Satio, iPhone or N900? Help Me Decide!!?!!?!?

Yesterday my dear friend hui xuan asked me what’s my take on the Satio, iPhone and N900. Well i can’t answer with absolute certainty as the N900 is still very new and i have not tested the Satio yet, but based on what i’ve read and seen, here’s what i think

    
Sony erricsson's Satio is more of a media phone if anything else. Like the iPhone, the Satio is completely touch based. The Satio runs on Symbian platform, so operation will be slightly similar to Nokia touch devices. If I'm not mistaken the Satio also has a 12meg cam and picture quality is pretty good! The Satio will be backed up by Sony’s new PlayArena, where users can go and download games and other content to their phone. Sony is pretty dedicated to bringing quality games and media content to the Satio with the Arena, further enhancing this device’s media capabilities. As with SE phones, the Satio’s speaker quality is good.

Next, the iPhone. I feel the iPhone will definitely please Mac fans or users who want a "fun phone" to show off and share with friends. The iPhone’s user interface is sleek, clean, and very attractive. iPhone's diverse array of games and apps can definitely entertain for hours, and the iTunes player is just superb. With proper headphones and large built in memory, watching movies and listening to music on the iPhone is a pleasure.

However i’ve always been put off by the iPhone because you cannot multitask or share files via bluetooth easily. The only application you can run in the background is the music player. So you can’t.. let say IM with your friends while having the browser or calculator app open. You have to Close this – open that – close this – open that… you get the idea ;)  Also battery cannot be changed, Mac accessories are pricey and the camera quality is iffish. With that said, getting an iPhone will get you noticed and it’s always fun to play games on the iPhone with your friends. It’s capacitive touchscreen is still one of the best on the market!

Now we have the N900. A multitasking behemoth that functions as a mobile computer. You can run as many tasks as you want with the 500Mhz processor and 1GB of RAM so if you're always on the move and want to get things done, the N900 will deliver. The N900 will always keep you connected. Contacts and chat, GPS- positioning, Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, photos, texts, emails you can have all of that on your N900 – and if you want, keep them all running at once.

The qwerty keypad makes typing a breeze. However the N900's camera is just good, not outstanding as i would hope for. Currently, most applications can only run in landscape mode but this might be fixed soon. The N900 is based on linux so customization and availability of apps will not be a problem. In fact we’re already seeing loads of applications being ported to the N900. I can’t say too much on the N900 in terms of reliability as it’s just been released.

So, to sum it up
Satio - Excellent Multimedia phone, good imaging device, good sound quality.
iPhone - Fun phone, good media features but can't multitask and sound quality from speakers is utter crap.
N900 - Powerful multitasking mobile computer. (In fact the "phone" feature for calling is actually an app.) Might be a bit much to operate if all you want is to make calls and listen to songs on your mobile device.

Nokia’s Maemo Powered N900 Starts Shipping!

Just yesterday there was a tweet from Nokia’s Maemo Team, and today the news of the N900 shipping has literally exploded all over the internet!

According to Reuters’ Tarmo Virki, the shipments of the Nokia N900, Nokia's latest mobile computer based on open source Maemo 5 software, have now started. A real game-changer that will help Nokia to finally turn the tide of smartphone war in their favour and control the mobile market again.

The N900, Nokia’s first Linux powered mobile computer with added phone functions is mostly seen as “the iPhone killer” but to me there’s a lot more going on than that. True, this maybe a partial response from Nokia towards Apple’s soaring iPhone sales but the fact that it’s an Nseries device tells me this is the next generation of high end mobile devices from Nokia - uncompromising processing power, open sourced, touchscreen but with full support of a hardware keyboard, fancy and sleek UI jam-packed with multimedia features etc.. just everything we’ve ever wanted in a device like this.

Nokia claims they spent 3 years on this baby (after the release of the highly successful N95), in that time frame released tonnes of below par Nseries devices and needed firmware fix after firmware fix after firmware fix, so it is crucial they get it right with the N900. Nokia fan boys out there have high hopes for the N900 to lift the Nokia name back to it’s former glory, but can this one device turn the tables for Nokia? We’ll have to wait and see but first impressions are good and solid. (well that was what they said about the N97 and look what a mess it turned out to be!)

Nokia works closely with the developer community and has recently seen significant innovation happening with Maemo. As a result, people will be able to discover a wide range of games, utilities, themes, panoramic wallpapers and service plug-ins for photo-sharing and messaging for the Nokia N900 through Ovi Store and Maemo Select, starting later in the year. In October Nokia announced official Qt port to Maemo 5. This means developers can use Qt software to target the Nokia N900 and that applications can be easily ported to all Qt's supported platforms including the next Maemo 6 release as well as Symbian.

The Nokia N900 will be available in retail stores in November with an estimated retail price of EUR 500, excluding sales taxes and subsidies. The Nokia N900 will initially be available in Europe, Middle-East, Russia and North America. It is also possible to order the device from the Nokia Online Store: http://europe.nokia.com/buy-online

As for me, though the N95-1 was a great buy and it’s still my primary device, it was a bittersweet rollercoaster ride waiting for Nokia’s firmware fixes to build the N95 up to it’s full potential. I’ve had enough Nokia, no more paying 500 euros just to become your beta tester! So while Linux coders and hackers, Nokia fanboys and hopefuls, and those just itching to get the latest gadgets can rush to buy their shiny N900, I’ll sit back here, sip some tea and wait for the reviews (and also my xps 16 ;) ) to flow in before i make my move. :D