Roland Tanglao's Weblog

IF you are a multimedia creator and a north american THEN get an N95 8GB NAM or N95-3 NAM

IF you are a multimedia creator and a european or asian (except japan of course) THEN get an N95 8GB or the original N95, the N95-1

ELSE get an iPhone 3G when it comes out

That's my capsule review of the N78 :-) What can I say? I am spoiled by the iPhone's ease of use and wonderful application environment and the N95's wonderful 5 megapixel camera and video! And with the N95 coming down in price, I can't recommend the N78 (which except for the GPS being faster seems like a downgrade!).

DETAILS:

1. Pricey at $US 500 for the N78 NAM (NAM = North American 3G version), especially when the the N95 North American is $469.97
2. Only 3 megapixel camera on the N78 (but it takes great pictures but not greater than the N95!) unlike 5 megapixel camera on N95
3. Camera is slower to focus (even in fixed focus mode) than N95 which means more blurry photos
4. N78 Keypad is awful, number keys are fine but the Green and Red Keys are very difficult to hit consistently
5. S60 3rd Edition FP2, the OS on the N78, has hardly any real improvements. I'd rather have an simplified, easier to use UI than FP2's eye candy. I'd also rather have a phone that doesn't reboot like the N78 did on me (could be due to the Nokia Sports Tracker beta I was running but all the S60 phones I have used since 2004 randomly reboot). Please make S60 more stable!
6. N78 Lanyard/strap clip is cool.
7. N78 GPS seems faster and better at getting a satellite lock.
8. Video is only 15fps unlike the 30fps on the N95 (and the difference is noticeable!)

Looking for a gift for a Canadian Social Geek? Then you are in luck. I'll show what's cool and give you a tour of the difficulties of being a Canadian Social Geek (there's no such thing as free trade in reality between Canada and the USA since it's even harder now than in the past to get gadgets over the border)

1. N95-1 Nokia Cameraphone ($650 from dell.ca)? Why because you can upload awesome cameraphone pictures automatically with suspend/resume to flickr for free over Wifi using ShoZu (every social geek knows where to find free wifi) and if you are rich you can do it over EDGE. Be sure to get your geek to upgrade the latest N95-1 firmware update which makes the phone much more stable when using ShoZu. And if you are really rich get an N95-3 ($619 US from Amazon USA) and upload over 3G over the r*poff Rogers and Fido 3G Network. Oh and you can do great videos but there's no automatic video upload solution (ShoZu will automatically upload 10MB videos which is far too little since that's less than a minute of full res video on the N95). Why not Sony Ericsson? Because ShoZu doesn't work so well on their phones (granted Sony phones take great pictures, better than the N95, it's just their software is even cr*ppier than Nokia's and even harder for 3rd party developers). Trust me your SGeek will love the quality of the N95 pics!
2. Apple iPhone - $US399 from Apple USA + about 150 bucks including shipping for a Hardware SIM unlock so it can work in Canada - lousy pictures but the most usable phone the world has ever seen for SMS, web browser for twitter, utterz, jaiku, etc. Notice how there are no CDMA devices on this list. That's because CDMA s*cks :-) (at least the Canadian and US implementations of CDMA s*ck, the fact that there are no SIMs means CDMA users are forever enslaved by the CDMA carriers) and even if it didn't there are no cool devices for it. Sorry Windows Mobile and RIM aren't cool and email is great but it ain't overly social :-) !
3. Chumby - display your friends flickr pictures and RSS feeds on this cute truly open hardware and software device - $179 shipped only to the US (but you know somebody in the USA you can ship this to right?)
4. Eye-Fi WiFi SD card ($US 99)- if you can't afford an N95-1 or 3 then this is the next best thing. Your point and Shoot or Digital SLR with SD to CF adapter = poor man's ShoZu. It ain't ShoZu because it doesn't have suspend and resume if connectivity is lost but it's the next best thing and the 2nd fastest way to get your pictures social. Ahem, not available in Canada. Buy in the USA at Walmart, Amazon, Costco.
5. One Laptop per Child (give one and get one for $US 400 and they ship to Canada, hallelujah!) - cool Linux laptop with built in mesh networking
6. Canon Digital Rebel XTi ($650 with decent kit lens but get the 50MM too):
   Rebel Xti + EyeFi Card and CF to SD adapter + Canon 50 MM f1.8 lens (about $100) + ISO 3200 + f1.8 = shoot in almost dark conditions and upload to flickr over wifi the moment you get to one of your locations with WiFi e.g. your house or work, the Nikon D40 is also an awesome camera but it doesn't take the Nikon 50MM lens so it ends up being more expensive (coz you have to buy a 3rd party 50MM fast lens or similar lens like the Sigma 30MM F1.4 to get a fast low light prime lens)
   
7. Nokia N800 ($274.99 from dell.ca) or N810 Linux (only available in the USA!) Internet Tablet - great for mobile blogging, twittering, jaikuing etc, also does mobile Skype very well! The N800 has two SD slots for a maxium total of 16GB of storage; the N810 has one slot but has a keyboard.

The N82 was released today with great fanfare (rightly so since it's the first Nokia with a real flash!) and some fun video but nobody has told me whether it can pass the "Roland Challenge" and the "Roland ShoZu Challenge". I'm hoping the latest Nokias like the N95-3 and the N82 pass because of their increased RAM.

p.s. in case you forgot, here's the Roland Challenge: take 50 pictures in 30 minutes of random stuff and see if the phone or camera app crashes (without any 3rd party software installed and a freshly formatted 2Gig or larger card)

p.p.s. and here's the Roland ShoZu Challenge: Repeat the Roland Challenge but install ShoZu first and set ShoZu to auto-upload and again let me know if ShoZu, camera app or the phone crashes

A wee bit late to the party: yesterday I received an N95-1 from Nokia Blogger Relations (thanks Andy and Comunicano and Nokia; I'd love to do a N95-3 comparison since I've already managed to run out of memory just running the web browser, something which I think is solved by the increased RAM on the N95-3).

I am enjoying the EDGE (anything's better than GPRS) and the WiFi and I have some video hijinx in mind which require a 4GB micro SD SDHC card. Anybody know where I can get this in Vancouver, Burnaby or Richmond (the usual suspects: Future Shop, London Drugs, and NCIX only have 2GB micro SD cards)?

I know I can mail order but I would like instant :-) gratification. Leave a comment or call or IM me please.

Assuming of course that the N95-3's increased RAM allows me to finally run ShoZu without memory problems (I can easily crash ShoZu on any S60 simply by following the "Roland Shozu Challenge" - turn on "Auto send" and rapidly take 50 or pictures. This leads to the infamous S60 error message: "Not enough memory to complete operation" and an eventual ShoZu crash). You gotta be "crafty" to use the N95-3 because the user interface is far from intuitive but if you can master it and overcome the S60 memory issues (fingers crossed that the N95-3 solves it), it's an amazing mobile multi-media creation machine (in other words I agree with ThoughtFix (with the proviso that in 2007 I'd also carry an iPhone for mobile Safari and a superior voice call experience)!).

QUOTE

Is this the blogger's dream team? For this blogger: Yes. A Nokia N95 can capture the photos and video as it happens, then either upload it directly or share an Internet connection with the N810. On the N810, posts can be written formatted, edited, annotated, and published. I wish I had one of these at CES. I may next year.

END QUOTE

More N95-1 observations:

1. shutter lag is less, still too much lag in general (sensor turn on lag, focus lag and shutter lag)
2. I seem to get more out of memory errors on the web browser than the N93 browser
3. Video stabilization like the video stabilization on the N93 doesn't seem to do much
4. I prefer the larger keys on the N93, but love the N95 compact form factor
5. Assuming the doubled free RAM on the N95-3 allows you to run ShoZu, Twitter in the web browser and the Jaiku mobile client simultaneously without crashing, the N95-3 looks to be a killer device. for mobile multi-media creators like myself. I can't recommend the N95-1 but based on the early reviews for the N95-3, I can definitely recommend the N95-3; too bad Nokia isn't giving N95-1 North American owners a rebate like Apple did for iPhone early adopters