Vs
1. 3.5 inch touch-sensitive Vs 3.5-inch (diagonal) widescreen
widescreen display Multi-Touch diplay
Resistive screen Capacitative Screen
Resistive screen has the advantage of point accuracy. This is good for hand writing because unlike apple, nokia is a all over the world so it has to cater to differnt popluations and some people espcially the asians prefer hand writing recognition for their myriad languages. But capacitative has the advantage of being more responsive. Although it has its side effects, being that it cannot be used with anything except your bare finger. This is really a pain especially for the North east states of the Us and Northern Europe in the cold climates. You cant navigate well with gloves. Another advantage of capacitative is that multi-touch so it is very useful in games and other actions like pinching etc. As far as i know this is the only advantage of the iphone compared to the n900 and of course the other being the app store. But both of these can be expected in the near future with more developers flocking to maemo due to its open nature.
2. 800 × 480 pixel resolution @ 225 ppi Vs 480-by-320-pixel resolution at 163 ppi
This is one area where the n900 totally burns the iphone. Basically resolution means the number of lines you can see on the screen. For example most of the laptops are about 1280 x 800. Since it is very near to that resolution on the n900 you can view web pages just like on your desktop without much zooming and panning. You just open the web page and read no need to keep on fiddling with the text to read which makes web browsing very comfortable
This is included within the sales package. What you can do with is that you can connect your phone to the tv using those 3(yellow, white and red connectors). Imagine playing games with your accelerometer on the big screen. It is fun. And of course you can directly play the recorded videos, images on the big screen. Here again the higher resolution helps by displaying the video on a bigger size and better clarity on the tv.
4. Micro-USB connector, High-Speed USB 2.0 Vs C
5.Bluetooth v2.1 including support Vs Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR
for stereo headsets
This feature is the same on both the phones. But with n900 you can send any file via the bluetooth. The iphone even though it has the hardware, deliberately clamps down that feature. The n900 supports tethering, meaning that you can use its data connection to connect to another device like a laptop. I heard even apple allows that these days... but also have heard that it is not possible on AT&T. So basically you cant do it on the iphone whereas you can do anything you want on the n910.
6. Integrated FM transmitter Vs None
An Fm transmitter transmits the audio/video out from the device into radio frequency. So you can tune your car radio into that frequency and listen to the media on the phone wirelessly. Basically this removes the additional audio jack going out of the device into the tape slot of the car stereo. This is a great advantage for car owners. Since i do not have a tape player in my car i use a stand alone fm transmitter. The biggest problem i have with the stand alone transmitter is that it takes the charging port in my car and so i cannot charge my phone. Now no more wires and i can use the charging port to charge my phone while the fm transmitter does its thing.Although it is not listed there i assume there is also fm receiver also. You can listen to the local radio stations and also the fm reciever could be use for traffic updates to your maps application.
7. Up to 1GB of application memory Vs 256 mb only
(256 MB RAM, 768 MB virtual memory)
The main advantage is that you could use your swap memory to open many applications simultaneously. Wheras in the iphone you have to have only one application at one time except for the phone and audio applications. This is just like your desktop. You can open any no. of applications and just switch between them. For example on the iphone if you are instant messaging some one and you want to just check something on the browser, the moment you press the browser window you are logged out of the chat. On the n900 everything is open and you are still logged in and you get a notification when you get an Im. You just need to switch widows and select what you want to do.
8. 32 GB internal storage Vs 16GB or 32GB flash drive
Up to 16 GB of additional storage None
with an external microSD card
9. Full QWERTY tactile keyboard Vs Only on-screen keyboard.
Full QWERTY onscreen keyboard
This is a very big win for the n900.
10. Quad-band GSM EDGE 850/900/1800/1900 Vs UMTS/HSDPA (850, 1900, 2100 MHz) WCDMA 900/1700/2100 MHz GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz)
11. Integrated hands-free stereo speakers Vs Mono speaker
Stereo speakers means that there are 2 speakers on both sides of the device giving a more comprehensive sound. Since there are 2 speakers it is great for listening to songs in a group and also podcasts and videos just like you would listen to stereo speakers on your tv or laptop. The sound also should be very loud and more importantly more clear.
12. Internet calling Vs None
This means voip calls can be made using the n900. For example skype, gtalk etc. This can considerably reduce the money spent on international calling. Even the iphone has gtalk and skype but the major problem is with multi tasking. If you are on a skype call you cannot use the phone for anything else. Infact if you are waiting for a skype/gtalk call you have to keep the app open and not try to open any other part of the phone. On the n900 you can just keep them open while you do your work and you will be notified of a call or im when you get it.Also there is a webcam for video calls. I could make phone to phone video calling if the other person is on gtalk on another n900. Full video calling will be soon coming.
13. Maemo browser powered by Mozilla technology Vs Safari without flash.
Adobe Flash™ 9.4 support
14. Pre-loaded Ovi Maps application Vs None
15. 5 megapixel camera (2584 × 1938 pixels) Vs # 3 megapixels Autofocus
CMOS sensor, Carl Zeiss optics, Tessar lens
3 × digital zoom
Dual LED flash
Here again there is really no comparison. The dual led helps to capture good clarity photos even in low light conditions. I dont know if there is zoom on the iphone but the n900 has 3x digital zoom. Then there is photo tagging which is useful for tagging pictures.
16. Video recording at up to 848 × 480 pixels Vs VGA(640x480) up to 30 fps with audio
(WVGA) and up to 25fps
The n900 records at a higher resolution although the fps is low.
17. Video playback file formats: Vs Cannot play wmv, .avi formats.
.mp4, .avi, .wmv, .3gp;
codecs: H.264, MPEG-4, Xvid, WMV, H.263
Since maemo is open source you could install mplayer for free and play additional formats like divx, flv and other formats. Iphone can play only a few apple supported formats. This is a big deal because most of the videos can be downloaded from the internet directly and played without any conversion. Unfortunately for the iphone you cannot save the videos directly. You need to save them using your pc then convert them and transfer them for later viewing. This is a PITA!
18. Background pictures Vs None.
Since the n900 has a panoromic desktops with support upto 4 active desktops, you could have different cool backgroud wallpapers for each desktop. Since the app icons are always present on the iphone there is really no use of the desktop and you can only have one desktop wall paper.
19. Widgets on your desktops Vs None
Widgets are really good for real time updates. You can have as many widgets as you want on mutliple desktops. you can have gtalk widget with real time online status. Rss widget with real time updates, internet radio widget, weather widget etc. Widget help you check the latest updates without opening the application. for example if you need to check what are your upcoming applications.... on the iphone you have to go into the calender application and then check it... wheras on the n900 you just have a glance at your desktop and you see your calender. This is very useful.
20. Intelligent contact shortcuts Vs None
Here again you can directly place a contact on one of your desktops and with one single click you can call or email the contact. Wheras in the iphone you have to go to contacts ans locate the contact and then initaite the call. Same goes for sending an email or sms or internet call.
21. PDF reader Vs Safari handles pdf
22. Sketch Application Vs None
23. Removable Battery Vs Non removable
