Yeah the Neo900 is out of my price range and it's not available now, so there are two strikes against it. Furthermore, it will still be dog slow with that hardware. After playing around with this 2011 vintage Android phone, i feel vindicated in thinking that the browser and some of the other slower parts of N900 experience are just intolerable at this point.

I'll go back to a linux phone when one is available at a reasonable price and reasonable configuration, but the premium i'm willing to pay for an open platform phone is not ~$700, unfortunately.

I flashed a custom ROM that keeps Gingerbread (the stock camera app can't be used on ICS ROMs) but increases the JPG quality, and the photos look a bit less fuzzy around the edges.

Let's see how they do at macro photos...

MyTouch 4G Slide vs. N900 -- Camera, Round 4

Macro

The N900 wanted to use the flash in these lighting conditions, and the resulting photo was actually quite good, albeit with a blue hue. The MT4GS opted not to flash, and I compare the detail of the photos without flash. Both exhibit some chroma noise, and again the N900 has a higher contrast, but again the MT4GS opted for higher exposure and did so without being as noisy.

When the flash was turned on for the MT4GS, it produced an image about on par with the N900's with flash, but in an overly warm color temperature. This seems to be the typical outcome: the N900 favors cool colors, both in its processing and its blue-tinted LED flash, while the MT4GS favors a warmer tone, and has a twin LED flash with a warm color temperature.

One thing that's definitely better on the N900 is the placement of the flash: it causes almost no shadow. You can compare in the final images, which show the macro with the flash on.