Lets Welcome Nokia N900 to Android Family :)

evolutionqy7

The Nokia N900 is full of surprises! The QWERTY slide-out device which we posted being compared to the HTC HD2's on screen keyboard was also famous for the way it handled Android. Back in May, we reported the Maemo powered Nokia N900 was running Android 2.1 thanks to the good people over at NITDroid but it looks like there's no limits when it comes to technology. The same device is now happily running Android 2.2 Froyo and it seems to be running it quite well! One of the greatest achievments of Android 2.1 was the browser which was quite fast and was counter ballancing the lack of memory card support. But with Froyo, the NITDroid team is getting closer and closer to a full Android port on the N900, now also supporting calls, both incoming and outgoing as well as cellular data.

With the team working so hard they might head for a full port pretty soon and when they do that, Maemo might be in real danger since Android's enjoying a great popularity. Do you think there will be a full port on the N900? On the same note, do you think there will ever be a fully working port of Android for other devices, like the HTC HD2 for instance?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jVpgqTF89zU

Source: Click Here

Inquitus

evolutionqy7 wrote: »

snip

It's cool, but semi working ports aren't that viable for genuine day to day use. The effort these guys have put into it deserves alot of kudos, but as usual the proprietary portions of the N900 which Nokia do not release hold back the whole project, to quote the NITDroid project themselves:

Q: Why isn't the UI smooth?
A: This Problem is mostly due to the simple fact that Android (eclair and above especially) are heavily dependant on graphical power, and at this time the NITDroid Port has no hardware based graphics acceleration (the excellent PowerVR SGX GFX Chip is not being used) and therefore the entire OS is displayed and rendered using software emulation which is obviously a lot slower.

evolutionqy7

well its hardly finished is it...

Inquitus

evolutionqy7 wrote: »

well its hardly finished is it...

nor will it ever be, most likely. I mean someone had Android running on the iPhone getting on for 6mths ago, but it's unlikely we'll ever see a useable version come out of it......

The HD2 you have has a passable version of android on it, alot of that down to the shared hardware with other Android HTC phones which is something you don't get with Nokias, but it aside there's next to no genuinelly useable ports of Android running on other OS phones.

evolutionqy7

well i wouldn't be so sure...nokia is a linux native devices...of course some driver content will have to be created...but if the project has the right developers i don't see why it shouldn't work

Inquitus

evolutionqy7 wrote: »

well i wouldn't be so sure...nokia is a linux native devices...of course some driver content will have to be created...but if the project has the right developers i don't see why it shouldn't work

Agreed, nothing is impossible with the right Devs and persistence. My Mate had an i7500 Samsung, and one Devs persistence has brought Froyo to it as an example.

I am just a cynic cos of the tech blog feeds I read...........Flash on the ipad only it doesnt really work properly and now the Dev's done a proof of concept and got a few headlines he's moved on etc etc.

evolutionqy7

yeah well as far as i know main iPhone devs have departed from the iPhone itself saying it was just too boring...wouldn't blame them but anyhow that's a different topic...

well if i owned an N900 i would pretty happy seeing my N900 moving to android...

i nearly bought it but was a bit scared after the N97 ^^

Inquitus

evolutionqy7 wrote: »

i nearly bought it but was a bit scared after the N97 ^^

You think your HD2 is big? The N900 is a fcuking monster, great bit of kit hardwarewise......Jury's defo still out on Maemo mind, but I could never lug something like that around......2cm thick!!!!

evolutionqy7

yeah i know

i could probably put an extended battery on mine and still wouldnt as tick as the N900

though its the keyboard that adds the thickness