The convergent device for me

So, I was quite interested when Apple’s iPhone was announced; I thought this was going to be the do-it-all device for me. Update my wiki trenchside with a laptop? Not any more, that touch screen beauty would be all I needed. Unfortunately I heard some more details and quickly lost interest: No 3G, no third party apps (or, at least no homebrew apps), a years wait and a bank crippling contract to take out.

Imagine the scene, I’m trying to update something over the painfully slow GPRS connection when I decide that I need to SSH into my server to do something else. Of course the iPhone can’t do this, so it’s out with the laptop and a bluetooth link to my mobile phone, suddenly I’m running at 3G rates, with a whole host of software. The choices? Either use my laptop all the time, or find a slightly more useful hand-held device.

That device has been out for quite some time now in the form of Nokia’s 770. This wonderful little gadget has recently been updated with the release of the N800. Yes, one of these devices would require me to keep my phone in my pocket, so it’s not truely the do-it-all device, but it’s close enough and my phone is always in my pocket anyway. With the release of the N800, ebay should be filling up with cheap 770s, so I gave Google a quick going over to find a 770/N800 comparison. Whilst in the process I found the 10 ways the Nokia N800 is better than Apple’s iPhone. I suppose I better get saving.