Zaurus Or N810 Or ?

[ArchiMark]

Saw Antikx's post over at his Tyrannozaurus website today about whether there's  future for Zaurus??

Perfect timing of this post as in the past day or so I've found myself pondering whether to pickup another 3200 as I sold my other Z's last year....

Not even sure why I'm thinking about this, maybe it's the feeling that soon they'll be gone, at least new ones...

Anyway, am I nutz or is the Z still a useful option compared to newer options such as a Nokia N810 for example?......

;-)


What does this illustrious group think?

 


Mark

[Capn_Fish]

Zaurus FTW!

I'll hopefully be awake enough to post why later... (keyboard, OS choices, community, etc.)

EDIT: I say Zaurii because they are a great form factor, can run standard Linux/act like "normal" Linux machines, have a great support community, and active development.

[speculatrix]

I picked up a cheap n800 - GBP130 - via a friend of my brother in california

I love the n800, but it's a very different beast to the zaurus and my palmt3, and all are different from my sony tx2 ultraportable.

I use the zaurus as a mini linux laptop for actual linux experimentation - coding, shell scripting, serial terminal, wireless sniffer, etc. I've learned a bit of qt/qtopia and wrote a simple game. It's currently being my android playground, and I hope I can dual-boot cacko with angstrom/debian/android at some point!

I use the n800 as a web browser, media player, radio streamer, occasional email client, mapping, and basically any interesting application I find - it's more of an appliance to me. perhaps it's the lack of a keyboard? I have been trying to get scratchbox installed, but it's not been trivial, as I want to be able to compile stuff and learn a bit of hildon/maemo/gtk.

I use the PalmT3 solely as a PIM, at which it is excellent, and for some palm games, and occasionally to run TomTomPalm. The screen res is too low for browsing, and it doesn't have wifi anyway.

If I had lots and lots of money and didn't care about the waste, I'd ebay the lot and probably get a PalmTX* or Treo for PIM and games, and a Nokia N810 as my handheld linux hacking tool. For a laptop I'd probably get the Toshiba R500 -  have compared them with my Sony TX2 and a colleague's Soiny TZ and they're a bit better; I might consider the Fujitsu U810 but I suspect the keyboard would be frustrating.

* I bought my wife a TX for birthday, and I like it quite a lot. I should have given her my Palm T3 and kept the TX!!

this is all my personal perspective, and all these devices have compromises that some people don't care or don't notice, but other people cannot stand!

[jpmatrix]

the question is terrible .... but the answer too : it depends on what you're looking for

zaurus is wonderful as a pocketable device where you have quite everything avalaible, but chipset is an ARM so you always have to wait for people developping new software or you can choose to compile yourself but with many difficulties...

that 's why i finally choosed to sell it (snif!) and take a Fujitsu U1010, with builtin bluetooth and wifi, a wide 1024x600 screen for browsing, etc... but it has its drawbacks too.......

but anyway...that's definitely not easy to find the perfect device

[ArchiMark]

THANKS Capn_Fish, speculatrix, and jpmatrix fcor your input! Very helpful....

So, I guess I'm not nutz for thinking about a Z again.....  

FWIW, had a N800 for about 2 weeks when they first came out...nice but didn't see much reason for keeping it at the time since I don't have wifi access most of the day..do have ethernet access though....

So, N810 seems better due to having a keyboard....makes it a bit more like a Z, slightly larger and with thumboard, not keyboard....


Hmmmm.......

 

[zmiq2]

I had a htc tytn ii (you know, a windows mobile 6 3G/wifi/bluetooth with sliding keyboard) but I sold it after 2 months:

- browsing was really painful
- even the 128MRAM, it felt slugish
- screen resolution 240x320 is definitelly not enough

so I'm lurking in ebay for the fujitsu u810/u1010.... my next victim?

[nilch]

I bought a N810 and have been using my N810 exclusively in place of the Zuaurs.

It is the perfect replacement ? - hell no.
But its has its own advantages and so far they have trumped over the Zaurus in many ways.

Firstly - it has a keyboard which makes typing emails on the go and notes possible and better than on a N800 (my wife uses a N800).
But of course the keyboard in no way compares to the Zaurus keyboard whch was far better.

Connectivity : Trumpts the Zaurus in all ways. I had to buy an CF Wifi card for the Zaurus to use it for Wifi networking.
The N810 built-in wifi is better than the CF Wifi on Zaurus. The N810- also gives mt BT Networking, hence I can just BT PAN over my 3G phone to get the internet when I don't have Wifi.

Browser and Multimedia is definitely better on the N810 than on the Zaurus. (Canola beats the hell out of any media apps on Zaurus, and there are others as well).

PIM is lacking in N810. With GPE apps I at least have access to basic Calendering and contacts on N810. Zaurus was better in this regards with KoPI suite.
Again GPE Calendar does sync with Google Calendar wirelessly, so that is again one advantage - I can check GCal without opening uip a browser.

SSH, VNC works on the N810, but the Zaurus was much more tweakable. I dont get the same feeling with the N810. Maybe because I havent played enough with it. I use it more rather than playing and resetting things on it. The Zaurus made me play on it more - it was that friendly as well as use it exhastively.

Office suite functionality really lacks on the N810. The Zuaurus with Textmaker and Hancom apps had Word editing and spreadsheets going for it

I can use my N810 as a GPS unit and a multimedia player in my car (I only play MP3, not Videos when driving  :-) It can mount easily on the windshield, the Zaurus really couldnt. Also BT Headphones work on the N810 with A2DP support being hacked onto it. The Zaurus was seriously short in this dept.

Lastly on the form factor issue - the N810 is more carriable in my pocket, now that I have a older Zaurus to compare it with.

But The Zaurus as most others said, was far better in terms of being a PDA and a mini Linux laptop.

Overall, I still have a feeling that the Zaurus HAD more potential which was never filled in for lack of Sharp's support on hardware iterations side, as well as developer support.

[ArchiMark]

I'm really enjoying my U810/XPT, zmiq2...especially after putting 100GB HD in it...next up Linux....did install andLinux as you can do this from within awindoze, but while it works, I can't get connected to internet so far...might switch to Debian or Ubuntu...

Excellent points, nilch about Z vs N810....tempted to go for a N810 for fun...really like Z, but screen is pretty small....do like it's lil' keyboard though and like you say it really lends itself to tweaking.....

hmmm..........

 

[zmiq2]

Uhm... I'm getting the fujitsu either tonite or tomorrow!! can't wait any longer without a new toy!! (that, of course, I'll use for work too)

archimark, thanks for the info

[eviLjazz]

True about the Fujitsu U810. It's a great device, smaller than the EeePC, convertible, better storage options, but more expensive too. Got myself one a few weeks ago as replacement for my aged Dell Inspiron 8100. I'll see if I can post some comparison pics on my blog soon. I'll definitely keep my Zaurus, since the U810 is a replacement for my laptop, not the Zaurus.

[zmiq2]

So I have bought a fujitsu. I hope to have it in my hands within a week !

[ArchiMark]

So I have bought a fujitsu. I hope to have it in my hands within a week !

Excellent, zmiq2!

Hope you enjoy it like I enjoy mine....

Especially since I got andLinux ethernet connection working today...so now have XPT and Linux running side-by-side....

 


Mark

[ArchiMark]

OK, I must be nutz.....

Just ordered a new 3200......

Couldn't resist....

 

[Capn_Fish]

Congratulations!

[speculatrix]

OK, I must be nutz.....

Just ordered a new 3200......

Couldn't resist....

 

welcome back... what will you install first? Android FTW!