Comments on: What’s important to Nokia tablet users

By: Russell Nelson

Russell Nelson — Tue, 23 Sep 2008 10:36:21 +0000

@nona: n800 much better than n770 and n810 much better than n800. Nokia is becoming more comfortable working with the community. They are a large ship and turn directly slowly. At least they have a goal of open source; you know apple isn’t even aiming there.

By: nona

nona — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 12:34:52 +0000

@fizze:
It would also have been nice if it was integrated with the existing p54 driver, and if it didn’t need a binary helper, and a non-redistibutable firmware.
Still, as you say: definitely a step in the right direction.

By: nona

nona — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 11:29:42 +0000

@fizze:
well, kind of. No WLAN for the 770. The positive news is that the new drivers are mac80211 based, so there’s a chance this driver will get mainlined.

By: fizze

fizze — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 09:02:13 +0000

@nona:
Nokia has just open-sourced drivers for the WLAN and parts of power management AFAIK.
I’d say that’s definitely a step in the right direction.

By: rawsausage

rawsausage — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 08:35:25 +0000

There’s statistical skew in the results by the way. The respondents were mainly those who are in fact interested in present devices, and not by those who are not. The #1 reason for that is that Nokia introduced internet tablet which can’t be connected to the internet. We are still waiting for the 3G data module (costs 2$ to manufacture, 2 weeks to add to the design) to be actually added into the devices.

By: nona

nona — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 07:02:07 +0000

Maybe “relevance” should be a box that gets ticked too.
I myself am a developer, and bought a Nokia 770 a long time ago on the premise that it was an open source software stack, and thus would evolve in similar ways to other open source projects.
Even though I really liked (and still like) the hardware, even after a few years, I’ve come to the conclusion that the Nokia tablets are a complete dead-end, and not worth investing my time and effort in.
The number one problem, is that Nokia made us dependent on their software stack because the hardware is basically closed. That would be OK, if they were good stewards of the maemo platform, but it’s just not good enough – devices like mine are just abandoned after a while, the software doesn’t provide any compelling features (user interface is disappointing and slow, etc); and there’s no real market or economies of scale; not for open source development, nor for commercial development.
If I have to go for a closed platform, I’d rather develop on the iPhone – the hardware is more than good enough, in a good form factor; they got the market/economies of scale; they integrated a good enough commercial distribution system; they raised the bar on the UI and software;
Yes it’s completely locked down – but I hardly get more freedom with the Nokias.

By: fizze

fizze — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 05:25:13 +0000

Well, I can’t argue with that list. I also don’t really care about sound effects.
What I miss is integration with other Nokia products. I’d have expected to be able to sync contacts from a Nokia cellphone to the internet tablet at ease. In fact it’s rather complicated.
Same goes for bluetooth profiles and support. All cellphone related profiles are missing, so it’s actually of no use (in combination) with a cellphone.