you know, i had a nokia phone once, and it was the worst assembled electronic product i had ever owned, it never worked, and no one at cingular (the company) could ever get it to work. the replaced it, and there was a whole different set of problems, the phone still wouldn't work, but the problems were all different. i got a motorola phone, and all the problems went away.

i bought this nokia N800 with the expectation the company had improved. i seem to have been very, very wrong.

i have had problems connecting this device to the internet, which is a different thread. this evening i decided to try and update the operating system...another thing that, like wifi, doesn't work. i downloaded the tool for my windows xp system, and installed it per the instructions on the website. when i hook the usb cable to the computer and turn the device on, the little usb logo comes up in the upper right hand corner, windows xp recognizes that a nokia n800 has been connected, but the update tool can't find the device...nokia seems to have done it again, and i am in defective product hell with another of their crappy devices. what a beating.

Plug the Nokia N800 into your computer... THEN... just before you turn the Nokia N800 on... you need to HOLD DOWN the "little house" button on your Nokia N800 as you turn the Nokia N800 on... of course have the Nokia Update Wizard running... this is how they pair together.

what a beating.

this inferior hardware teamed with microsoft windows. can there be a worse combination?

your info helped, to a point, but i still can't update the device. it seems one needs to be able to synch the time which, in lieu of doing things like giving decent error messages, etc. nokia has wasted resources carefully checking whether you windows time has been synched before "allowing" the update to run. this sounds pretty trivial, but it is not. with the new daylight savings time rules, there is a windows fix which must be installed before you can hit a time server. that's ok except to get it you have to install "windows genuine advantage" to your operating system, thereby opening your computer up to microsoft.

if nokia had told the truth about what was required to use this device, i never would have bought it, but then they wouldn't have my money unless they used fraud, so, oh well, we can lie about the device, we can lie about its operating system, we can lie about what is required to use it, and somehow, some way we can, if look is with us, steal the money of another unsuspecting customer.

what a beating.

Use Linux on your desktop instead - you can then download the linux flash tool from maemo and update without "opening your system up to microsoft".

For what it's worth, I also think that it is unfair to blame the n800 for microsoft's predatory policies.

Just one man's opinion. K.

why require that the time be synched to update the device? That's the problem, not anything microsoft did.

Linux, and I say this as a user for seven years, is like this device, the only difference being Linux is free, and you get what you pay for. Unfortunately, with nokia that is not true, instead you get the full Linux experience *and* you pay for it.

Had I known that the device would be of such general poor quality, (Linux is *not* poor quality) and have the total lack of documentation, along with the unusable software, I would never have bought it. In other words, had Nokia told the truth about the device

1. It is going to take several man days and perhaps man months to get the device up
2. No documentation exists worthy of the name (a single sheet of paper which is 75% graphics is not documentation and the pdf user manual is a total joke, with no instructions how to do anything.
3. No sort of error reporting system exists, the buyer must, on their own, evidently, go onto third party web sites (so long as they have, like Nokia requires, windows genuine advantage installed) and follow some sort of convoluted schedule for getting the basic applications required to troubleshoot the device

I cannot imagine anyone, without virtually unlimited funds and time to fiddle, buying this device.

Now I have to go explain why the thing doesn't work and try to get my money back.

Nokia has proved to me that they are not a quality organization. Essentially, what they have done is what Linux has always done, throw a piece of crap out there and let the users clean it up, again, the only difference being Linux is free.

What a beating.

If it's not for you, I suggest you just return it and move on.

simply because you are too arrogant to learn doesnt mean the device is the trash you purport it to be.

it is not without its faults and shortcomings, but as with most things new-to-market there are growing pains to deal with and improvements to implement. one of the improvements in the works happens to be an OS update without needing to reflash the device and lose settings and data.

admittedly, many of the users on this board are of the advanced user persuasion, but we all had to learn what has to be done to get the device working to our satisfaction. we all have our gripes and desires for the product, but we arent here to bash Nokia or M$ or Linux.

Wiser words were never spoken.

I don't have any of these problems. And I'm not an advanced linux user.

I bought it because it is the N800 and 770 are the ONLY devices currently on the market that you can put in your pocket and browse the Internet on in a normal good-working way. It IS an internet tablet and it does that very very well. (all those UMPC's are way to big to fit in a pocket)

The latest mobile phones are getting better at browsing the net, but once you browsed on a 800 pixel wide screen with a fairly complete webbrowser (Opera like the N800 has), you will never want to go back to a smaller screen (320x240 or 640x480 is very annoying), or use an incomplete browser (pocket internet explorer is crap)

Re: ...what a beating.

Yup, sounds like your taking a beating but I bet by now you're used to it.
Based on your preamble about something that has nothing to do with the task at hand, it may be you that is beating up on you.

Nokia didn't lie anymore than Microsoft lied about Windows v1.0 ~ 3.0. In both cases a promising new interface was presented.
It took Windows 5 years to achieve anything approaching usability. If you count the N770, Nokia did it in less than than 1.5 and some would argue that they use the 770 just fine.

The point is, there was plenty of web info about the Nokia interface because of the 770. You could have known what you were getting into well before you purchased it and that may very well be your "problem".
You may be misplacing your anger over not doing your homework and are transferring your aggression to the device and this forum.

For help with this issue try this link >> CLICK HERE

Have a nice day!

BTW, I am glad Newbie is shown before the misleading title of this thread on the main page.