What happens to the tablet?

As all of the news of the new shiny N97 flows through the web I can't sit here but wonder what is going to happen with the Nokia tablet lineup. The N810 has been one of my favorite devices now for over a year. I constantly hear from people what kind of phone is that, and as always I reply with a smile, its a internet tablet. Like most of you I plan on upgrading my N95 to the N97 come the US release date. I ask myself what would I need a tablet for now?

Video

My tablet has been my primary on the go video watching device even though my N95 plays the same videos using Core Player just as good. When it comes down to it I chose to use the N810 due to the screen size. With the release of the N97 I have a good size screen and equally, if not more capable, video playing device in an all in one device. Sure you can argue that the tablet allows me to play more formats using mplayer etc.. but honestly when it comes down to it I rip all my own videos and can put them in any format I like. Thus this is not an issue for me.

+1 N97

Audio

The tablet has been incredible as an audio playback device. With a large choice of media players for the tablet (Media Player, Media Streamer, Canola) its easy to find what works just right for you. The sound quality on the tablet is much better than that of the N95 that I use. My N95 is plagued with the annoying hiss and being an audiophile it drives me nuts.

The N97 appears to be on par if not better than the N96 as far as audio quality. The media player is reasonable and very easy to use. If they add support for flac playback then would put the icing on the top for sure. Again why would I need a tablet for audio playback when I have an extremely capable phone.

+1 N97

Internet

When it comes to internet browsing the clear winner in my book is the N810. Having the almost full internet in the palm of your hand is hard to beat. The experience is far from perfect and I could go on forever about performance but overall it wins. With the N95 the browser gets the job done but is not what I would call great. With the recent introduction of skyfire things change a bit but its still a long way from being ready.

+1 N810

Navigation

For those of you that have used the navigation on the N810 in the real world you know exactly what I mean when I say slow and inconsistent. I tried for several months to make my N810 the primary navigation device in my car. It doesn't work well enough to replace the N95/N97 with nokia maps or my stand alone TomTom.

Now that Nokia introduced Maps 3.0 I can't see why the tablet would even be an option for navigation. I can easily see using my N97 as my primary navigation device for car, motorcycle and on foot.

+1 N97

User Interface

I cannot officially talk about the new N97 touchscreen but from what I read the screen is sensitive and easy to use with your fingers. The N810 is great and I love it but its not the most responsive touch interface I have used. I had an iPod touch for around 6 months and the difference between the two was huge.

Maemo and S60 both offer very different user interfaces and both have great features. Personally the S60 interface is a bit cumbersome and can take some time to get used to. However once you learn it you can navigate very quickly and get anything you need to do done very quickly. Maemo has a unique interface and I find it very simple to use. Maemo is biased towards using a stylus which sometimes can become annoying. My main issue with maemo is the inconsistency between applications. Having to use the stylus for this and then use your finger for that can get a bit old. A more consistent guideline for UI design on maemo would be a huge help. Make the buttons bigger folks ;-). Bottom line I cannot say one or the other is better.

Conclusion

If Nokia wants me to keep both devices they are really going to have to step up the tablet line and make it something that just knocks our socks off. I don't know if I can justify buying another device that does almost the exact same thing just because its cool anymore. What are you thoughts?