On the Question of Handhelds: iPaq Best? 245
A reader writes "I've been wanting to get a Linux based handheld, and was
trying to decide between an iPaq and a Yopy. This article about the Yopy
has pretty well convinced me the iPaq is the way to go, but I'm
hoping some /.ers might have some additional insight before I drop
a bit of serious cash. I'm a poor student, and can't afford to make
a mistake here."
Poor student... (Score:1)
Apple Newton Messagepad 2100 (Score:1)
Re:Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:1)
When I need to do my organization and routine clicking to add numbers, the palm and iPaq perform about as well, and are both equally convenient at my palm.
The iPaq may do simple addition and organization as well as the Palm (I haven't tried one, so I really can't say), but there's no way it's equally convenient in your Palm. The Palm PDAs sacrifice anything which doesn't directly support organization in favor of keeping the form factor small and light and the battery life long. The iPaq is good for less than a day on a single charge and is physically enormous compared to a Palm V.
Yes, the iPaq does a lot more stuff than a Palm, but I don't need most of that stuff. I don't want to edit Word documents on a screen that small and without a real keyboard. I'm not interested in surfing the Internet on something too small to do serious browsing and too large to keep in my front pants pocket. The iPaq is too large and sucks too much battery power to fill the niche that my Palm V fills: indispensable, infinitely portable life organizer. It's too small to replace a laptop, and it's too enormous and expensive to be a good MP3 player, so I really don't get its appeal.
One thing I do know. The first guy I know who bought an iPaq sold it to somebody else before he'd owned it six months.
Re:Misinformed opinion (Score:1)
Consider Psion (Score:1)
Dust. (Score:1)
Don't bother with Agenda's VR3 (Score:1)
--
Re:PDA (Score:1)
What are you supposed to do with an emulator and no ROM? I realize you can get the OS from your Palm, but what if you don't have one?
Everything else can be had for free. You can download Codewarrior for Windows -- okay, it's a "light" version. You can use gcc on either windows or linux. The emulator itself is freely downloadable, as is all official documentation.
That's fantastic, hats off to Palm for providing all that. I was merely pointing out that MS is offering all that and more with less hassle. I am not attempting to fan the flames of an anti/pro-MS discussion.
Re:Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:1)
Wireless connectivity and network access are two seperate things. Connecting to a network over a cellular link is painful at best.
I don't know why I wasted my time posting on Slashdot again. I don't know why I am continuing to do so. I guess I'm a masochist. ;)
I am not down on Palms. They are great. They are not, however, in the same category as a device like the iPaq. This is not to say one is "better" than the other, they're just different.
Show me a Palm device that has a color screen, can play MP3s and videos, can connect to a corporate network, has wireless options, records voice memos, and has large storage solutions and I'll happily eat my words. Show me an iPaq that doesn't go thru batteries like a Nascar driver goes thru tires and I'll do the same.
There is nothing wrong with difference. There is nothing wrong with your personal choice of PDA. Just be aware that different folks have different wants and needs when it comes to their portable computing platforms.
Re:PDA (Score:1)
Erum, other than the fact that you can actually run linux on it you mean...?
If it's using Linux to support Free Software, I'll remind you that buying an iPAQ will profit to Micro$oft (WinCE is ALWAYS preinstalled, evn if you plan to use Linux on it).
This logic goes over my teeny little head. If you buy a Palm, are you not creating profit to Palm, Inc? MS has been a lot more open about WinCE than Palm has about their platform. You have to sign a friggen agreement to get a Palm emulator and development information!! MS will let anyone download full version of VB and VC++ for WinCE for free.
yopy is unreliable (Score:2)
At this point, yopy has only just recently been released, while ipaq is almost a year old (yopy promised that it would be ready last year at the beginning of the summer), even though their specs are almost identical.
Ipaq has had the time necessary for the testing of a thousand eyes (for bugs), while yopy hasn't. Also, ipaq keeps getting better. Yopy is still trying to get off the ground.
And that's making the assumption that all things are equal in terms of development. But they're not. The operating system for the yopy is an obscure distribution of Linux that they made mostly themselves, including a windowing system called W (which they didn't make). Forget using all of your own graphical programs - they won't work on W, only on X. Its almost as though they don't actually have Linux, only something that vaguely resembles Linux.
The ipaq comes with Windows CE, which has the added benefit of actually working most of the time, and having LOTS of developers. You can even download free development kits for it in various programming languages, including C++ and Java.
You can switch platforms, in which case you can use a more normal distro of Linux that actually has X. And recently, you can switch back (check here [handhelds.org] for info).
Re:Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:2)
If all you want is a PDA, a Palm would probably be your best bet. If you want a small, mobile computer capable of multimedia, network access, large storage, normal web browsing etc., get an iPaq.
Priorities? (Score:2)
If you are really a poor student, then you shouldn't even be worrying about whether to get a Palm or an iPaq. You probably can't afford either one. If you are thinking about paying for it with a credit card that most college students get flooded with, don't do it. Your limited funds should go towards study and survival, not paying outrageous interest rates to satisfy a want, not a need. Most college bookstores sell cheap student planners, but all you really need is a small notebook and a pen/pencil which will cost you at most a buck each. With a small amount of discipline, those simple tools will suit you just fine.
If you actually _need_ it as a part of a CS programming project, sign up for Palm's developer program, download their free development tools, and get a discounted (35-40 percent) model being offered to developers or a refurbished one [in both cases a PDA would cost you about $100 or less]. If you are able, release the finished product on the web. Buying an iPaq & running linux on it to satisfy some geeky want only depletes your bank account and supports Redmond.
Re:I love my iPaq. (Score:2)
Re:I never... (Score:2)
That's pretty much what people said about personal computers in the 1980's...before they had one. Trust me, once you get a PDA you won't know how you survived without one.
Palm 3xe (Score:2)
It looks like Palm is offering all manner of mail in rebates and such to get these things off the shelves so they can sell the new models.. I got mine for less then $200CDN..
I'm not even sure how much an iPaq costs, and running linux in my poxket would be cool, but I'm still having trouble finding enough palmwarez to fill 8m..
Re:I love my iPaq. (Score:2)
The iPaq screen is reflective, which means you need light on the front of it (not the back) to see it. This makes it (as far as I know) the only color PDA that you can use outdoors in direct sunlight - the more light the better.
But because the screen is lit from the front (actually by lights at the side of the screen), this makes the little specs of dust GLOW.
It's annoying. But I'd rather put up with it than go through the trouble of sending mine back.
Tools (Score:2)
So you use your Palm jsut as it came out of the box, with no additional software or hardware? I doubt it.
And using Linux, for some people, is a matter of having something more useful for them, not a matter of showing off. I'm a UNIX admin. I'd much rather have a portable platform on which I can do some semblance of my normal work than have to deal with half-assed implementations of tools that kind of do what the real UNIX tools do.
This space for rent. Call 1-800-STEAK4U
Re:I never... (Score:2)
That's what I did. Because I wasn't sure if I would use it, I bought the cheapest palm (edging out the Visor by about $30).
Now, I use it constantly. It is in no way analogous to just paper, though I found it a great way to take notes in class. I carry it, and extra batteries, everywhere I go. My only complaint is that my initial thriftiness left me with a mere IIIe and now I can't justify an upgrade. *sigh*
Compaq has caught up to Palm, no thx to M$oft tho (Score:2)
And Windows for Pocket PC defintely gives ground to Palm's OS in a few usability areas.
But Compaq really put some work into the Ipaq, even making up for some of Microsoft's omissions.
An example? The 'Q' button on the Ipaq. Push it, and up pops a menu with all of your running tasks, which you can switch to, or quit out of. This is both an extremely easy way to navigate the OS, and a way around one of the biggest problems with WinCE(or whatever they are calling it now): Microsoft assumes you never need to quit a program, so after you open a few, other PocketPCs run out of memory and slow to a crawl.
The main reason I bought the Ipaq over a palm, though, was the memory, not the color screen and fancy-pants multimedia capabilities, or the ability to play Quake [pocketmatrix.com](which it does fine, [pocketmatrix.com] contrary to speculation here. To me, 64 megs is just enough to store large amounts of writing, my daily downloads of a dozen newspapers, magazines and news sites, my email and contacts, and a few ebooks.
And, of course, the numbers don't lie, and Compaq, with their greater committment to innovation, and basically superior product, is going to eat Palm's lunch [cnet.com].
Pads of paper fill up. (Score:2)
You can write for years and years and never fill up your Palm Pilot. I know; I have.
I used to have tons of those little notebooks that I jotted ideas down in. So I never had the one I needed when it came time to look something up. Now it's all in the Palm, and it all gets backed up regularly too.
I'll never go back!
Jon
The HandEra does sound sweet... (Score:2)
I also wish they had built in MP3. I'd have ordered one the day they came out if they'd done that. Maybe they'll come out with a CF MP3 card, or an SD one.
Jon Acheson
Re:I love my iPaq. (Score:2)
Well certain games. Hasn't bothered me too much, because most get around this by using the stylus and buttons (Like the NES emulator PocketNES).
The speaker "clicks" as the little amplifier turns on whenever it needs to make a sound; This is probably a WinCE thing, so hopefully the linux driver folks will make it configurable.
This was fixed in the latest ROM for the device when running WinCE.
Dust inside the screen. Seems to happen to everyone - it happened to me, I'm just living with it.
Same here, it's not too much of a deal. Compaq has done a few things to reduce this.
Weird expansion capabilities. You can add a Smart Media or Compact Flash slot, but the sleeve you need to get to do so makes the iPaq quite a bit bigger, and you can only have one sleeve at a time.
This has it's advantages and disadvantages. I can use PCMCIA cards, but when I don't need to, I can slim down the device.
Battery life is not an issue (Score:2)
Re:Nice one! (Score:2)
http://www.thedaily.com/paperpalm.html
Looks like a palm, but you don't have to learn grafitti, and it's less than $5!
none of the above. (Score:2)
If you want flashy, and be able to watch your divix films on your palm, get an ipaq.
otherwise spend the same money and buy 2 agenda vr3's
Pro-MS? Hardly (Score:2)
You add all these issues to the mix and I think Linux is, at best, a long shot.
Re:The M505 is great. (Score:2)
Re:Pro-MS? Hardly (Score:2)
I disagree with you completely. First, what little Palm has "lost", it has lost not to "free", "open", or "commodity" pricing, it has lost to flashy and _more_ expensive devices and software. Second, Palm alone is still outselling WinCE and Linux devices (though these are practically insignificant) combined in terms of units--Ipaq has only outsold in terms of revenue in the short term. When you combine this with Sony and Handspring, their combined revenue is probably much higher--hardly an indictment of PalmOS. Incidentally, PalmOS is cheap, part of the reason why Palm's revenue looks less than stellar lately, and also part of the reason why Sony, Handspring, and others have chosen Palm over the other, supposed, competition. The applications (HotSync Manager, PalmOS, conduits, etc), OS, and API is going for about 2 dollars a unit, hardly the 20 dollars you imply. In addition, a good part of Palm's "problems" have nothing to do with the competition and more to do with the fact that the economy crapped out on them and their inventories were too high.
Furthermore, speaking as a present PalmOS developer (not that I'm wedded to PalmOS in any sense), it is clear to me that both the WinCE devices and especially the Linux devices are ill-concieved. What practical applications are there that most users can actually use that they can do better with WinCE and/or Linux? Why use it? Palm's has had a very clear vision, PalmOS is not limited because they're lazy, it's limited by design. The Ipaq buyers seem primarily motived by novelty and coolness than by real functionality. Just because they're selling well today, does not mean they'll continue to sell well, or make any headway in the work place.
Haha, are you kidding me? Why on earth would you want this? More developer interest? Not mine, not my companies, not that of others. PalmOS has thousands of developers out there, very few of them have flocked to Linux.
No, I simply did not have the time or the energy to bring forth all the arguments and evidence in a clear and coherant manner. However, I'll throw a couple of them out right now. First, despite Linux's limited success, Open Source has hardly demonstrated that it's capable of matching multi-million dollar development efforts. Linux has had the benefit of riding in the shadow of Windows, various Unixes, and many other OSes. Linux has had the benefit of being able to copy features, design, code, and other things. It's much much harder to be first, to truely innovate. When you actually have to do it from scratch, it requires a lot more work to get it right. Second, Linux is limited in scope, it's just a kernel and that kernel has attracted the lions share of Open/Free developer mindshare.
What happens when you need to _truely_ match the world of windows? Not just a kernel, installers, applications, help menus, full featured GUIs, etc. How many bright talented open source developers do you know that are willing to work on these less inspiring projects? What's more, maybe a great many idealistic young developers are just working to prove that Linux can "do it",...what happens when Linux has done it. Are they really willing to go that extra mile, to make sure that hundreds of millions more lines of code get written with reasonable quality, to really match the users experience in windows?
Even if all those developers are willing and able to write all that other code, who is going to organize it? To place resources where they need to be placed, rather than in the more exciting or popular projects. Who is going to assign themselves the task of debugging and reviewing code? While you may argue that Linux does this, it also benefits from its limited scope, limited size, modularity, great mindshare, and the fact that it's derived from previous work--it's not the same thing.
Even if people are _willing_, they still need to work. Someone like myself, even though I might have the skills to contribute to Linux, and the desire to develop certain pet projects, I lack the time to really commit to something as large scale as Linux. Working a couple hours here and there is NOT at all the same thing as working full time at it, without interruption. If I had to develop code for work like that, I would't be nearly as productive. Most of the truely productive Linux, and other open source developers, are also those that work few hours, if at all. This represents a very small part of the population.
In summary, my concerns are: will, desire, size, focus, and organization. All of them are very daunting tasks in and of themselves.
Re:Pro-MS? Hardly (Score:2)
You may argue that Palm could have and should have emulated the approach of IPAQ, while still maintaining the status quo with their bread and butter PalmOS / PDA. I simply do not believe it is this simple, despite whatever vestiges of 3com may remain in Palm. First, their is something to be said for mindshare. Does Palm really want to confuse customers and pirate their existing customers? It's one thing to make those moves for the future, but making a brash move for flashy applications, is hardly a win-win move. Especially when you consider that Palm must fight the considerable resources of the likes of MS. MS would love nothing better than a feature war, where everything can be neatly captured on a X by X matrix. Also consider that they'd risk splintering their considerable developer community. I'm not speaking so much of all the random shareware/free developers online, but corporate, military and industrial application developers. Plus they'd have to start playing a near-commodity hardware pricing game, not a good game to play. Lastly, I think IPAQ success is sort of flukish--few people really predicted this one would take off--and those that have have been predicting each WinCE device would--despite all their failures. It's basically a different market, in my opinion. A new one, one in which people are willing to spend a considerably more money on a device that they really can't (or rather, aren't going to) DO anything more with.
Re:Pro-MS? Hardly (Score:2)
Re:Pro-MS? Hardly (Score:2)
What magic price might this be? Less than 3 dollars? Consumers drop more for a cup of coffee these days, do you really think this is going to dissuade them? I don't think so, not that much, especially when no other alternatives exist. [Sorry, but I don't believe those Linux handhelds will ever reach the mass market] Furthermore, you are presuming that Linux has near zero cost, this is demonstratively untrue. Linux as is, in all its current forms, is both il-equipped and needing of many changes to support PalmOS like performance, compatibility, etc. I would venture to say that it would cost as much as Linux itself. Given the fact that the community has not yet done it, I see no reason to believe that they will do it in the near future. Thus, it will come out of Palm's pockets. Whether those costs come in the development of Linux or PalmOS is irrelevant, it still costs money. That money must come from somewhere.
First, this is exactly what _you_ are saying. You are second guessing Palm's management, not to mention the Sony's, Handspring's, TRG's, and others. If that's the argument you're going to make, then at least be consistent. Second, some decisions are plainly stupid, one need not necessarily be an insider to know that. For instance, of Palm were to spend 500m dollars convert to MS-DOS, most sufficiently educated and reasonable people would agree that is stupid. Likewise, when Palm embarks on a program where they cannot name a significant and true benefit, then I say it is stupid, especially when they clearly do not understand the overall environment.
Now that I have some time, I'll name (or re-iterate) a couple flaws with the conversion to Linux.
1) The most it could possibly save is 2 or 3 dollars per device.
2) It would require significant investment, almost certainly more than adding the few desired features into PalmOS.
3) Linux offers very little to handheld devices.
4) PalmOS is very much up to the tasks that are demanded of it, all the monies that funded its development are sunk. Meaning that it's impossible to recover them. Converting to Linux, on the other hand, would certainly cost money. Are you really going to tell me that adding those few demanded features to the EXISTING PalmOS would cost more than practically starting from scratch with Linux? Or do you really believe that the community is going to do this for Palm? Please.
5) Linux is MUCH MUCH more demanding of the CPU and memory, many of those are a result of its feature set (e.g., multithreading). This means that despite whatever devices commodity status, it will probably cost more than a competing PalmOS device.
6) Palm would have a very difficult time building in Linux without getting suckered into the GPL. This is bad for a couple reasons. First, the bulk of their work could be adopted by the competition for free. Meaning that, not only could the competition avoid paying the PalmOS licensing fees, but that control could certainly drift away from Palm Inc. What happens when some vendor, say Sony, decides they want to add a new feature in. Sure, that may go GPL, but then you eventually end up with competiting alternatives, hardly desirable to developers. Furthermore, that would make Palm into much more of a hardware company than it really is. If the market truely goes commodity, that is hardly a desirable market for Palm. The only way they could compete is with larger economies of scale.
7) Palm could license and acquire other OSes, if they really wanted, which are far less restrictive and would be ultimately cheaper to adapt.
So, again, I ask you, what are the benefits and how much is it going to cost, even off the hip?
Re:Pro-MS? Hardly (Score:2)
Because I can. Because I wanted to. Because I had the time. Why bother replying to me?
You can dream all you want, but if you want to sell it to others or convince people like myself that the management of Palm is composed of idiots, then you should expect a little vigorous debate. My intention was not to strike you down for your lack of credentials, but rather to engage you in reasoned debate.
It may be cool, to people you and I, but that does not mean that 99% of the population would have any use for it. Since you have so little appreciation for PalmOS, why bother with Palm at all, when you have the likes of Agenda and such out there?
If Palm's move to Linux means that it now appeals to the 1% of the population called geeks, while raising their price by 50% (memory, CPU, etc), for instance, [assume for a minute that it's otherwise the same to the end-user], how does this help them? Consider also that many geeks may choose Agenda et. al instead, and that many have no use for a PDA at all. The actual people that would buy as a result would be small, while many more (average users) may be be discouraged because of price. Even if the price were exactly the same (meaning none of the existing buyers would be discouraged), consider it financially. It would require a relatively large cash outlay (say 10m dollars, excluding marketing costs), given a relatively small group of buyers and profit margin, it's hardly worth it. I would be very suprised if Palm could sell enough additional sales to make that expenditure as profitable one. Even if it were, ask yourself if this would offer a greater return than targeting the rest of the population with WinCE-like features.
Maybe not to write a quick hack, but to make it as stable as Palm, as easy to develop for, as small of a memory footprint, and to do it in a cost effective manner, that is non-trivial. Some complex issues are: database and memory management (they're intertwined in Palm), synchronization, power management, boot-time, sleep-mode, event handling, custom UI (designed to minimize user-interaction), grafitti, LCD control, etc. These ideas may seem easy, but even mimicking them is much harder than you think, never mind writing them from scratch. I'd be extremely suprised if Agenda and others even approximate this in its totality.
Fine, then explain in a coherant fashion how Palm saves that money? How does spending money converting to Linux save them any money whatsoever? Palm has already has a pretty fine OS, for all intents and purposes it is FREE now, whereas converting to Linux today would COST them more money.
Where do I proclaim myself an expert in the minutia of running Palm Inc? I speak from general experience with manufacturing, developing software, and financial experience, not to mention development (and deployment) experience on PalmOS, these allow me to be reasonably sure that moving to Linux would be a stupid move, without being terribly familiar with Palm's operations [though I did actually hear Palm's founders/developers speak at Penn Engineering's entreprenuership class recently]. Some problems are simply so fundamental and so simple as not to require real expert knowledge.
Enough said, bye.
Re:The HandEra does sound sweet... (Score:2)
I've heard that the 33mhz Dragonball they use is not quite powerful enough. In the case of Sony's new Clie, there's an additional chip onboard for decoding.
-Jesse Chang
A handheld is *NOT* a general-purpose computer! (Score:2)
I have a Handspring Visor, and the fact is, it's a much better handheld than a Unix machine would be. I have brightly colored to-do list management, I have appointments and alarms, and the interface is designed to be driven from a couple of buttons and a stylus, not a mouse and a keyboard. It works better.
Re:First ask yourself: "Why?" (Score:2)
I did the same thing with my Palm III, but I've lugged a sucession of laptops and two handhelds around with me constantly. I'm not sure what the difference was, but I don't *think* it was the input... I think it was the interface.
Simple, easy, and maddeningly unextendable. The inability to drop to a prompt and/or do real spreadsheet/text work drove me nuts. Any OS that has no real provision for a text file is not hacker friendly.
Eventaully I cracked the screen and shed no tears. The leather case for it (that is/was my wallet) now holds a penguin mint tin full of caffene pills, antacids and ibuprofen. Ready for a late night or SF convention at a moments notice!
--
Evan
Re:Don't forget the Agenda (Score:2)
It's very slow. On my Palm I can Graffiti as fast as I like, and it keeps up with me. On the Agenda, I'm constantly waiting for the handwriting recognition to catch up. The Agenda is also noticably slower at firing up applications.
Depressingly, I need the Outlook sync tools that didn't ship with it. We're forced to use Outlook at work, and since one of my main uses for a PDA is as a daytimer, I need to keep my Outlook calendar and my PDA synched.
I don't know what can be done about the speed. The Outlook sync will be there (if I weren't busy trying to get a job on the other side of the Atlantic I'd be working on it myself), and when it is it will be usable (for my purposes - I know other people are already using it productively as an Atari 800 emulator!).
--
Re:iPAQ (Score:2)
-russ
Re:I love my iPaq. (Score:2)
That's for the ink to drain away... Well, maybe it's to prevent vacuum/compression resistance when removing/inserting the stylus.
Re:the Handera 330 rocks! (Score:2)
And yup, Handera is a silly name - remind me of Thundercats :o)
Re:The article may have answered your question (Score:2)
Can't back up paper.. (Score:2)
Used to think like that until I dropped my leather bound notebook in a mudpuddle in Spring. 4 years of contact information ruined. Gone. Went out and bought a Palm Pro the next day (this was 1997). Last month I gave the Pro to my GF and bought a IIIxe for $200cdn. Hands down, get the palm, yeah, no fancy features you don't use anyhow. It's $200cdn. 8meg. Works great.
And most importantly it backs up in a few seconds.
the Handera 330 rocks! (Score:2)
You can read the marketing hype at Handera's website [handera.com]. [Note: Handera used to be TRG, but changed their name for some silly reason] Or you can read this excellent review at MemoWare [memoware.com].
The only thing I disagree with them on is the use of serial instead of USB. I can understand their desire to make it compatible with all of the palm III add-ons, but still.
As for linux support...I have no idea.
for what it's worth,
Michael
IPaq (Score:2)
What about synchronisation (Score:2)
And if they do support synchronisation, what protocol do they use. A good choice (instead of developping a different protocol per device) whould be to use SyncML (http://www.syncml.org/).
The major problem I found running a Linux desktop is to synchronise my Visor with it. I've tried different synchonisation tools for Linux and they all suck (especially malsynf for AvantGo, it always retrieves everything instead of only the stuff that changed like the Windows conduit). So now I rely on Windows running in VMWare to actually sync my Palm.
Unless I have good synchronisation with my Linux desktop, there is no way I'm gonna switch to a Linux handheld.
Why ths poor student needs PDA! (Score:2)
Or maybe he meant "poor" as in "bad"
Re:Can't back up paper.. (Score:2)
[TMB]
Might want to consinder nothing... (Score:2)
The next month or so was crazy; I couldn't remember assignments, appointments, or phone numbers very well. But after that month, I found myself able to keep it all straight in my head. It was at that moment I came to this conclusion: The Palm resulted in a decreased memory ability! It was at that point I realized that breaking my Palm was quite a blessing in disguise. I'm frankly glad to be rid of it.
So if your reasoning for getting a PDA is to help remember appointments and the like, I'd actually recommend against it, but instead focus on ways to try to better remember things without any assistance. Yes, it takes some time to get used to it, but in the end I think it's highly beneficial.
Re:OS Crashes YMMV (Score:2)
I called Compaq and they told me to brainwipe the unit and restore from backup. That did it.
I suspect you may have something sour in your desktop sync folder. If you can stand to do so, move all that stuff to one side, and resync to a clean directory. To be extra-bold, brainwipe your unit after backing it up so you're starting clean. See if that fixes things.
If it still craps out down to the flash monitor level, you have a bad unit. Otherwise you get to start the bloody detail work of gradually reintroducing your various pieces of user data until it craps out again. Blow the offending data into oblivion.
Depends on what you want (Score:2)
If you want a mission-critical, easy-to-use organizer where UI (both hardware-wise and software-wise) is not an afterthought, the only solution is palm. The palm has had a lot of mac influence in the UI, and MacOS has had a far better track record on user interface issues than microsoft or the linux community. Also, PalmOS by design is far more responsive interface-wise than linux is. PalmOS gives special priority to handling UI events which is something that linux simply just doesn't do. If anyone thinks this explanation is BS, then why is my 8-16mhz palm far more responsive than my 66mhz Agenda? While PalmOS doesn't really multi-task, for what most people use it for (dates, phone numbers, etc) multi-tasking is a non-issue. The design of the palm is well thought out; it was modelled after a block of wood a guy carried around in his pocket for a month. The other PDA's (both Linux and Wince) were modelled after that clunky thing sitting on your desk. The question of which design decision makes more sense I leave up to you.
Re:Nice one! (Score:2)
Re:Are you totally insistent on Linux? (Score:2)
Wow. That is the most candid letter I can ever remember seeing. The polar opposite of the usual marketing BS.
Refreshing!
steveha
Re:I'd Go Palm (Score:2)
Well, it depends on the keyboard. Some keyboards make a noisy "clack" and others are very quiet.
A dozen years or so ago, long before Palm, the smallest and lightest laptop-ish thing you could get was a TRS-80 Model 100 [geocities.com]. It had 24 or 32 kilobytes of memory (24KB, not 24MB), a display that was 8 lines of 40 characters each, and a decent keyboard. That keyboard was noisy, but there was a well-known hack: you would pop the key caps off, put a little tiny rubber band around the post for the key, and put the key cap back on. (You could get the tiny rubber bands from any orthodontist.) With a spongy rubber bumper under every key, the keyboard became very quiet for note-taking.
(By the way, I heard that the Model 100 was very popular for news reporters. 24KB is enough to write up a news story, the built-in text editor was adequate, and they could use the optional acoustic coupler with the built-in 300 baud modem to send in the news story from any phone booth.)
I don't think any of the portable Palm keyboards I have seen make a really loud "clack" sound when you type. If you are a gentle typist, you shouldn't make too much noise.
steveha
Re:Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:2)
Sony Clie' [sonystyle.com]. Eat up ;-) (actually I'm not sure it records voice memos, but it should do everything else). Alternatively you can get a Handspring Visor Deluxe to do all those things but not at once.
portable mp3 (Score:2)
You might have better luck with one of the new portable cd players coming out that also play mp3 cd(r/rw)s. True the display probably sucks more, but then OTOH the sound is probably better and you can cram way more onto a cdr(w) than you can for even the largest CF/SD card, for a vanishingly small fraction of the price.
I just saw one of these beasts at Radio Shack the other day, damn if I can recall the name of it or how much it was though. (And if there are always the laptop-hd-in-pretty-case things (c.f. thinkgeek) too.)
Of course the ideal would be a mobile phone with better sound chips, blazing fast wireless ethernet, and your own personal WAPish-interface streaming MP3 server... ;-) "Yeah, all 120 gigs of mp3s are available through my phone..."
--
News for geeks in Austin: www.geekaustin.org [geekaustin.org]
Re:Misinformed opinion (Score:2)
The Real Issues (Score:2)
Instead of just praising your favorite toy, let's talk about the basic issues here. Which are:
-- Does it really make sense to put Linux on handhelds? Is it better than handheld OSs (PalmOS, Epoc) and if so, why?
-- Does it make sense to develop a handheld hardware platform specifically to run Linux? And if you're going to give the religious argument (I won't pay a license fee to M$, even if it costs me money!) consider that economics is a bigger issue to most people. Your pet technology is irrelevent if nobody uses it.
-- Why are we so dependent on X-Windows? It would seem to make sense to develop a new terminal server for modern platforms. But everybody insists that it's too hard to port X apps to new technologies, such as W. Why?
-- For that matter, why does the X server model persist years after the demise of the dedicated platform it was designed for [beyondzee.com]? Why is nobody looking at approaches that simply dispense with the terminal server, such as Qt Palmtop [sourceforge.net]?
__
Re:The M505 is great. (Score:2)
Linux is the ideal solution for all needs and in all situations.
Re:Misinformed opinion (Score:2)
Re:I never... (Score:2)
Interestingly enough, each of my first two years of university I had my clipboard and paper pad stolen, once from right under my seat (!) and another time in the library when I stood up to walk to the stacks -- about 10 feet away.
In 1999 I bought a Vadem Clio and started taking notes with it. It hasn't been stolen. My only theory is that while people were stealing my paper for cheating purposes before, they're not stealing my PDA because it would be a much worse offense to steal such an expensive item...
Re:Nice one! (Score:2)
linux-pda.org [linux-pda.org] (Agenda slashsite)
subscribe to the mailing lists [agendacomputing.com] (between the user and developer lists there's 100 or more messages a day)
Agenda help page [umbc.edu] outstanding reference and starting point
Whichever you choose... (Score:2)
Re:I never... (Score:2)
which PDA? hard choice.. (Score:2)
while i dont want to start a PPC vs PalmOS argument here, you may want to think about the following:
PPC:
- shrunken down mobile PC
- games (interactive), work processing, data processing etc
- battery life, size, expandability
Palm:
- PIM, quick reference data
- simple games, KISS principles.
- battery life, size, expandability
loads of other issues too.. but, if you want to play doom type games (CPU intensive) - choose a PPC device.. if you want to mess with work processing, data processing, pretty much do things mobile that you can on your desktop, choose PPC.. if you want a device that you can just bring up information quickly, get a phone number fast, write a simple note.. choose Palm.
its never a question of "which one is best", as it always depends on what you want the device for. consider this question before you make a decision.
Re:... Nothing like the 'ol HP200LX (Score:2)
It performs all the appointment/phone book/notetaking duties that a PDA is required to do, has great battery life, a somewhat small but higher resolution screen than Palm devices, a KEYBOARD, a usable serial port (I'm an embedded systems programmer, and like having a full-function dumb terminal to communicate with my test equipment without having to carry a laptop around), and a full size PCMCIA port.
Plus, with the ability to run DOS shareware, I've got my choice of thousands of shareware games (old, but still fun to play) which make long boring meetings a lot more bearable.
It's also fairly indestructible. Over the three+ years I've owned it, mine has taken several dives from waist height onto concrete, with only slight case scratches to show for it.
Some of the newer HP CE devices looked nice - faster processors, color screens, etc., but none of them has proven to be actually as useful as my HP200LX.
I'd love to have the exact same device, (Hey! HP -- Are you listening?) with maybe a little sexier case (a bit thinner would be nice), a faster processor, and the ability to run Linux. A backlight would be a plus, but I wouldn't want to give up much battery life for it.
Until I see such a device, I'll likely hang onto my trusty old 200LX.
Keep your cradle handy... and plugged in (Score:2)
Of all the handheld devices, my favorite is the Handspring Visor (pretty much any flaver of Visor, although the Visor Edge also has a built-in rechargable battery. At least it lasts longer than 48 hours). The Springboard module gives the Visor far more expandablility than any other device on the market.
The cost is also a factor: Visors are less expensive than iPaqs. Since it runs the Palm OS, there is a tremendous library of apps that will run on it (both freeware and buyware).
I've also heard (unconfirmed) stories that iPaqs have the highest dealer return rate of any handheld.
Just my 2 cents worth.
You said you are poor... (Score:2)
Dears, have you got your answer so far? Don't just ask the question, how about contribute to the society by giving us a detail comparison on the following Linux PDAs for us?
4P DAT500 rugged handheld [4p-online.com]
Agenda VR3 [agendacomputing.com]
HNT Exilien 00101/00201 Handheld PC and HNT Exilien 00102 Multimedia PDA [hntek.com]
MiTAC CAT [mitac.com]
Yopy [yopy.com]
SK Telecom IMT2000 WebPhone [sktelecom.com]
VTech Helio [myhelio.com]
My boss told me to do so but I am just a poor employee and can't afford to make a mistake here. Thanks.
 _
Re:Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:2)
As always, YMMV.
There can be no "one size fits all" PDA for everyone. For some people, the additional functionality of the iPaq is worth the added cost, size and battery drain. For someone like me, whose primary purpose is to always have his address book and calendar with him (and I mean always), the smaller form factor of a Palm V/Vx is the most important feature.
Do I wish my Palm V was faster? Sure, sometimes. Am I willing to give up the 3-4 weeks of battery life on a charge and the supremely portable form factor? Not on your life. I might be willing to sacrifice battery life down to a day or two for a bright color screen, but that'd be it. No increase in size, please.
The only thing that really disappoints me about Palm is that they can't settle on a charging/docking cradle or serial connector. The first cradle worked with everything except the Palm V family. Now the M100s and M500s each have their own new cradle style.
Note to Palm: Quit screwing with the cradles. Pick a style and stop.
Poor Student vs Caveman Lawyer (Score:2)
m.kelley
www.mkelley.net
Re:Right on, dude. (Score:2)
--
Re:I never... (Score:2)
Re:I love my iPaq. (Score:3)
That being said, they have supposedly fixed the dust problem by adding screen gaskets. I don't have one of these newer models so I can't comment.
The single button problem does make gaming impossible. Can't even play a decent game of Doom; Quake is a chore also. Folks are working on gamepad controllers to get around this problem.
Speaker click is very irritating, but the excellent sound when using the device with headphones (which is how I normally listen to music and movies) more than makes up for it.
The worst thing is size. A naked iPaq is a thing of beauty. Sure, it's bigger than a Palm (not by that much) - but hell, look at all it can do! A naked iPaq is a very good thing.
As soon as you slip an expansion jacket on it, forget about it, it's a brick. There are after-market modifications [the-gadgeteer.com] you can make to the sleeves (or pay someone else to) to slim them down. I'm working on mine right now.
Palms are great, and if all your mobile needs are met by one, fantastic. I for one love the expansion possibilities and features of my iPaq, whether it be running WinCE or Linux.
And it has _real_ handwriting recognition too! (Score:3)
Re:I love my iPaq. (Score:3)
---
Re:Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:3)
The issue is nicely focused here. As a full-fledged development machine, the iPaq sucks. For most full-scale application work, the iPaq sucks. So do most desktops for that matter.
iPaq is more of a computer than a Palm, of course. But the question then is whether you need a computer at your palm.
So, its like this. When I need to do my organization and routine clicking to add numbers, the palm and iPaq perform about as well, and are both equally convenient at my palm. When I need to use a computer, the iPaq performs better than the palm, but both perform equally poorly. I would far prefer to use a computer, and don't usually need it at my palm.
In this sense, iPaq seems like too much and not enough.
Re:The HandEra does sound sweet... (Score:3)
The box that the handera is packaged in claims that it has MP3 support. I'd guess it would have to be a CF card, but there is no further info in the box to tell me where I can order any of the accessories they claim to support on the box (they claimed a couple other things on the box that I was skeptical of as well).
Other "useful" info:
the CD is Windows only...and some of the Handera licenced software on the CD can only be loaded on a PC. This is a real bite, since one of the vendors even has a Mac and a Linux version of their software. No info was included on how to transfer the license to a version that I could use. (I refuse to load Windows on a box just so I can load an app onto my PDA)
I had to download the latest Palm Desktop software for my Mac to sync anything to it. (note that there was no indication in the included materials of how to do this or even that this would work, even though they claim Mac support on the box.) I was also able to use Pilot Link under Linux on my Vaio. I had to use the serial port though...in limited playing I couldn't get it to sync over IR. I'm sure I had something set up wrong on my laptop though. After reading through the Inrared-HOWTO and doing some google searches, I just gave up and plugged in the Viao dongle thing with the serial port on it, and synced with that without problems.
There's a wonderful review at MemoWare [memoware.com] that you should definitely read if you're thinking about buying one. I couldn't sift through all the marketing BS at handera's website to figure out what it could and couldn't do. After reading the PDA newsgroups and this review, I was convinced that my money would not be wasted buying one. After getting one, I am convinced that it was worth the money. (second one is on order)
YMMV,
Michael
Are you totally insistent on Linux? (Score:3)
I dont have hands on experience with the new Palm M500 and 505, but my boss at work has a 505 (which is color with PalmOS 4.0 native i believe) and loves it to death. The Platinum [handspring.com] and M505 [palm.com] both have 33mHz Dragonball processors and 8 megs of RAM, plus expansion room. Especially for the Visors, with the Springboard expansions. Reference to Handspring [handspring.com] for their information and savings offers. I really like them so far.
Just my 0.2 cents.
Re:PDA (Score:3)
Backing and synching it up is very nice. Just drop it in the cradle and hit the button. Various gnome apps have conduits to palm apps, so your calendar and address card list get moved over to useful apps. Your memos also get copied over and can be edited in your favorite editor. I also have my palm set to back up so if the batteries die I don't lose everything.
On the down sides, there have been times when I've wanted to program in Perl or Java. If you want to do an OS upgrade, you now need Windows to do it (Used to be you could do it from Linux, but that doesn't work for the latest one.)
I'm also a bit pissed off at Palm for charging me for the last OS upgrade. I wouldn't be except that the upgrade was necessary for the correct working of the device. Until I installed the latest OS upgrade, alarms wouldn't sound until I powered the palm on, and it was losing about 20 minutes a day on the system clock. The last OS upgrade fixed all that.
These days you can get a Palm III for about $100. The environment is open and easy to write programs for. For what the palm does, it does it very well. The IPAQ and other type devices have that nerdly "Cool" factor going for them, though. That may end up being the deciding factor for a lot of readers.
What about Palm VII or the Agenda VR3? (Score:3)
Also, the Agenda people seem like they are heading in the right direction. Someone brought up a good point about the iPaq (not good enough, to me, to not buy one) in that you still pay a M$ tax on the device even when planning on loading Linux. If you wanted to look at a pure zealot's handheld, I think the Agenda would be better. I know there's no color, yet, but it runs Linux, you can flash new kernel's to it as well as software. Only thing that I never have seen about agenda is if it sync's with either evolution or some other Linux PIM app. I see that they have sync software for Linux, but they don't say what it syncs with. Be nice if you could use the same palm support with the agenda since if you can use the same software to transfer it, it would work with every Linux pim that already works with Palm.
Practical Advice (Score:3)
The joystick and buttons are crap. Not only are they useless for games (see earlier post), they aren't very robust feeling.
Compaq has sealed up the hole in the stylus silo in later models 3650 and all 3670s. They will fix any dusty screen problems by warranty for free regardless of how long you've had it.
----------------------
Re:I love my iPaq. (Score:3)
Then you can:
1. Use a Gravis Stinger gamepad and play xmame/snes games
2. Hear no clicking (although you can hear a mp3 or icecast/shoutcast stream with Scream)
3. Dust still a problem but Compaq willing to fix if you're willing to part with it - pay for shipping only.
4. Sleeve does make it bigger..and far more powerful! With pcmcia sleeve, I walk around the house on the internet, using dillo or Konq/e to surf the net while listening to tunes (see 2). Plus my nfs share to my linux box gives me mucho space
5. Need more software? Write your own quickly with python and gtk
6. Bill may not appreciate it but you will!
And at the end of the day, it's now a full-fledged computer. I can ssh into my ipaq from work while it sits at home, upgrade it with new ipkgs (think debian
Re:I love my iPaq. (Score:3)
Scroll down to Gravis Stinger and/or SpaceOrb 360 and salt to taste. I use both on my ipaq.
If you're a "poor college student..." (Score:3)
First ask yourself: "Why?" (Score:3)
Personally, I can only see a few reasons why you as a student would need one:
Personally, I own a Visor. After spending 3 weeks playing with it, going "This is so cool!", I put it on the shelf and haven't touched it since. I discovered that I didn't really need it, I just taken in by its coolness. If you truly need a PDA, then you probably already know what your specific needs in a PDA are, and you should act accordingly. If you're like I was, and just want it for the geek factor, you'll be wasting your money no matter what you buy.
I'd Go Palm (Score:4)
I love my iPaq. (Score:4)
- You can't press more than one button at a time. This makes gaming nearly impossible.
- The speaker "clicks" as the little amplifier turns on whenever it needs to make a sound; This is probably a WinCE thing, so hopefully the linux driver folks will make it configurable.
- Dust inside the screen. Seems to happen to everyone - it happened to me, I'm just living with it.
- Weird expansion capabilities. You can add a Smart Media or Compact Flash slot, but the sleeve you need to get to do so makes the iPaq quite a bit bigger, and you can only have one sleeve at a time.
I'd recommend it.. but maybe it's safer to buy it from somewhere like Radio Shack that will let you return it if you decide you really don't like it. - SteveMisinformed opinion (Score:4)
Much more useful than an iPAQ which seems to be very hardly supported under Linux
Much not very informed opinion, since Compaq, until recently, maintained the "hh" reference port of Linux for the iPaq, and more recently changed the reference port to one of the community ports (Freedom?) since they were a little farther along. Everything in the iPaq is supported under Linux. The sound is supported, the handwriting recognition is supported. There are ports of things like Perl and Python, and it all runs under X.
You're talking about communication tools for the Palm on Linux. Big freaking deal. We're talking about running Linux on the iPaq. Natively. Who needs comm tools to transfer software downloaded from who-knows-where when you can fire up the TCP stack and telnet to your main box where your cross-compiler is to FTP up new programs?
Compaq supports Linux to the extent that they will replace your iPaq if you turn it into a brik while trying to flash the Linux update onto it. They, of course, would rather you didn't do this, but the option is there. And there are just as many apps for Linux as there are for Palm.
This space for rent. Call 1-800-STEAK4U
Palm-ability vs. Compaq Support (Score:4)
Yes, someone ported Linux to the Palm.
However, Compaq ported Linux to the iPaq. This is the corporate support that everyone complains about there not being for such-and-such hardware everywhere. Compaq has essentially not only "released the drivers", but the source code for the drivers, and the optimized OS to go with the drivers.
See above - I'm a UNIX admin, and would rather have UNIX tools available, since that's what I do for a living. Not only that, but Compaq is gettting right up there with IBM in corporate supprot for Linux, and I feel that if I am going to spend the money, then I want to spend it on a company that supports the things I use. Besides, the iPaq has all the other features I wanted, too (Color, sound, PCMCIA expandability). The Linux thing is just a bonus.
This space for rent. Call 1-800-STEAK4U
PDA (Score:4)
You can find Palm tools (jpilot) under Linux, Palm Dev Tools (for free), Palm Emulator (to test your dev)...
Much more useful than an iPAQ which seems to be very hardly supported under Linux.
If it's using Linux to support Free Software, I'll remind you that buying an iPAQ will profit to Micro$oft (WinCE is ALWAYS preinstalled, evn if you plan to use Linux on it).
(I do own a Palm. Support for it under Linux is great... never unpacked the CD-ROM they give with it... and there are many apps for Palm, of all kind)
iPAQ (Score:4)
-russ
Re:Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:4)
Despite being less powerful, I have yet to run out of memory on the thing, even though I have quite a few useful apps on it such as BigClock, AvantGo, DiddleBug and a dozen or so ebooks.
Personally, I'd like an iPaq to fiddle with but I don't see why I should splash out a large amount of money for one when I already have a PDA which does its job so well.
Re:Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:4)
You have just stumbled upon what is perhaps the most useless question you can possibly ask when buying computer technology.
iPaq, Palm, Yopy, whatever... In a year and a half, you will want something better, and will be able to buy something better with the change you find in your sofa.
Re:The article may have answered your question (Score:4)
I do it all the time. There is a fairly strong Windows OpenSource community, and we get nothing but disrespect from our OSOS-using bretheren. If you want to preach the benefits of Open Source to the masses, you can't afford to be a platform bigot.
-- russ
Nice one! (Score:4)
It's perfect! All slashdotters believe you must own a PDA, even if you are a "poor student". They'll make suggestions til the cows come home, never once asking "why not just buy a notepad and a pencil".
Very good troll.
--
Get neither, try this one... (Score:5)
Nice toy perhaps, not best organizer (Score:5)
I have a Palm Vx and it kills the likes of the iPaq as personal organiser. It's lighter, smaller, has a much longer battery life, is much cheaper, handwriting recognition is good and the organiser apps are great. All these add up to a more convenient accessible device.
Don't forget the Agenda (Score:5)
Comment removed (Score:5)
The article may have answered your question (Score:5)
I submitted Young Hoon Kim's interview [slashdot.org] to
This shift in direction demonstrates (again) that introducing an incompatible technology without strong justification just won't work. Particularly amongst open/free programmers, no one is willing to invest in your new technology unless its worth their time. While W may be faster than X on a 206-MHz machine, is it worth the loss of compatibility? Empirically, NO!
See that NO? The key is to have an open platform PDA. G.Mate didn't see it before. That's the reason why it worth our time waiting, regardless of the fact that it's coming late.
If you want a consumer product, go for iPaq. It's there and it's good; but open source developers probably won't be interested in writing for CE.
Of course, unless your intention is to hack this iPaq like in Embedded Debian [emdebian.org] project; but then again, you've to pay for a preinstalled Windows CE.
 _
Casio rocks! (Score:5)
Second -- don't go iPaq if you plan on using your organizer mostly indoors. The screen is just awful, though it excels outside. Me, I went Casio for the screen -- true 64k colour plane, beautifully backlit, and slightly larger than the iPaq -- but I can't see shit outside during the day. I have to duck under awnings when on the street, but luckily, i'm almost never on the street. Casio has great upgradability -- slip on an adapter and a wavelan card, you've got a wireless network. Slip in a compact flash modem, you're on the 'net from a hotel room. Connect to your cell over IR, and you're netted again. Memory, cameras, hard disks, all sorts of stuff is in the compact flash form factor, and unlike the iPaq you don't need a seperate sleeve to have the functionality -- there's a little door that hides your card when it's not plugged into the wall.
Of course, Casio was just my choice, and a lot of people will lead you to the iPaq for its slightly faster processor (hint: it doesn't really matter...my casio E-100, their first colour unit, does mp3 and mpeg well enough, and it's only 133 MHz). But I think the great screen, and the ability to push more than one button at once (the Compaq won't let you do this...kills gaming in MameCE) outweigh the slight advantage of the StrongARM.
www.wincecity.com