Nokia Booklet 3G - The iPad Alternative

It looks like I have found the ultimate netbook. The Nokia Booklet 3G. I will not use the word "killer" here, but this is a computer that can be considered a serious alternative to the iPad. The Nokia is based on a different approach, the more traditional one. It is a classic. Mechanical keyboard, Intel CPU, non - touch screen and runs Windows 7. But what is unique to the Nokia, among many other netbook designs, it is the first, which hits at least the same score on the "cool factor" meter. I took a number of photos of both devices side by side, so you may judge for yourself. For me it has been the love at first sight. And it is not only the looks.


Before the Nokia, there had been several approaches before, by Sony among others, to create the ultimate mobile computer. But the Sony Vaio X was able to run only for three hours on a charge. While the Nokia is designed to run for twelve hours. To be honest the battery performance sold me the machine. Full day computing on a single charge is very important. Especially when the size and weight of the computer goes down. Often supplies and cables weigh a third of the machine they power. First this is not the case with the Nokia, as the designers put at least the same attention to the power supply design as they did to the main unit. And second, with 12 hours battery, there is no need to carry a power supply on a one day trip.



And there are more options, not present in other netbooks. The screen is high - res, 1280x720, which is a little less than my current 1440x900, but it is far better than the standard netbook 1024x600 (limited by licensing restrictions of the Intel Atom chip). 1280 x 720 seems to be perfectly fine for me, especially when properly configured. A word on that. Most web pages are designed for 1024 width. That potentially leaves 256 pixels to be utilized. I reconfigured my windows to have the taskbar vertically at the right edge. I also armed my FireFox with the Tree Style Tab addon, effectively moving the tabs from top to the left edge. That still leaves 1024 horizontally for Web pages without a horizontal scrollbar, while showing full gallery of up to 30 or more open tabs. At the same time getting rid of the bookmarks tab, using small menu icons and turning off the text menu bar maximizes vertical space.



The Nokia also has other goodies. As the "3G" name implies, there is a built-in HSPA wireless modem (by Option), with conveniently located SIM card slot. It takes a standard SIM and does not require shutting down the machine or removing a battery. The driver integrates with standard Windows 7 dialer and does not introduce any fancy 3rd party application. There is a 1.3MP video conferencing webcam with microphone. Stereo speakers, SD card slot, HDMI out and three USB slots.

I did a clean Windows 7 install (this has been my paranoid rule of the thumb, since I once purchased a WiFi router with a trojan preinstalled). The device specific drivers had to be downloaded from the Nokia website. But they installed without a glitch (including the BIOS update). You can feel the machine is not a speed daemon. It runs the single core (with Hyperthreading and VT) Intel Atom Z530 at 1,6GHz with 2 watts power budget. There is no active cooling (no fan), meaning the machine is very quiet. The aluminum case acts as a heat sink, but is only very lightly warm.



The slowest part of the system is definitely the 1.8 inch 120GB hard drive, which seems to be just a bad design decision. My own acceptance test for the Nokia has been the upgrade to fast SSD storage. The original hard drive in the Nokia is a 1.8" Toshiba MK1235GSL 120 GB consuming 700mA at 3.3V. I intended to upgrade it with the 1.8" Toshiba THNS256GG8BAAA-FDE coming from my Lenovo X200s. The latter drive is a fast SSD, with capacity adequate for my present needs and - most importantly - it is an FDE drive. FDE means Full Disk Encryption. There is a security chip (similar to TPM) on the drive and the drive self encrypts all the information written to it. Such process is both trouble-free (no software needed) and fast (does not depend on host CPU). As I write this column, my SSD - FDE - upgraded Nokia is finishing copying data from the NAS server. I am going to describe the SSD upgrade procedure in a separate column, for the moment all I can say it works and is fast. The downside has been the battery life - contrary to the crowd wisdom, SSD drives often consume more power. The one I have is rated at 1600mA, a 130% increase over the original one, taking the battery life down to 8.5 hours, which is acceptable to me, considering the speed increase, and the fact the upgraded machine has zero electric motors inside, making it the first 100% solid state computer I have ever had.



Last but not least, there are a couple of nice to have accessories I would recommend, should you decide to make the Nokia Booklet a primary workhorse. A wired (RJ-45) USB - to - Ethernet adapter may be handy in some situations (they can be purchased very cheap, for less than $10). I am also looking for a nice (preferably DisplayLink - based) USB - to VGA adapter, as there are still projectors not equipped with HDMI socket.

Finally I have to confess there is one thing making me mad. It is the audio port, a 3.5mm one, with integrated microphone connector. Like in all iPhones, iPads and BlackBerries. But no! Nokia has managed to make it incompatible. The headphones that come with the Nokia do not work with an iPhone, iPad or Blackberry. And the Blackberry headphones do not work with the Nokia. Aaaarrrrrrrggghhhhhhh! Why oh why....? It is like the "micro SIM in the iPad" decision... Something I will never understand....