Slashdot Mirror

knightwolf writes "Well, finally, handspring has released their updated Treo - the Treo 600. Its only available on the sprint network at the moment, and owners of any of the other treo communicators can get a discount on the phone. Current price is 449 after a "service credit", or 399 for those trading up their current treo's. There's numerous new features, such as an SD/MMC slot, camera, Palm OS 5.2.1, a 144 Arm processor, 32MB, and other updates. Take a look, as I'd imagine this is the last actual handspring release, before they fully merge with Palm. "

knightwolf writes "Well, finally, handspring has released their updated Treo - the Treo 600. Its only available on the sprint network at the moment, and owners of any of the other treo communicators can get a discount on the phone. Current price is 449 after a "service credit", or 399 for those trading up their current treo's. There's numerous new features, such as an SD/MMC slot, camera, Palm OS 5.2.1, a 144 Arm processor, 32MB, and other updates. Take a look, as I'd imagine this is the last actual handspring release, before they fully merge with Palm. "

knightwolf writes "Well, finally, handspring has released their updated Treo - the Treo 600. Its only available on the sprint network at the moment, and owners of any of the other treo communicators can get a discount on the phone. Current price is 449 after a "service credit", or 399 for those trading up their current treo's. There's numerous new features, such as an SD/MMC slot, camera, Palm OS 5.2.1, a 144 Arm processor, 32MB, and other updates. Take a look, as I'd imagine this is the last actual handspring release, before they fully merge with Palm. "

knightwolf writes "Well, finally, handspring has released their updated Treo - the Treo 600. Its only available on the sprint network at the moment, and owners of any of the other treo communicators can get a discount on the phone. Current price is 449 after a "service credit", or 399 for those trading up their current treo's. There's numerous new features, such as an SD/MMC slot, camera, Palm OS 5.2.1, a 144 Arm processor, 32MB, and other updates. Take a look, as I'd imagine this is the last actual handspring release, before they fully merge with Palm. "

securitas submits this painfully well-linked piece: "eWEEK reviews the RIM BlackBerry 7230 color handheld, Research In Motion's latest combination wireless e-mail/phone/PDA, and the first BlackBerry to feature a full-color display. The tri-band GSM/GPRS J2ME device features a 240-by-160-pixel, 65,000-color display, 16 MB flash +2 MB SRAM, an Intel 386 32-bit chip, SMS, an HTML browser (missing from the preceding BlackBerry 5810), a claimed 4 hours talk/10 days standby removable/rechargeable lithium-ion battery, POP3/IMAP/Exchange/Notes wireless e-mail for up to 10 accounts with file attachment management, security via Triple DES encryption, USB sync/recharging and the usual organizer functions. RIM squeezes it all into a 4.8 oz/136g, 4.4x2.9x0.8 inch/11.3x7.4x2.0 cm package (tech specs at RIM). The BlackBerry 7230 is exclusive to T-Mobile USA until 2004 and costs about $400. With this release, RIM is moving the BlackBerry into the prosumer/consumer market to expand its customer base beyond enterprise users. The release comes amid speculation of BlackBerry doom following RIM's recent patent ruling loss and ahead of the highly anticipated Handspring Treo 600, its direct competition (which includes the MS Pocket PC Phone Edition Smartphone and the Palm Tungsten W). More at Wired News, E-Commerce Times, InfoWorld and Forbes/Reuters."

securitas submits this painfully well-linked piece: "eWEEK reviews the RIM BlackBerry 7230 color handheld, Research In Motion's latest combination wireless e-mail/phone/PDA, and the first BlackBerry to feature a full-color display. The tri-band GSM/GPRS J2ME device features a 240-by-160-pixel, 65,000-color display, 16 MB flash +2 MB SRAM, an Intel 386 32-bit chip, SMS, an HTML browser (missing from the preceding BlackBerry 5810), a claimed 4 hours talk/10 days standby removable/rechargeable lithium-ion battery, POP3/IMAP/Exchange/Notes wireless e-mail for up to 10 accounts with file attachment management, security via Triple DES encryption, USB sync/recharging and the usual organizer functions. RIM squeezes it all into a 4.8 oz/136g, 4.4x2.9x0.8 inch/11.3x7.4x2.0 cm package (tech specs at RIM). The BlackBerry 7230 is exclusive to T-Mobile USA until 2004 and costs about $400. With this release, RIM is moving the BlackBerry into the prosumer/consumer market to expand its customer base beyond enterprise users. The release comes amid speculation of BlackBerry doom following RIM's recent patent ruling loss and ahead of the highly anticipated Handspring Treo 600, its direct competition (which includes the MS Pocket PC Phone Edition Smartphone and the Palm Tungsten W). More at Wired News, E-Commerce Times, InfoWorld and Forbes/Reuters."

securitas writes "In case you can't wait until September to find out what it's like, Walt Mossberg reviews the Sony Clie UX50 (as previously discussed). He likes it, but with reservations. The keyboard lacks predictive text (unlike the Handspring Treo and RIM BlackBerry) and the Clie Mail e-mail software can't read graphical e-mails and has poor attachment support. The audio player only reads files from a particular directory. He likes the 802.11b WiFi and loves the 450x320 screen. The biggest problem? The $700 price tag ($600 for the non-wireless UX40 model) - equivalent to a low-end laptop - especially since it doesn't come with a Memory Stick. If you can read it, here's a Japanese Clie UX50 review and PalmInfocenter press release rewrite."

securitas writes "In case you can't wait until September to find out what it's like, Walt Mossberg reviews the Sony Clie UX50 (as previously discussed). He likes it, but with reservations. The keyboard lacks predictive text (unlike the Handspring Treo and RIM BlackBerry) and the Clie Mail e-mail software can't read graphical e-mails and has poor attachment support. The audio player only reads files from a particular directory. He likes the 802.11b WiFi and loves the 450x320 screen. The biggest problem? The $700 price tag ($600 for the non-wireless UX40 model) - equivalent to a low-end laptop - especially since it doesn't come with a Memory Stick. If you can read it, here's a Japanese Clie UX50 review and PalmInfocenter press release rewrite."

jlouderb writes "Handspring debuted the biggest product at last week's lCeBit show in New York. Lots of news articles were written about the Treo 600, but I actually got to borrow one of the few prototypes for a day." Looks like the only real negatives are that there's no protection for the screen, and no removable battery, otherwise it's a tight little device. It'll be interesting to see the release model in action.

jlouderb writes "Handspring debuted the biggest product at last week's lCeBit show in New York. Lots of news articles were written about the Treo 600, but I actually got to borrow one of the few prototypes for a day." Looks like the only real negatives are that there's no protection for the screen, and no removable battery, otherwise it's a tight little device. It'll be interesting to see the release model in action.

securitas writes "Handspring unveiled its final product before being acquired by Palm: the Treo 600. It runs Palm OS 5.2 on a Texas Instruments ARM processor with 32MB of RAM, has a 160 x 160 color display, comes in GSM and CDMA versions, includes a digital camera plus various camera applications and supports Good Technology's Goodlink e-mail software, competition to RIM's BlackBerry. Of course it also comes with a keyboard, SMS capability, MP3 player, Web browser and Secure Digital/MMC memory-card expansion slot. Measuring 4.41 inches x 2.26 inches x 0.87 (LxWxD) and weighing about 6 ounces, analysts say that the Treo 600 is what clinched Palm's takeover of Handspring. The only problem that they forsee is a seriously crowded market for PDA/mobile phone combinations. Availability for the Treo 600 is this fall. Images at eWeek, SFGate or Reuters. Streaming movies from Handspring (QuickTime dial-up 56k| QuickTime dsl/cable 300k)." Reader Michael Ducker points out this longer article at TreoCentral as well.

securitas writes "Handspring unveiled its final product before being acquired by Palm: the Treo 600. It runs Palm OS 5.2 on a Texas Instruments ARM processor with 32MB of RAM, has a 160 x 160 color display, comes in GSM and CDMA versions, includes a digital camera plus various camera applications and supports Good Technology's Goodlink e-mail software, competition to RIM's BlackBerry. Of course it also comes with a keyboard, SMS capability, MP3 player, Web browser and Secure Digital/MMC memory-card expansion slot. Measuring 4.41 inches x 2.26 inches x 0.87 (LxWxD) and weighing about 6 ounces, analysts say that the Treo 600 is what clinched Palm's takeover of Handspring. The only problem that they forsee is a seriously crowded market for PDA/mobile phone combinations. Availability for the Treo 600 is this fall. Images at eWeek, SFGate or Reuters. Streaming movies from Handspring (QuickTime dial-up 56k| QuickTime dsl/cable 300k)." Reader Michael Ducker points out this longer article at TreoCentral as well.

securitas writes "Handspring unveiled its final product before being acquired by Palm: the Treo 600. It runs Palm OS 5.2 on a Texas Instruments ARM processor with 32MB of RAM, has a 160 x 160 color display, comes in GSM and CDMA versions, includes a digital camera plus various camera applications and supports Good Technology's Goodlink e-mail software, competition to RIM's BlackBerry. Of course it also comes with a keyboard, SMS capability, MP3 player, Web browser and Secure Digital/MMC memory-card expansion slot. Measuring 4.41 inches x 2.26 inches x 0.87 (LxWxD) and weighing about 6 ounces, analysts say that the Treo 600 is what clinched Palm's takeover of Handspring. The only problem that they forsee is a seriously crowded market for PDA/mobile phone combinations. Availability for the Treo 600 is this fall. Images at eWeek, SFGate or Reuters. Streaming movies from Handspring (QuickTime dial-up 56k| QuickTime dsl/cable 300k)." Reader Michael Ducker points out this longer article at TreoCentral as well.

Jason Weill writes "MSNBC has a slightly premature review of Palm's brand-new Tungsten models. These models, currently (as of 11:10 PM EST Sunday) unavailable on Palm's own web site, are the Tungsten T and Tungsten W. The Tungsten T includes a fold-out Graffiti area, new cross-key keypad, 144 MHz ARM processor, Palm OS 5, a 320x320 full-color screen, and 16 MB of on-board RAM. At $499, it's more expensive than most handhelds currently on the market. The Tungsten W replaces the Graffiti area with a thumb keyboard and includes GSM/GPRS phone capabilities. Unlike the Handspring Treo devices, the Tungsten W only works with a handset -- you can't put it up to your ear. The Tungsten W will cost $549, although most American service providers will subsidize at least part of the cost. These models will officially be unveiled Monday, October 28."

cr0sh asks: "I have a question that I am hoping someone can answer - today I was looking into cheap handhelds - I first looked at Palm, then at Handspring, then at something called LinuxDA, which seems to be a company offering not only an embedded Linux for handhelds, but also a device with it pre-loaded as one of their products. Looking at each of these companies offerings, I began to notice how they all seemed to be identical, hardware-wise (case, processor, button-layout, memory size, etc), so my question is - is there some company in Asia making the hardware, which each of these companies now source from, with the difference being the software on the platform? Handspring was kinda "spun-off" (not in the traditional sense) of Palm, but what is LinuxDA? The hardware they have looks the same, and their software can run on Palm devices. They surely didn't design and built their own hardware, and besides, each of these companies having such similar designs would cause them to lob trademark infringement lawsuits around - but they aren't - that only leaves the option of one of them acting as the source for the hardware, or an outside supplier. Basically, I want to know where I could get the bare hardware..."

inblosam asks: "I am about to make 'the switch', but the thought came to me that there may be a strategic time of year to purchase technology goods. Of course once you buy something it is nearly outdated already, but there must be some marketing cycle for lowering prices and releasing new toys. Anyone seen any patterns that may help? I do have one hypothesis: Companies push their products that have been on the market for 10-11 months during the holiday season (December), then afterwards drop the prices some and bump up the product with a new feature or size, etc. I believe this was the case for the iPod ($500 down to $300 ?), and even the Handspring Visor Edge was $300 when I bought it (November?) and then $169 three months later."

miradu2000 writes "Handspring has released even more handhelds to drool over. The Treo 270 is a wireless PDA, with a CSTN color screen! They also have decided to make a new organizer too, dropping their proprietary Springboard slot in favor of SD. The Treo 90 is a color PDA with SD and built in keyboard. Strange as it seems SD I/O will not work with the Treo 90. Full coverage is at TreoCentral.com."

An anonymous reader sent in: "According to The Register, AvantGo is shutting down unregistered (unpaid) "custom channels" with more than eight subscribers. Until now, AvantGo has been free (as in beer). What alternatives are there for Web sites that wish to distribute free information to PalmOS devices? Blazer and Eudora Internet Suite require wireless connections; Plucker is open-source and almost does the trick but doesn't automatically synchronize and the installation is way too complicated for the average user. Is there an alternative to paying AvantGo thousands of dollars? All I want to do is give away information, not charge for it."

miradu2000 writes: "Handspring's Treo, the revolutionary new communicator is now shipping. This has been anticipated since October. See the scoop here! This could change the world..." My guess is no, it won't change the world. But it could reduce by one the number of gadgets a lot of people carry around.

axlrosen writes: "Walter Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal reviews the new Handspring Treo, and loves it. 'For the past week, I have been carrying around a new hand-held, wireless device that is simultaneously the best personal digital assistant I have ever used and the most capable cellphone.'"

-homb- writes: "Finally, Handspring has done it before everyone else: The Treo, a combination cellphone, wireless POP3 email, and PalmOS PDA. Plus, the first version comes with or without a keyboard. I love my Blackberry, and it looks like the keyboard is the way to go for email. And the next version coming later on next year will have color." We mentioned these earlier.

ByteHog writes: "Handspring now has 2 more Visors for us to play with. The Visor Neo, which comes in 3 different colors and the Visor Pro" The battery thing especially is a big deal.

ByteHog writes: "Handspring now has 2 more Visors for us to play with. The Visor Neo, which comes in 3 different colors and the Visor Pro" The battery thing especially is a big deal.

ByteHog writes: "Handspring now has 2 more Visors for us to play with. The Visor Neo, which comes in 3 different colors and the Visor Pro" The battery thing especially is a big deal.

Imran writes: "Palm and Handspring have both received regulatory approval for three new wireless devices. According to documents filed with the FCC, the Palm i705 will have a built-in antenna, a universal connector for add-ons and syncing, and a postage stamp-size Secure Digital expansion slot. There will also be new features aimed at making e-mail a key function of the device. Handspring's devices, the Treo k180 (which has a keyboard similar to that of the BlackBerry) and Treo g180, can surf the Internet using Handspring's Blazer browser. They feature a 33MHz Dragonball VZ processor, 16MB of DRAM and rechargeable batteries. Both can connect to a PC using a USB or serial cable. The cover of each device flips up and acts as the earpiece for the phone, while a microphone is located at the bottom of each unit."

Bono writes "Handspring had their site down until 11:30am today so they could announce their new handheld...the Visor Edge. Looks pretty sweet at .44" thick...although the Springboard expansion requires a little add-on that comes with it." When I first read the name all I could think was a thin Visor...with pizza toppings. In any case, the device looks pretty darn cool. The Springboard expansion reminds somewhat of the iPaq does, but hey, more devices, better.

Bono writes "Handspring had their site down until 11:30am today so they could announce their new handheld...the Visor Edge. Looks pretty sweet at .44" thick...although the Springboard expansion requires a little add-on that comes with it." When I first read the name all I could think was a thin Visor...with pizza toppings. In any case, the device looks pretty darn cool. The Springboard expansion reminds somewhat of the iPaq does, but hey, more devices, better.

Tihstae writes "Since this hasn't been mentioned yet, I figured I would bring it to everyone's attention. Of course I did ordered mine before the slashdot effect. You can get yours visorphone here " This looks a lot nicer then the clunky Qualcomm/Palm III version that was available for awhile, but I still think its a bit large. I'm still waiting for the handhelp PDA/Phone with a nice built in game system, and enough memory for a few days of MP3s tho. Oh, and 802.11 networking, and the ability to remotely display X11 apps. And it should cook rice perfectly every time.

JWhitlock asks: "My wife recently purchased a Handspring Visor. There is a program that turns your Palm-based handheld into a learning remote control, which seems like a cool (and possibly useful) application, since I have at least four remotes, and digital cable's navigation system is nearly worthless. One problem - she won't let me install it. She's under the illusion that her toy is just for productivity, or that I'll steal it if I play with it too much. In any case, I do have a laptop with an Infrared port to play with, but there appears to be no software out there that uses it. Is this because it's not technically feasible, or has no one else thought of it?"

SL33Z3 asks: "I've been toying with the idea of creating a Handspring Visor Springboard module. However, since I have no real formal training (and don't plan on it anytime soon), no hardware knowledge and am very new to C/C++ programming, I have no idea what to even search for when looking for documentation and technical publications for beginners. Where can I find the information I need with at least some very simple examples of how to handle simple I/O operations on a proprietary piece of hardware? I've pored over the technical documentation on Handspring's site and viewed the hardware specs and even got excited to find all the parts and accessories I needed were easily accessible and reasonably inexpensive. If I can get some help, I'll be glad to start developing and posting my experiences on a site for future beginners to view as well."

ResQuad writes: "Handspring realeased a new palm top in their Visor collection, the Prism. It is $450 and have 65k colors, compared to the 3c's 256 colors. It also has an internal Li-Ion battery. Handspring also came out with another new palm, the Platinum. It is still gray-scale, but it is suposed to be 50% faster that the Visor Deluxe. This makes four palms out from Handspring." These are the same models discussed a few weeks ago, but now Handspring claims that they're shipping. Personally, I'm still pretty happy with my Deluxe, but the Platinum one looks very nice.

ResQuad writes: "Handspring realeased a new palm top in their Visor collection, the Prism. It is $450 and have 65k colors, compared to the 3c's 256 colors. It also has an internal Li-Ion battery. Handspring also came out with another new palm, the Platinum. It is still gray-scale, but it is suposed to be 50% faster that the Visor Deluxe. This makes four palms out from Handspring." These are the same models discussed a few weeks ago, but now Handspring claims that they're shipping. Personally, I'm still pretty happy with my Deluxe, but the Platinum one looks very nice.

ResQuad writes: "Handspring realeased a new palm top in their Visor collection, the Prism. It is $450 and have 65k colors, compared to the 3c's 256 colors. It also has an internal Li-Ion battery. Handspring also came out with another new palm, the Platinum. It is still gray-scale, but it is suposed to be 50% faster that the Visor Deluxe. This makes four palms out from Handspring." These are the same models discussed a few weeks ago, but now Handspring claims that they're shipping. Personally, I'm still pretty happy with my Deluxe, but the Platinum one looks very nice.

What will They think of next? Easier to start with what They've thought of previously. For instance: How is Steven King's online book experiment going? And speaking of Them, where lies the trend in The War Between The Pitiful RIAA and the Splendid Universities? And when will They realize that I don't want to talk into my address book, even if that's a PDA? Those people have a lot to answer for.

Allegedly U.S. $299, allegedly end-of-year, allege, allege. Good news for those of us equipped with the quaint alternative to Palm Computing's organizers, even if less than impressed by most combination PDA / phone attempts -- InaneBoy writes: "Handspring's got a bunch of pictures and details of their new 'Visor Phone' Check it out! Super-keen!"

Of course, hemos is right -- there's a reason that most phones aren't as wide as your average PDA. This one looks like a reasonable -- if expensive -- way to combine the two items, especially if it will work with the combination mic / speaker earbud things. (But shouldn't the people making Springboard modules be a little busier with my GPS reciever?)

Plus, many colleges have declined to ban copying machines, tape recorders and ethernet. carlocius writes: "It appears that my college, Michigan State University, just handed Metallica and Dr. Dre another loss in their attempt to get Napster blocked on large Universities. MSU's administators stated that the Acceptable Use Policy of the university already covers copyright issues and there is no reason for Napster to be banned before a trial. GO STATE!!!"

Likewise, jellings writes: "The University of Pennsylvania joined the ranks of leading universities who are refusing to shut down access to the Napster on their campus, according to an article from the university press. U Pres. Judith Rodin said that "banning the Internet service would go against the University's educational mission by denying students freedom of inquiry and expression" and pointed to the Digital Millenium Act for further justification, saying that limiting access is not her responsibility ("Internet service providers cannot be held accountable for illegal activity on their networks if they are unaware of the activity"). Although the awareness of the activity of the issue may be questionable, it is certainly good to see a big U not yielding to the demands of Dr. Dre & Metallica ..."

The list of schools refusing to buckle under keeps growing; campus admins and sysadmins seem justifiably adamant about letting their policies be dictated by corporate vulture groups. Bandwidth reasons may be another story entirely, though.

Of course, not everyone has the awesome power of ResNet behind them ... ca1v1n writes: "The awesome power of the record labels has come through again. The Offspring have cancelled their plans to distribute their next album for free, after legal action and the threat of a lawsuit from Sony music. Yahoo! news has the scoop. So much for protecting the artists' interests."

An enquiry into establishing a curve of electronic book sales ... Triumphant former astronomy student jamie points out this CNN story on the continuing book experiment by Stephen King, who is still selling his novel online. Here's a telling snippet:

...since the first installment's release July 24, the percentage of readers paying for their downloads has dropped from 76 percent to less than 70 percent for the second installment. Part three goes up on Monday.

jamie points out that 70 "but he's giving us part 3 anyway. The more telling figures: 172,004 people had paid for part one and 74,373 people had paid for part two."

maomoondog pipes in: "Apparently, King's company is upset that too few of the downloads are being paid for. Stephen King comments on the progress here. Personally, I'm impressed that 70% of the downloads are being paid for. With as low a per-item cost as a text download is, the author should really clean up in this sort of arrangement."

If you're one of the 172,004, liked the story, but are not part of the 74,373, please consider joining the second group on jamie's behalf, because as he says: "It's actually not a bad story and I want to see how it ends :)"

Several readers wrote in about the new Palm VIIx. It looks really nice and all, but I've got to say that the Handspring looks good too. If anyone's had a chance to use a prerelease of the new VIIx, please post your experiences below.

Welcome to another episode of Slashback, laden with bits about the psychology of the Apple Cube, damage-control parity among handhelds, mourning the passing of a Linux-friendly ISP, technicalities of credit, and aliens. Can you ever read enough about aliens, anyhow? Enjoy.

Its maddening combination of color and shape drive one completely in -- No, wrong cube. Savage Henry Matisse writes: "There's a really super article analyzing the psychology behind Jobs' most recent flight of fancy, posted here. The thrust of it is that, rather than being a replay of the NeXT FUBAR or another instance of being too-far-ahead-of-his-time, the CUBE is really a very sly piece of manuevering meant to shoehorn Macs into the corporate compu-hierarchy from the top down. Very insightful-- an analysis kinda along the same lines as Neal Stephenson's In the Beginning was the Command Line" And for those who prefer the practical to the theoretical, RevAaron writes: "Many of us have been wondering about some of the details of Apple's newly released Power Macintosh G4 Cube, including whether or not it has an AGP slot or just a chip soldered onto the board. Listen to the story from the lead designer of the cube here at MacSlash."

Well technically, they'd still block excess light from your eyes ... FroBugg writes "Handspring has just released an OS upgrade for all their Visor handhelds, which is supposed to fix the DRAM problem that caused crashes and data corruption. Go get it here." This is the same RAM Problem Palm devices have as reported a few weeks ago, at which point no fix was out for Visors.

The end of a (very brief era): dubious_1 writes "The free internet service provider http://www.freewwweb.com has ceased operation. The service provided by freewwweb used ppp and pap authentication for its dialup making it available to users of any operating system. Users of freewwweb agreed to set their web browsers home page to a page used by freewwweb, to allow them to support the service through ad revenue. According to the web page you are redirected to when accessing the previous freewwweb.com site, the service lost by the demise of freewwweb is now being filled by Juno however, this service is only available for users of MS Windows 9x and nt. Unlike freewwweb, Juno uses a proprietary front end to authenticate users on their service. The web site specifically says that this client program is not available for either Linux or MacOS."

One recurrent Ask Slashdot question is about this very issue -- Where are free ISPs for Linux users? I wonder if there are any good answers now that freewwweb has snuffed it. Surely if billions of dollars are there to be made with free-for-the-viewing television programming, there's no reason that ad-supported ISPs should be uncommon. Can you say "target market"?

Credit where credit is due. We mentioned a fraudulent site established to mimic the look of online personal credit-card site PayPal. Jawed Karim writes, "You incorrectly mention that your credit card can get stolen by becoming a victim to the fake PayPal site. This is not true. The credit card is not exposed when you log into your PayPal account. Just wanted to make this clear. (The same correction has been made to the MSNBC article, at the bottom of it)"

Well, isn't the danger that customers lulled into thinking they were on the right site would be also lulled into giving their information away? Someone sure wants to steal credit card information with this site, but yes, it's more of a social engineering trick than an automated number grabber.

Yes sir, we know that the damn cat is still in the box. Swede2048 writes: "Lots of people think that SETI is a hopeless adventure, and mostly a waste of time and processing cycles. [including many who read yesterday about the "SETI-on-a-board product" ;) -- t] For those who haven't read it yet, last month's Scientific American had a great article describing the results SETI has already provided. By NOT finding e.t.life in the searched sky, SETI has placed some restrictions on what kinds of e.t life can exist."

Welcome to another episode of Slashback, laden with bits about the psychology of the Apple Cube, damage-control parity among handhelds, mourning the passing of a Linux-friendly ISP, technicalities of credit, and aliens. Can you ever read enough about aliens, anyhow? Enjoy.

Its maddening combination of color and shape drive one completely in -- No, wrong cube. Savage Henry Matisse writes: "There's a really super article analyzing the psychology behind Jobs' most recent flight of fancy, posted here. The thrust of it is that, rather than being a replay of the NeXT FUBAR or another instance of being too-far-ahead-of-his-time, the CUBE is really a very sly piece of manuevering meant to shoehorn Macs into the corporate compu-hierarchy from the top down. Very insightful-- an analysis kinda along the same lines as Neal Stephenson's In the Beginning was the Command Line" And for those who prefer the practical to the theoretical, RevAaron writes: "Many of us have been wondering about some of the details of Apple's newly released Power Macintosh G4 Cube, including whether or not it has an AGP slot or just a chip soldered onto the board. Listen to the story from the lead designer of the cube here at MacSlash."

Well technically, they'd still block excess light from your eyes ... FroBugg writes "Handspring has just released an OS upgrade for all their Visor handhelds, which is supposed to fix the DRAM problem that caused crashes and data corruption. Go get it here." This is the same RAM Problem Palm devices have as reported a few weeks ago, at which point no fix was out for Visors.

The end of a (very brief era): dubious_1 writes "The free internet service provider http://www.freewwweb.com has ceased operation. The service provided by freewwweb used ppp and pap authentication for its dialup making it available to users of any operating system. Users of freewwweb agreed to set their web browsers home page to a page used by freewwweb, to allow them to support the service through ad revenue. According to the web page you are redirected to when accessing the previous freewwweb.com site, the service lost by the demise of freewwweb is now being filled by Juno however, this service is only available for users of MS Windows 9x and nt. Unlike freewwweb, Juno uses a proprietary front end to authenticate users on their service. The web site specifically says that this client program is not available for either Linux or MacOS."

One recurrent Ask Slashdot question is about this very issue -- Where are free ISPs for Linux users? I wonder if there are any good answers now that freewwweb has snuffed it. Surely if billions of dollars are there to be made with free-for-the-viewing television programming, there's no reason that ad-supported ISPs should be uncommon. Can you say "target market"?

Credit where credit is due. We mentioned a fraudulent site established to mimic the look of online personal credit-card site PayPal. Jawed Karim writes, "You incorrectly mention that your credit card can get stolen by becoming a victim to the fake PayPal site. This is not true. The credit card is not exposed when you log into your PayPal account. Just wanted to make this clear. (The same correction has been made to the MSNBC article, at the bottom of it)"

Well, isn't the danger that customers lulled into thinking they were on the right site would be also lulled into giving their information away? Someone sure wants to steal credit card information with this site, but yes, it's more of a social engineering trick than an automated number grabber.

Yes sir, we know that the damn cat is still in the box. Swede2048 writes: "Lots of people think that SETI is a hopeless adventure, and mostly a waste of time and processing cycles. [including many who read yesterday about the "SETI-on-a-board product" ;) -- t] For those who haven't read it yet, last month's Scientific American had a great article describing the results SETI has already provided. By NOT finding e.t.life in the searched sky, SETI has placed some restrictions on what kinds of e.t life can exist."

Stonent writes: "Palm computing has just announced that a number of 8MB units produced between October 1999 and May 2000 may have some faulty memory. They are currently working on a patch for the IIIXe and have one for the Vx and IIIC. You can read about it on the Palm Computing site. I'm just wondering why they are supplying a software patch for a hardware issue. Intel tried this with the FDIV bug and look where it got them."

And those of us who went with The Other Company aren't off the hook either. An Anonymous Coward writes: "There's no mention of it on their main webpage, but apparently some Handspring Visors shipped with faulty DRAM. See if you're one of the unlucky ones, like me, by running the test program included here. I found out mine was faulty and called 'Customer Care' -- after a brief runaround I learned that the unit wouldn't be replaced, instead a patch would be out in *mid July*. Gee, thanks Handspring. Blinded by the allure of Springboard modules, I took DRAM over FlashRAM in the Palm IIIxe. With bad DRAM and substantive Springboards (wireless ethernet, bluetooth, 6-pack) looking more and more like vaporware, I'm regretting my decision."

Stonent writes: "Palm computing has just announced that a number of 8MB units produced between October 1999 and May 2000 may have some faulty memory. They are currently working on a patch for the IIIXe and have one for the Vx and IIIC. You can read about it on the Palm Computing site. I'm just wondering why they are supplying a software patch for a hardware issue. Intel tried this with the FDIV bug and look where it got them."

And those of us who went with The Other Company aren't off the hook either. An Anonymous Coward writes: "There's no mention of it on their main webpage, but apparently some Handspring Visors shipped with faulty DRAM. See if you're one of the unlucky ones, like me, by running the test program included here. I found out mine was faulty and called 'Customer Care' -- after a brief runaround I learned that the unit wouldn't be replaced, instead a patch would be out in *mid July*. Gee, thanks Handspring. Blinded by the allure of Springboard modules, I took DRAM over FlashRAM in the Palm IIIxe. With bad DRAM and substantive Springboards (wireless ethernet, bluetooth, 6-pack) looking more and more like vaporware, I'm regretting my decision."

kevin922 writes: "Check it out! IDEO, a small close-knit development firm (they are responsible for products such as the Visor, Transmeta Webslate, and a variety of other cool things) has developed Cisco's new IP Phone. This device (which looks like a normal phone) plugs directly into a 10-baseT connection and has a phone # associated with it. When you plug the phone in somewhere else it takes the # with it. I'm planning on getting some eval units to try out. Should the PBX guys start reading up on TCP/IP? :)" Doesn't look like these things are available just now, but the concept is long, long overdue. Bypass the phone company -- in fact, just ignore the phone company.

William Tanksley writes: "Handspring, the PalmOS licensee started by the inventors of the original Palm, is going public. " Not much information yet -- just stating they've filed with the SEC.

William Tanksley writes: "Handspring, the PalmOS licensee started by the inventors of the original Palm, is going public. " Not much information yet -- just stating they've filed with the SEC.

yugami asks: "I was wondering if anyone in the Slashdot ranks has any experience with getting a HandSpring Visor PDA to work with Linux. The only reall difference between one of these and a Palm is the use of USB instead of serial to link up with the computer. "

Stickster asks: "What is the deal with Linux's ability to exchange information with the new Handspring Visor (Deluxe)? I realize that there is the USB/serial cradle hardware question which will affect people depending on their boxen, but right now Handspring says only WinPC/Mac can do things like HotSync. Isn't the PalmPilot connectivity solution set for Linux pretty well-developed at this point? And how does that bode for the Visor?"

Gryff writes "Victorinox, makers of the fine Swiss Army line of knives, has just announced a Cybertool version. It has 13 different screwdrivers and a total of 34 functions including, according to the pictures on that page, tightening peripheral cables, pulling chips and setting dip switches. And - hey! - it's see-through to match your iMac and Visor. "

arban writes "According to this article on CNET, Philips is discontinuing the Nino, their WinCE base machine. " Phillips is citing lack of sales and consumer response to WinCE machine. On the other side of the coin, Handspring has begun taking orders from their new Palm-OS handheld. Nice and cheap.

Thanks to Ian Hopper> for the current story on CNN about the Visor. Pictures-and in a very cool turn of events-two very cool peripheral ports in the back of the machine. It runs about 20% faster then the Palm III or V, 8 MB of RAM in the high-end version of the machine. Oh-and about 2/3 the cost of a Palm V. Check out the Palminfocenter for more details, as well.Update: 09/14 03:33 by H :The corp. website appears to be up and running as well.

crashwilliams writes "Donna Dubinsky and Jeff Hawkins, people behind the PalmPilot have a new company, Handspring. See their press release. Their first product will be out end of next year. To bad I would have love to it out before Christmas!!"

crashwilliams writes "Donna Dubinsky and Jeff Hawkins, people behind the PalmPilot have a new company, Handspring. See their press release. Their first product will be out end of next year. To bad I would have love to it out before Christmas!!"