The Best Hand-Held PC

wolfmann601

wolfmann601

Gone, but not forgotton. RIP Ira.
Joined
Mar 12, 2001
Messages
7,385
OK you geeks. I need to buy a pocket/hand-held PC. Someone suggested the HP Jornada 568, someone said compaq and someone else said the new SONY. Since I have no clue, which one should I buy?

Thanks..........Ira
 
Unless you just want to spend a lot of money . . . you might want to walk through what you want it to do. If you're looking for "task management", I would lean more toward the Palm OS based machines. If you want to be able to run Windows applications you might want to look at the Pocket PC based machines. In that realm the new Toshiba offerings are outstanding. (I am looking at getting the new e310!)

See here:http://www.pricegrabber.com/search_getprod.php/masterid=581142/ut=c4282b9b194a8a7e

Either way . . . they are great!:D :D
 
What Jason said is spot on. I've used both. For most of my needs, a PalmOS is perfect. However, from time to time, a task comes up where the PocketPC devices work better for me. The nice thing about PPC devices is that they will do everything a PalmOS device will do and more. The downside is their cost and size. If I were to do it all over, I'd probably buy a Sony Clie. They're super slim and priced well. I just don't get to use the advanced features of PPC often enough. The capability is there, but nobody is producing good software or hardware addons. I'd like to get a 3G Compact Flash card for my Casio, but they don't exist yet to my knowledge.

As far as picking a specific PPC device, I'd stay away from HP. I was never impressed by them. The Compaqs are nice and everyone develops for them first. Plus, they have a screen that is usable outdoors (the Casio has a better screen for indoor use, but almost useless outdoors). I haven't looked at the new models. I'm sure they're nice too.

Chris
 
Just got a new iPaq 3850 and I love it!

I think the Jornadas will be discontinued due to the HP-Compaq merger...
 
Thanks guys, your help is greatly appreciated. I still would like to know which Pocket PC's handle E-mail, word processing and spreadsheets the best. Screen image is crucial as is the ability to plug in peripherals.......Thanks again
 
You should check out the new sony clie it has an mp3 player and digital camera built in. It also has a cool uninversil remote feature
 
Originally posted by wolfmann601
Thanks guys, your help is greatly appreciated. I still would like to know which Pocket PC's handle E-mail, word processing and spreadsheets the best. Screen image is crucial as is the ability to plug in peripherals.......Thanks again
Click to expand...

Regarding the applications, all PPCs have them built in. All of the handhelds have roughly the same size screen, so that is not a factor either. In last year's model, the Compaq was slightly faster than the Casio, but the Casio's screen was better indoors. I'm not sure about this year.

For peripherals, unless things have changed, Compaq is the winner. With their different addon jackets, you can use either Compact Flash or PC Cards. There is a model called the Amigo from another company that does PC Cards natively, but I don't know if it's around this year. Casios do Compact Flash. Compact Flash devices use less battery, but some things are only available in PC Card.

Checkout www.brighthand.com and www.pocketpcpassion.com for the latest news. I don't keep up with it as much as I used to.

Chris
 
I have a new Compaq 3860 which replaced my old Philips Velo which replaced my old HP Omnigo. If you are looking for a laptop replacement, forget it. Windows CE 3 ["Pocket PC"] is a lousy os and the screen, although much better than before, is too damn small to be very useful for displaying large files or spreadsheets. This format does not compare to the old palmtops that had the folding screen/keyboard combination. On the other hand, they are incredibly portable and do many things quite well. Lots of software is available and Compaq has the best selection of peripherals and add-ons out there.
I haven't used Palm OS products, but it seems to me that if what you really need is a daytimer, contact manager and some minor wordpreocessing with limited email/internet capability, there's no reason to pay the big bucks for these CE 3 machines that are pretty poor laptop subsitutes. The situation may change as more software comes available, but Microsoft is horrible at supporting and developing these OS.
 
Compaq Ipaq is a very sweet little machine, I use mine all day at work for normal Day Timer duties, along with keeping many Excel or Word documents on the 128mb CF card.

You can also watch Mpegs, listen to MP3's, play games, use it as an IR remote (wouldnt recommend it though, range sucks on all the PPCs), go wireless and use Blackberry (read your emails on the go), if your company uses an Avaya PBX, the new version 10.5 or 11 will allow just the IPAQ with wireless setup to act as your work phone.

In a nutshell, I have always had a HUGE daytimer, with over 1 1/2 years worth of crap that I usually always had to refer back to, the IPAQ took care of that, along with giving me the ability to view everyday files on the go (having internet functionality isnt bad either).

My 2 pennies....

ReaperVelle
 
that if you get a palm devise, don't compromise your screen space and get one with a dedicated graffiti area. you need all the screen space you can get. I'd probably go with sony for palm and compaq for ppc. Also, there is a new devise called the danger hiptop that will be wirelessly enabled and have full web browsing and java. i think www.danger.com should get you to it.

- Pete
 
If you go palm OS i would go with a handspring, the springboard adds so much to the expandability plus they are way cheaper than the palm's.
 
Originally posted by Rifter
If you go palm OS i would go with a handspring, the springboard adds so much to the expandability plus they are way cheaper than the palm's.
Click to expand...


Nooooooooooooooooo!

My coworker has a Handspring (the color model). Not only is it the least stable PalmOS device I've ever seen (it was never stable with the modem, she stopped using it), the rechargable battery is junk as well. After a bit over a year of use, the battery is worn out. Handspring wants $300 to replace the battery (the device originally cost around $500). I would avoid them like the plague. If you need expandability, go with PocketPC. There is more of a selection of add-ons and they cost less to boot (the cards, not the basic PDA).

Chris
 
Maybe the handsprings got better, i have had mine for about 2 months and have had no problems and paid less than half of what an equivelent palm PDA would have cost. Its stable, it works fine using my cell phone as a modem through the IR port and the springboard slot works fine with the cards i have tried it with. Just my .02 cents
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top