N95-3 is US 3G supported, and available now. I'd love to take that off your hands when the Round Robin bonus round is all done

back on topic, kinda:

The Tilt is just too big, too cumbersome, and too disjointed to use effectively. What I mean by dsijointed is that after all these iterations, WM6 still feels like a telephone bolted onto a late 90's PDA. Also, as a professed former "believer" in the smartphone as a notebook replacement, I have trtuly come to learn that almost NO ONE ever really edits substantial documents on that "itty bitty living space" called Windows Mobile.

This is a conclusion that some people have come to. Its one of thsoe things where the device just kinda reaches too far (for now). Much of it isn't even in the ability, but the flow of the software. It a lot of things tacked on, and not a lot of consistancy throughout. That comment about there being so many ways to do things; its great in theory, but causes a brain fart in practice (before additonal software comes to simplify that).

Maybe I should try a Blackberry. Do you want to swap your Curve for my Nokia?

Having spent 3 weeks with the Curve 8310, I have found it to be the best productivity converged device I've ever used. Its communication based focus is readily apparent in all the software, and isn't that what it's really all about? I've had nearly every brand/OS from Samsung i500 to a half-dozen WM devices, to iPhone, to the Curve 8310 (only missing the Nokia/Symbian bus) and I can truthfully say the BB experience has been the best all round fit.

Now, if we could just bolt together iPhone hardware and base OS with BB email and phone control...ah, heaven.

• Seems everyone uses the SPB stuff. Better go check into them a little closer.
• Did you use Yahoo! Go? What are the main benefits? Does it sync a Yahoo! calendar?
• Is Pocket IE really that bad? I better get over to a store and check it out. Not many nice things said about it. It's got to be better than Blazer, though, right??

Thanks for the response,

-Curt

Yes, there comes a point where I need to stop "optimizing" my devices and just start using them. I do wish the iPhone had more features (and we'll see how iPhone features expand as the SDK becomes available).

Not being harsh on WM is my goal -- it's a powerful OS, and though using it frustrates me, it doesn't do anyone (including me) any good for me to spew wrath for 1500 words. Which was pretty much my first 2 drafts of the final review.

Yep, that's basically how I think of WM. Of course, the power and customizability comes at the cost of ease-of-use and overall system speed. Of course there are always tradeoffs, but I can live with the cons for all of the pros. Great writeup, I was actually surprised to see that you weren't too harsh on WM.

There's been a lot of interest in the n95 around here in the Round Robin forums. I'm definitely going to do a "bonus round" with the n95 (and will send it off to anybody else that's interested) - but I can't really say when I'll get to it. probably mid december.

update eh, I guess it doesn't really matter. here's my list

[list] []pick any 3 SPB software house programs. make sure one of them is SPB mobile shell. If you can replace the start menu and/or programs, that would be best. There are many users on the forums that know better than me on this one. []a finger-able keyboard so you don't have to pull out a stylus or kick out the keyboard (or enable voice command) to start typing the first few letters of a contact. []missing sync for WM by mark/space if you have a mac []opera mini or opera mobile, your choice. mini is free, mobile is $40 or so? pocket IE isn't great by any stretch. []windows live search is actually pretty good []yahoo go! is good if you have a yahoo account []google maps is good, though not necessarily as important if you already have WLS []documents2go would be a killer app if you need to do office editing. as dieter says, it's better than microsoft's mobile office software. []any IM software. I'm a big AIM user, mostly for work. []really liked the gcalsync for syncing google calendars. free version only does 1, so I chose work, but it's better than nothing. there's also oggsync though I didn't try that one. [/list]

What are the absolutely critical 3rd party add-ons in your opinion?