So I had the N900 loaner from the office and needed to hit up the T-Mobile store to get a new SIM card.

I walk in, they ask if I wanted to trade in my fiefdom to AT&T (I was holding my iPhone in my hand) and move over to T-Mobile... I whip out the N900 and say "I need a new SIM card for this..." and I notice the look of shock on their faces.

About two minutes later, I finally get the inevitable "What is that?"

"You're kidding, right? It's a Nokia N900."

"Is that a phone?"

"Yes. This is... a phone store, right? And besides, this internet tablet with phone capabilities works on your 3G network and not on AT&T's 3G network frequencies."

"Is that a phone?"

"...yes. It's a phone. Made by Nokia."

"We sell that?"

"Not directly. Nokia sells it, Amazon sells it, Dell.com sells it and your network supports it."

"And it needs a SIM card?"

"Yes. It should have been waiting for me. Calling in by Mr. X."

"Oh yeah! We have that right here. But where does it go in?"

"I'll handle that... "

"Can I touch it?"

"Sure. Just don't hit the auto-destruct button."

"IT HAS ONE OF THOSE!?"

"You betcha."

"..." (walks away from N900 slowly)

"I was joking man... you can touch it."

I cannot believe that nobody from T-Mobile, including the district manager who was in the store - the one I scared about the auto-destruct button - hadn't seen a Nokia N900.

Sorry for the boring story. Just had to share...

yeah its a sad truth

LMAO, reminds me of the experiences I had with my N-Gage classic ;D, good times man, good times...

Reminds me of when I walked in to a Nokia official store in Singapore one of the first few days the N900 was available here (I got mine earlier from the US). The store manager proudly said 'I've sold one of these today!'. Just across the shopping center you could see the huge queue of ppl lining up for an iPhone...

Store by me knew everything about this phone and the DM played with it for 30 minutes while i played with his proto hd2

Funny story. I still have people calling my N900 an iPhone or Blackberry. Apparently, if it's not a flip phone, it's got to be one of those two.

Same here. First thing people say is that it is an Iphone, and then I open the keyboard and they say "I didn't know the iphone had a keyboard!!!!!!!!"

I was in a Tmobile store playing Quake 3 on my N900 and the sales lady said that "That game is like what I have on my HD2"......I have yet to find anything like Quake 3 for my wifes HD2....

2 years ago I was getting "Whats that!!!" from Tmobile when I would pull out my N82 and use the front cam or play Ngage games..... Go Nokia!

Similar story when I brought my N900 into a T Mobile store. The salesman was wowed, said, "you've got one of those? I've heard about them!", and asked if he could see how it works!

funny thing happened to me as all those who see my n900 ask if it's an iphone, a droid, or an evo...

sad to say that because the u.s. market survives on subsidized phones compared to asia and europe, americans are limited to what network providers offer. they don't know that better devices exist aside from what they see at stores...

With mine I called at&t when I first got it last October and said I need to raise my data plan to a smart phone plan. They asked what phone I had and I told them. I was then told that the only smart phones are either iOs, Blackberry, or Windows Mobile based. Then I was told that for feature phones(dumb phones) I had to get the much cheaper basic data plan. I just said ok and went on paying my $10 a month.

at&t didn't havn't an android phone back then which is why I assume he didn't include it in the last of smart phones. Funny think is I think at&t does some symbian phones but he didn't list them as being smart phones.