--- 
layout: post
title: Nokia n91
created: 1165022378
permalink: blog/walkah/nokia-n91
tags: 
- gadgets
- nokia
- series60
- shozu
- n91
---
<p><img src="http://walkah.net/files/images.jpeg" alt="nokia n91" class="right" />As a nice little side benefit from <a href="http://walkah.net/blog/walkah/drupal-training-vancouver">my trip</a> to Vancouver a few weeks ago, I got another fancy phone as a hand-me-down from <a href="http://www.rolandtanglao.com">Roland</a> (who has moved on to the n93): a <a href="http://www.nokia.com/n91">Nokia n91</a>. I've spent 2 weeks with this phone now and overall I *love* it!</p>
<p>I ran into a couple "gotchas" while getting it all set up - I think mostly from being so hip and bleeding edge it hurts. Namely, this phone is not natively supported by apple's <a href="http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/isync/">isync</a> (which I can't really live without these days), however, <a href="http://www.atmasphere.net/wp/archives/2006/06/27/n91-isync-success">these instructions</a> worked beautifully (complete with little n91 image :). The other tricky bit was I initially installed <a href="http://www.shozu.com/">ShoZu</a> on the hard drive - which the music syncing tool does not like at all - however, installing on the phone's memory cured that.</p>
<p>That brings me to what I love most about this phone: it has a 4gb hard drive! Why is that so cool? Well, combine that fact with the built-in music player (and matching <a href="http://www.europe.nokia.com/A4158096">iTunes syncing app</a>) and my phone is effectively a little iPod. Oh, this phone also has wifi... ok, so that's *two* things I love most. Here's a quick bullet point review:</p>
<p><strong>The Good:</strong></p>
<ul>
<li>4gb hard drive : I don't need to lug my iPod as much anymore - phone, camera and music all in one. Plus there is a music control keypad.</li>
<li>Wifi!! Can't say enough good things about having wifi on my phone - it means I'm willing to use ShoZu again (since I don't have to worry about data transfer fees). Another neat thing I also use my phone as a little wifi finder (Connect -> Conn. Mgr -> Availabl. WLAN). Oh, really it's cool.</li>
<li><em>Standard</em> output jacks - RCA headphone jack and standard mini usb. Thanks, nokia.</li>
<li>Keypad locking switch - I didn't realize how much I'd love this when I first got it... but the standard series 60 keypad combinations to lock/unlock your keypad are a pain... especially on a phone where you have to slide open the keypad.</li>
<li>Not unique to the n91... but I really like having a half decent camera in my phone... especially since I can use shozu again. *Almost* makes my flickr pro account worth the money.</li>
</ul>
<p><strong>Complaints</strong> ('cause it wouldn't be blogging if I didn't complain):</p>
<ul>
<li>Nokia's "Music Manager" application for os x is clunky. Wouldn't it be possible to actually build this as an iTunes plugin? I thought that was one of the big things with Tiger - the whole iSync services framework... how come nobody is using this?!</li>
<li>Some apps aren't available/supported. The one I'm really missing is <a href="http://www.salling.com/Clicker/mac/">Clicker</a>. But, I'd love to see support for <a href="http://beta.plazes.com/locate/mobile.php">plazer</a> and <a href="http://www.reelintelligence.com/BluePhoneElite/">BluePhoneElite</a>.</li>
<li>The keypad (hidden under the music controls) has *really* small buttons. I don't actually mind them - but if you use them for a while (if you *ahem* send a lot of text messages) they've actually made my fingers sore.</li>
</ul>
<p>Overall, I love this phone. The size and weight are good - considering the feature set.... and it's pretty close to my ideal "all in one" device. Thanks Roland (and nokia)!</p>
</ul>