TouchMe.MyGizmo

Pocket gizmos seem to be getting to a stage where they might actually be worth my while, but are they? Is their beauty only hardware deep, i.e. do they have the software smarts to really be my pocket slave?

Salivating at the thought of a pocket gizmo that might actually do what I want it to… I “reach out and touch” the new generation of multi-tasking, always connected wifi-web-phone-cam toys. I marvel at these truly gorgeous objects of digital desire… knowing all it takes is a smarter, better, faster model from the geek toy-makers at Santa’s secret phone factory and my fickle heart will flutter anew.

For now though, I can enjoy my love affair with these new and very sexy rivals to the iPhone, secretly hoping the iPhone will be assassinated… (although it has a user interface to die for… it’s sooo uncool). These new gizmos (namely the Nokia N97 and the HTC Touch HD phones) come with 3.5/3.8 inch touch screen, web-cam on the front, 5mp cam on the back, mini/micro-USB port, 3.5mm headphone jack, micro-SD (max 16gb), but other than that they don’t vary hugely in terms of hardware (the HTC has a slightly bigger screen but the N97 is wide-screen format, has 32gb on-board memory, a slide-out qwerty keyboard, cam flash and the 3.5mm jack doubles for TV out) and they both have GPS sat-nav capability.

My heart’s desire was that my magical pocket gizmo would function as a phone, digital concept/sketch book, mini-tv, and all round webby communicator; handy when waiting around for someone in a cafe or public place, or when I’m on the move - I can jot down ideas, make minor edits to documents, surf, watch the latest episodes of my favourite tv serials and check-in/catch up with everyone (via phone/email/IM/VOIP-chat, blog, social network etc.)

My latest gizmo journey had started a few months ago with the announcement of the Wimax edition of the Nokia N810 (it’s not a phone but an “internet tablet”). This is when I had begun sniffing problematic issues to do with choice of OS and thus, development platforms. I came to the conclusion that these gizmo’s, with all things pretty equal in the land of hardware, really stand or fall on the strength of the little apps I could download and make friends with.

I realised that jotting down an idea normally meant a combination of pen, paper, PowerPoint and Word and the N810 was Linux, not Windows (i.e. no MS Office). However, the fact that it would be a stand-alone sketchbook didn’t deter me, but the fact Wimax wasn’t yet fully up and running in central London at the time did. After all, if I couldn’t be online all the time, what was the point of having a Wimax gizmo? In the meantime though, I had started to investigate the various open source Linux apps I could download for the N810 and deemed that development hadn’t quite proliferated into a mainstream geek activity. This meant that I wasn’t confident in the development community reliably supplying me with new, friendly and ever-improving mini-apps. So I abandoned the N810, only to be woken from my techno-slumber by the HTC Touch HD and Nokia N97 phones a few months later.

For me, the one big thing the HTC Touch HD has going for it is Powerpoint and Word (on Windows Mobile), but the downside is that the Opera browser seems a bit clumsy (but that may improve). Apart from MS Office on the HTC, I’m currently wanting the Nokia N97 as my new best friend; it has a funkier user interface, seems better at auto-flipping between landscape and portrait screen formats, its browser looks more friendly (i.e. more Flash compatible) and it generally seems to be more web oriented (not to mention, the bonus of the push button qwerty keyboard).

However, it’s very early days yet (i.e. the N97 isn’t even on the market) but the question I’ll be asking myself is “who do I have the most faith in, the geek-devotees loyal to Symbian (Nokia N97) or Windows Mobile (HTC Touch HD)?”. Ultimately, it’ll be these development communities that will be responsible for keeping me happy and ensuring my pocket gizmo remains uber-sexy.

dmojo

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Below: The Nokia N97, staying in Santa’s factory,
only to be released in the first half of 2009.

Below: The HTC Touch HD, already on the shelves.

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© Dmojo, 2008-2009.