I was thinking about the WiMAX Internet Tablet and decided that a three-prong Internet Tablet strategy is perfect. Here's why:

1. The Nokia N800 is still a solid device with many of the features of the Nokia N810 but at a much lower price point. With dual full-sized SDHC card slots and the 800x480 widescreen display, it leads the pack as a media playback device. This is the tablet for people thinking of replacing their iPod and who want a better mobile browsing experience than their phone can ever offer but who do not want to justify the cost for the GPS, sunlight readable display, and keyboard.
2. The Nokia N810 is for those who spend a lot of time away from their computers. The smaller size, GPS, transflective display, and keyboard are all about mobility and, to that audience, justify the extra cost over the N800. This would be a mobile blogger's choice - especially those with tethering plans to their mobile phones.
3. The WiMAX Nokia N8?? is for those who want and need everything and need it fast. WiMAX allows the Internet Tablet to be always online and saves the hassle of phone dial-up, tethering rate plans, Bluetooth range and overhead, and custom phone configuration. With Skype and Gizmo, it allows the tablet to be an always-available phone as well.
   

Of course, these devices do not need to be phones at all - still. Who wants to hold their tablet up to their face?

It's that time again. Engadget's awards are always fun to watch.

The Nokia N810 is up against:

• Amazon Kindle
• HTC Advantage
• HP iPaq 210
• iRex iLiad
• OQO model 02
• Sony Reader

That's a weird category. Three eBook readers, a few "real handhelds" and an ultra-mobile PC. Was the handheld market so light that it decided to take full-power (yet super mobile) PCs like the OQO 02 and pit them against something that'll give you Harry Potter and the New York Times?

Still - Vote!

Thanks to Ricky for the flyer shots and this internettablettalk thread for the tip. Ricky thinks it's the WiMAX tablet.

We see what appears to be a Nokia N810 in black. A zoom in on the ad looks very much like it says N830. It is NOT the N830. Reggie fixed my perception. This image is from a Best Buy mobile ad but I cannot find the original. It appears to have already been pulled. Best Buy's existing listing for the N810 shows the steel color. Updated again: Found the ad.

An exhaustive search of FCC filings by Nokia between October and today does not show a new Internet Tablet, but shows that the N810 did get a redesigned Bluetooth antenna.


It's sexy. VERY sexy. I don't care if it's just another N810 dressed in a new color - I want one. I hope it is the WiMAX tablet with a better GPS sensor. I also hope it shows up at CTIA.

Chumby, the open hardware and open software information/entertainment appliance, now allows users to create and play with a "virtual chumby." Chumby is an alarm clock sized embedded Linux device with a Flash widget player. The widgets are selectable, configurable, and automatically flip cycle. This is something I wanted on my Internet Tablet for some time as the tablet can still feed me information while I am at my main computer.

To turn your tablet into a virtual Chumby, follow these steps:

1. Register at chumby.com
2. Create a channel and choose/configure some widgets. There are a lot, so have some fun with it.
   
3. Create a virtual Chumby using the channel you chose. Keep in mind that interactive widgets ones that require clicking or shaking) do not work on the virtual Chumby.
   
4. Create a simple web page that displays the chumby. It's as easy as dropping the embed code into an empty html file and adding normal html and body tags around it. Centering it would be good too.
   
5. Put the web page somewhere on your own site and visit it from the tablet.

That's it! It's actually rather fun. I use weather, Facebook, The Onion, woot.com, a horoscope, and more.

What inspired you to buy your Internet Tablet? Was it a specific feature (or several) or the whole package? Which tablet did you buy and what would you add to it?

I recorded it all. Thank you, ustream.tv, for allowing hour-long recordings!

Quim and I talk about user experiences, wish lists, progress of the internet tablet platform, and more. One viewer summed it up nicely at the end of the show:

Faz1 : Nice to know someone with Quim's outlook is involved in the dev of our beloved tablets :)

Don't forget to add it to your calendar. Tomorrow at 9PM Arizona time (6 AM in Helsinki) I will have Quim Gil as a guest over Skype. To watch and participate in the show:
Hop over to the main show page. There, you will find the IRC chat room and the live stream. I'll be watching the IRC for questions and commentary and any pertinent links will be posted into the room too. I'll see if I can record the session as well.

People have asked me to do a podcast several times. This has been difficult before with scheduling guests and I think it would be boring to just have me chat for a half hour to an hour at a time. After some chatting and advice (thanks, antirelusionist) I decided on a format that may work. We'll try it:

Call me over Gizmo and leave a voicemail message. The voicemail messages will be the user or developer voices and get added into the show. I may occasionally do live recordings but the voicemail will be the primary way to do things as it allows me to be flexible in my schedule.

Want to be in my podcast?

Someone sent me an Instant Message last night asking me if I ever slept with my Nokia N810 Internet Tablet. The answer is yes - but nothing happened.

I took for granted a lot of the "switch time" when I had an N810 after the Web 2 Summit. Since the device was "new to me," I was learning and exploring the features one at a time. When I had to switch back to my N800 for a while, I fell back into my old routines. Now that I have an N810 again, I found myself accidentally using N800 methods on my N810. Here are some tips for those who upgraded from an N800 to an N810:

Use the "lock" switch. The power button is made to be tiny because it is not often used. On a related matter: Treat it like a phone: Don't turn it off - just lock the keypad when not in use.

Take advantage of your LED indicators. The N810 has that multi-color LED in the corner. The settings for it are in Control Panel - Display - LEDs.


Because the N810 is smaller and more slippery than the N800, you may be worried about dropping it. I remedy that by swinging out the kickstand and just keeping it between my fingers.

Re-learn stylus scrolling and navigation if you're used to the D-pad on the front. The N810's D-pad is smaller and behind the slider so acclimating to touch input makes fast look-ups even faster.


Try out the Map application. Even if you don't intend to use the N810 as a GPS, you can bet there will be one time you wish you had a GPS on you and could locate a specific destination.I need to keep reminding myself of these advantages, too. In fact - I know darn well the N810 has a sunlight readable display but still find myself remembering that I can use it outside.

On to other things: Remember - Next Tuesday night (or early Wednesday morning for the European crowd) we will have a live show with special guest Quim Gil (pronounced Kim Jil - I know I got it wrong a few times.) and he will be on over Skype to discuss the maemo platform and development. The live shows have an IRC chat room embedded so you are welcome to come in, ask questions, and discuss.

Final note: I have a back-log of unreviewed software that built up. What do you want to see that you haven't yet?

Developers: Time to stay up late. On Tuesday, Feb 12 at 9 PM Arizona time (6 AM Helsinki time on Wednesday or just check this page for time) maemo's own Development Platform Product Manager will be a guest over Skype in my next live show.

I will ask that any support questions be pertinent to his role as the guy in charge of the development platform. This guy knows maemo inside and out and we should focus our interaction on that - so questions like "Why can't we charge over USB?" don't belong here.Keep in mind that Nokia staff cannot comment on in-development projects that have not been announced.

Here's the link to the live show page. Start thinking of software and platform questions. We'll talk to Quim in one week!

Here's the Google Calendar button:

My mention of battery life problems with my N800 prompted others (both in comments here and over private communication) to tell me they were having the same problems since the OS2008 upgrade. Ten people mentioning the same thing to me is beyond coincidence. Let's see if we can help isolate the problem and file a proper bug in the bugzilla.

Problem: Battery drains within 8 hours of non-use in standby mode.

Installed applications:

• boingomobile
• camera
• canola2
• libuiw
• load-applet (but the problem showed up before this was installed)
• maemo-recorder
• map
• mauku
• mnotify
• osso-xterm
• Pidgin Instant Messenger
• python2.5-feedparser
• python2.5-pyinotify
• quiver
• rdesktop
• skype
• tutorial-home-applet
• vc-epg-widget
• videocenter
• videocenter-ci-plugins-base
• videocenter-plugins
• xgalaga

When checking the processes using the statusbar applet, expected applications are running plus goboingo (even though I am not connected to a Boingo hotspot.)

Others who have this battery life problem: What do you have installed? We can see if we have something in common.