was running the charge, and I answered "Nokia". Well, nobody named Nokia was trying to charge my card -- but there was another copmany with a generic counding name that was trying to charge my card, for the same amount as my 770. I call Nokia back to ask if they are charging under that name and they tell me yes. But now my order is delayed until January 10th.
All in all, they have way more demand then they anticipated, and they really don't have their act together with production, shipping, even charging people's cards properly.
However, I am glad that there has been a literally overwhelming response -- I have always wanted a true tablet computer, but I didn't want to shell out $2500 for a table "notebook" that really wasn't using a pen-based GUI. I'm an obsessive note-taker, and if I can take down notes or draw sketches directly into digital, hooray! I hope Nokia pursues this line and develops a reasonably priced tablet computer with an OS that is truly driven by the stylus.
Computers are useless. They can only give you answers.
-- Pablo Picasso
Try 480x272 for the PSPs screen resolution.
The confusion comes from the firmware-limited video capabilities of the PSP. In 4:3 mode, it supports up to 320x240; and up to 368x208 in 16:9 mode.
Yes, the Nokia still beats it. And the PSPs browser has no Flash support either...
The PSP screen res is 480x272, not 320x240.
Where is that guy who'd die defending what I had to say when I need him?
I've been blogging my experience with this one like mad:
http://thoughtfix.blogspot.com/
Posts today:
- Using the device's USB host mode without soldering a special cable
- Using an iPod nano as external storage
Lots of other things too, like enabling sshd and other thoughts and wishes.
I spotted this puppy at Fry's on Dec 31. Did some googling on my T3 and was intrigued. I was a bit worried it would be too much of a duplicate of my Palm T3, but boy was I wrong. I love roaming around the house with this in hand. Web surfing and email are obvious uses. Haven't used the email client and just use a webmail client. IM is great using 3rd party GAIM app and I really haven't found the "written input" any more difficult to use than the Palm graffiti. It's been fun reading CES coverage blogs while listening to podcasts. (It's interesting that I've found no CES coverage on the 770 @_@) Another nice thing to do is listen to mp3s streamed from slimserver. It's really not a replacement/duplication of my Palm T3. Basically, it's a VERY portable web browser and audio/video player. Battery life seems pretty good and DivX 4.12 avis seem to work best. It really reminds me of a portable palm-sized 3Com Audrey, if anyone remembers those (I still use one!) I have had no connectivity problems and it connects to my phone (Nokia 6230) and laptop via bluetooth with no problems.
At $800, I could just buy a laptop. Why would I want this?
Because it sells direct from Nokia for $359.99. Link, you have to click continue to view the price. For some reason a direct link wouldn't work.
Err. Oops. That's this.
The Pepper Pad... not the Nokia 770.
Install the latest firmware to start. Following that, consider setting up a swap :)
- upgrade-plus-gps-wishes.html
. php?p=4013&postcount=13
My experience with upgrading:
http://thoughtfix.blogspot.com/2006/01/update-and
A link to setting up a swap (not for noobs)
http://www.internettablettalk.com/forums/showpost
Hope that helps.
I have one also, and love it. I love being able to whip it out in the cafe in the train station each morning (I commute by train) and read my RSS feeds, check my email, get on GAIM and chat, or at home I hook it up to the stereo in my living room and stream internet radio stations.
Now I will attempt to take a crack at your questions.
1. How well does it (or do you think it would) function as a PDA? Does it have calendaring apps and stuff? How well does it sync that sort of data with a PC? What sort of software will it sync with?
Well, with the software that comes with it, it really doesn't. Nokia seems to by hyping this as "It's not a PDA and it's not a phone, it's for the internet!" But in reality, it's just a small hand-held computer running Linux, and the software that it comes with is bundled with the internet in mind.
But that doesn't mean that nobody will write Calendar and PIM software for in. (In fact, I know there is already one commercial one out there, which synchronizes with Outlook, and one open source one which I don't think does synchronization.) I would wager that decent Calendar and PIM software will show up for it, but there's no way to be sure.
2. I'm still a bit sketchy about what I need to connect to Penn State's Wi-Fi network, but I know that at the very least I will need *some* VPN client. (PSU has downloads for OS X, Linux, and Windows for a Cisco VPN client; I don't know much about VPNs, if clients are interoperable or anything like that, but it seems that at least whatever client comes with the Axim series will connect.) Does the 770 come with such a client?
OK, if the Linux VPN stuff from your university can be run from the command line as a normal user, then I would guess that it'd work. If it can run from the command line as root, it'll take some work (you need to do some trickery to put the 770 into "Development mode" before it'll let you switch to root), but I'd think then you could get that running. If it requires some kind of GUI login stuff, well, probably not.
3. From the Maemo tutorials, it looks like it uses some mix of a special API (the Hildon stuff) and GTK. How difficult is this to learn (I've done GUI programming with the Win32 APIs and have a very rudimentary knowledge of Qt, but almost no GTK knowledge) and how much knowledge is transferrable to making desktop GTK apps? Is it possible to use something like Qt on it?
I don't know how difficult it is to learn to develop for it, but it seems like GTK developers are having a lot of success getting their applications running on it without too much pain. GAIM, for instance, was ported to the 770 almost immediately after it was released. Using QT on it, I would seriously doubt that's possible.
4. How's the handwriting analysis? To compare, Windows Mobile gives you a virtual keyboard you can tap on the keys, an entry area that you use like the older Palms and special glyphs, and full screen recognition that tries to do it from your natural writing. It seems from the site that it has something like the first and last modes; is this accurate?
Same deal, you can get the little virtual keyboard you tap, or the handwriting analysis. You can train the handwriting analysis to recognize your handwriting. But I have one major complaint about this: When you go into the handwriting training screen, it'll show you the seven different ways it knows to write, for example, the letter A. And you are only allowed to add one new way to write "A" in your handwriting, and there's NO WAY TO DELETE the seven ways it already knows. This is quite frustrating if, for example, the way you write the number "1" is the same as what the device knows to be the letter "l". I seriously hope they change that in the future.
Also, when you are using handwriting recognition, it will try and auto-complete what you're writing. For example, if you want to write the word "example" and you've written the first two letters, it'll show you down at the bottom
One of the many things I hate. thingsihate.org
I really like it. Quick overview is that it's great if you basically just want to use the internet (hey that's what they made it for) and don't expect it to do everything a PC can do.
Here is what I like about it:
1. I commute by train, so if I have a few minutes to wait I get a coffee in the cafe at the station and jump on somebody's open wireless network (the hotel next door, maybe?) and check my RSS feeds, do my email, browse the web, open up GAIM and chat, etc. When you've got a wifi connection (and since I live in an urban area, there's open wifi networks all over the city) it's a great.
2. Hook it to my stereo in the living room at home and stream internet stations or podcasts. I love doing this. I get Soma FM's "Drone Zone" going when I can't sleep. And this month is old-timey country month on Radio David Byrne!
4. Stream podcasts using the little built-in speaker. The little built-in speaker isn't great, but if you're listening to a podcast where it's just voice and not music, it's great. If I'm cooking in the kitchen I'll set it on the table and fire up a podcast.
5. Use the internet from bed, or the recliner. I admit it. I have no shame.
6. When there's no network connectivity, for instance when I'm on the train or in the middle of nowhere, it makes a great e-book reader using FBReader. Or if you've downloaded some music or podcasts and have some headphones, you can listen to those.
OK, now here are the things that so far I have disliked about it:
1. Handwriting recognition isn't that great, so I use the little virtual keyboard instead. You can see a longer post I wrote about the handwriting recognition here.
2. While the Opera browser that comes with it is great, it does seem to have some problems with pages with a lot of DHTML on them. For instance, if you start loading Gmail or Bloglines, and then switch to another window while they're loading, and then come back, you'll see they didn't load properly. For some reason when loading those pages, I need to keep that window in the foreground for them to properly load.
3. The Opera browser doesn't have a way to change the font size. If I'm reading a page where the font just shows up too small, I can't increate the font size, all I can do is use the ZOOM IN feature, which creates a horizontal scroll bar in the browser. This is actually rarely an issue, though, since the display is so crisp and easy to read.
4. Running the Nokia-distributed version of the operating system, there's no way that I can see to remove the icons for the Mail and News readers from the left-hand-side menu. I don't use them, I just use Gmail and Bloglines in the browser, so I don't want those two icons taking up space in my menu. (Apparently it's possible to install the Maemo operating system directly, instead of using the Nokia'd-up version, but I haven't tried this.)
5. No network file browsing! So if I'm in the living room, I can't browse the music on my desktop computer over the network and play them. I have gotten around this by installing SlimServer on the desktop computer and connecting the Audio Player in the Nokia to that, but this is sort of clunky. I'd rather just have SMB support in the nokia.
6. Videos have to be sort of low-quality to play smoothly, I think. At least, I've downloaded a couple of videos to it, and they were choppy. This isn't an issue of the display, I think, it's an issue of the processing power.
One of the many things I hate. thingsihate.org