[ubuntu-uk] New FreeRunner

[andylockran]

Tim,

I read this after I posted to the list.

I'd _love_ to get the 'moko back up and running.  Make sure you remember
that blog post link when you write it!

andylockran

Tim Dobson wrote:
> James Tait wrote:
>> Tim Dobson wrote:
>>> I have a freerunner which I bought from www.truebox.co.uk
>> So what are your impressions?  I certainly take Popey's point about a
>> phone that "works and works well", but just how much work/grief can one
>> expect with the Freerunner?  The two biggest drawbacks for me are the
>> lack of a built-in camera and the massive start-up time, though I have
>> to admit I don't expect to have to cold boot it that often.  I've read
>> numerous reviews, tech articles and so on and I'm still not really sure
>> how close to "end-user ready" it is -- I've read some somewhat worrying
>> stuff.
> 
> I quite like it.
> It's an awesome piece of kit.
> The hardware is really god in my opinion though I take your point in 
> reference to camera.
> The startup time shouldn't affect you really.
> 
> It depends what you are wanting to use it for...
> 
> if you want to use it as a phone(!) everything works fine. Rumours about 
> stuff crashing on incoming calls etc seem to be a thing of the past, no 
> more command line calls(!), the gui works fine and seems stable.
> 
> Regarding SMS they are easy to send recieve.. no stability problems etc.
> Contacts and are automatically imported from your SIM if you have them 
> there and more contacts can be imported in vcard format.
> 
> I was extremely surprised at how polished the GPS stuff was
> Tango gps - http://www.tangogps.org is an awesome program a *bit* like 
> the google maps bit of the iphone (i think).
> Anyway it does stuff like overlays your position on maps and allows you 
> to record your track and stuff.
> 
> The wifi stack is stable and functional, currently two beta GUIs exist 
> for it, but development is so fast that 5 days ago, neither existed in 
> their current form. By the time anything has been shipped to you, you 
> will be wondering why i am mentioning anything there.
> 
> GPRS is a bit ugly at the moment (functional but impractical) but I'm 
> going to investigate that in more detail in the next few days with a 
> view to making it awesome.
> 
> There are 2 webrowsers, (the minifirefox one is best imho) an image 
> gallery and file manager, pidgin IM client, and a media player.
> 
> I would really recommend it, in places it is rough around the edges, but 
> i can not give comparison at the speed development is going - if you 
> think how the gnu/linux desktop changes in a year then you will probably 
> be able to imagine how much the gnu/linux phone changes in a month...
> 
> I intend to get round to in depth blog post at some point. I'll remember 
> drop a link to here when i do.
> 
> Tim
> 
>