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I bought smartphones before Android was around.

They ran Symbian.

Actually, they ran PalmOS.

"Smartphone" is to computer/handset hybrids what what "Xerox" is to photocopiers -- at one time, it was the model of the phone, not a ubiquitous term.

I had one of these for about two years. Browsing the web (however slowly) on a phone in early 2001 was pretty sweet.

Your other option instead of waiting for a Mi-Fi, or if you want the portability of a USB cellular modem, is the Kyocera KR-2 Mobile Router. I use this with Verizon and it has the added benefit of being network-neutral, and also allowing for using another (faster) network and reverting to the cellular connection as a backup. The downside? Not as portable.

I would suggest either the Kyocera KR2 or the Cradlepoint Cellular routers.

I concur. I have Sprint EVD0 RevA and it works well. I got the all you can eat plan because their breakdown is something like 40Mb per *month* or unlimited. I go over 40Mb everytime I get on line.

Anyhow, one interesting thing that I've seen is a wired/wireless LAN router that has a card slot for EVD0 PCMCIA broadband cards. It apparently works pretty well, but it's pricey ($~260).

http://www.kyocera-wireless.com/kr1-router/

Mark

You mean like the Kyocera Slider Remix? Add on stereo headphones that let you talk to callers as well (and automatically mute your music when you answer a call), plus 512mb of storage for all that music and pictures (1.3megapixel is kinda fun on a phone).

You mean like the Kyocera Slider Remix? Add on stereo headphones that let you talk to callers as well (and automatically mute your music when you answer a call), plus 512mb of storage for all that music and pictures (1.3megapixel is kinda fun on a phone).

Hot lip fungus!

For more than a year, I was in complete heaven. I did not pay for a data plan, and got info for logging into a 3G data connection from PDA Phone Home. A net connection was billed as regular voice minutes. Couple that with unlimited nights and weekends, and I could use the Internet at will.

I could hook the phone up to my laptop using the USB cable and connect at 28.8-36.6 anywhere with cell service and surf at will after 9pm.

Now several users are upgrading from 2-year-old Kyoceras to the Treo 650 and are getting burned, even with the slower/older QNC service.

I suppose I should have felt lucky that I got cheap cellular internet access for so long, but it's hard to start paying for something when you got a free ride before.

http://www.kyocera-wireless.com/7135-smartphone/

There may be others out there, but I'm quite happy with this one.

My year and a half old Kyocera 7135 has a built in MP3 player just like the Ericsson with a Palm Pilot built in to boot. It's a great feature for a phone and I was always surprised no other phones were offering it.

myke

If I ever have to get one and can't get a phone without all that crap in it, I'll probably just give up

I finally bit the bullet and got a cell a couple years ago, I was able to get (at no additional cost) a basic, no-frills phone thrown in with my plan.

• One of them is http://www.kyocera-wireless.com/slider-phone/.
• Here's another one: http://www1.sprintpcs.com/explore/PhonesAccessorie s/PhoneDetails.jsp?navLocator=%7Cshop%7CphonesAcce ssories%7CallPhones%7C&selectSkuId=samsungvi660&FO LDER%3C%3Efolder_id=1476015&CURRENT_USER%3C%3EATR_ SCID=ECOMM&CURRENT_USER%3C%3EATR_PCode=None&CURREN T_USER%3C%3EATR_cartState=group&bmUID=110564626533 9

if you look carefully, kyocera was NOT REPLACING PHONES, they were replacing batteries. same goes for their current replacement program
http://www.kyocera-wireless.com/battery.htm

The combination of clamshell form-factor and PDA capability is the `hardest' requirement for you. If all you want is Outlook sync, you no longer need avoid Palm-based phones, and that's good, because there are very few PocketPC/SmartPhone/Windows Mobile/etc phones that use a clamshell form-factor.

You might be interested in the Kyocera 7135 Palm clamshell.

You might also be interested in the Samsung SPH-i500 clamshell Palm phone, or it's Windows Mobile cousins, the Samsung SP-i600 and the Samsung SCH-i600.

You may have to switch carriers to get the phone that you want, which is a shame, but that's also the way our markets work.

i used to have a Kyocera SmartPhone(cell phone + palm)

The idea of not having to swap at all. Having entire car ride at night (passenger of course) with back light display. Was great. The docking station/cradle also recharged the phone.

And idea

I assume this is a clothes washing/drying reference.

If so, my Kyocera 5135 passes that test.

It went through the washer and dryer two weeks after I first got it. I was certain it was ruined, but pulled the battery out and let it air dry overnight. Next morning I plugged it in to charge and it worked. Still works fine a year later.

I just bought a Kyocera 7135 because it has recently been made to work with Linux. Though there are still some rough edges with gnome-pilot syncing (with Evolution), I easily got it working with J-Pilot. I like the 7135 because it's a more 'phone like' phone - rather than a PDA with a microphone and antennae :P

The good thing with the Treo is that it's CPU should allow for Vorbis decoding, whereas the 7135 relies on it's built in DSP for the cycles, which only supports MP3.

This may be what you're looking for. Has everything except bluetooth, and is still cheap with a black and white screen. Tetris is official (has tetris logo) and even plays the famous theme.

I was all ready and willing to buy the Kyocera 7135, a Palm-based phone that retails with service for $499, until I found that only two really expensive services supported it in my area. By itself it would have been almost $700, and that wasn't worth it, and most of the services that I was interested in couldn't use it anyway. If you think about the way that people use cell phones, as address books, entertainment devices, and information stores, this idea made sense back to the old Qualcomm pdQ Smartphone (built by Kyocera even) and if more readily available would make sense. Something like that might even help the manufacturers, since they could charge a premium for a high quality phone that would be usable for many, many years, instead of these crappy ones that break easily and are more of a commodity trend than anything else.

I use a Kyocera 2035 without any problems. I'm profoundly deaf (HA model escapes me at the moment).

The phone itself is a "brick" according to my friends that have new ones smaller then my thumb, but I'm hesitant to upgrade because it simply WORKS. I've used friends' fancy new Nokias and they just don't do the job. Crappy telecoils or something? I don't know, but my 3.5 yr old Kyocera keeps working for me...

--Dave

This goes for PDAs with phones, or phones with PDAs built into them. Either you get:

• A "big" phone, capable of holding a useful PDA screen and keyboard, which can no longer be comforatably worn on a belt or in a pocket, or..
• A "tiny" PDA, with an equally "tiny" keyboard to tap on to type in messages, with a screen you have to squint at to read.

The 7135 fits comfortably on my belt. While the screen is slightly smaller than "normal" PalmOS devices, it's still quite readable (even in sunlight) and actually sharper because the pixels are denser (still 160x160, but more pixels per square inch).

Now if you were carrying both a seperate cellphone and a PDA, their sum would be much larger than the 7135.

This goes for PDAs with phones, or phones with PDAs built into them. Either you get:

• A "big" phone, capable of holding a useful PDA screen and keyboard, which can no longer be comforatably worn on a belt or in a pocket, or..
• A "tiny" PDA, with an equally "tiny" keyboard to tap on to type in messages, with a screen you have to squint at to read.

The 7135 fits comfortably on my belt. While the screen is slightly smaller than "normal" PalmOS devices, it's still quite readable (even in sunlight) and actually sharper because the pixels are denser (still 160x160, but more pixels per square inch).

Now if you were carrying both a seperate cellphone and a PDA, their sum would be much larger than the 7135.

Grab yourself a copy of the 7135 SDK here and look through the docs. I would be surprised if what you are asking for is not possible.

The last PDA I bought was a ,a href="http://shop.store.yahoo.com/letterfolders-of fice-equipment/palwitac.html">PalmVIIx in early 2001. I used it for maybe 6 months before it became too much of a hassle for me to deal with. It's been sitting in my closet collecting dust ever since August 2001.

While PDA's are handy, I'm not big on carrying around a whole bunch of gadgets. And besides, being a very mobile person who is often on foot (downtown SF), having to lug around a PDA on a sunny day can be a bit of a problem. And the Zaurus in the article looks gigantic! I already have a titanium powerbook, so some hybrid PDA/Palmtop has -5 appeal to me.

For those like me that are always looking for the smallest, most functional and utilitarian gadget to lighten the load with, check out the Kyocera 7100 series smartphone it's a Palm OS PDA with a color display, takes compact flash and is freakin tiny! Ohhh and yeah, it's a phone too.

Kyocera phones have had flashlights for quite some time now. They seem to be quite popular in india.

What about palm for smartphones? As a longtime user of the Kyocera 6035 who recently upgraded to a Treo 600 I've fallen in love with the palm-based smart phones. I've looked at some windows ones and they just have *too* much functionality so that it all gets confused and horribly complicated. I haven't looked much at Symbian based ones but they didn't seem to have as many features and certainly not the broad application base either Palm or Windows have. As far as Linux are there any smartphones out there based on it?

I've been carrying a Kyocera 7135 PalmOS SmartPhone for the last three weeks, as seen on TV. I like it -- it feels like a phone that does useful things, rather than like a PDA that can also make phonecalls. I get real wireless Web browsing on it, that's a given. The MP3 player gets a little choppy sometimes; I haven't figure out why yet -- but mostly it plays pretty well. The MMC/SD slot enables me to hook in all sorts of cool gizmos: VGA adapters, printers, keyboards, cameras, etc. Cost a little under $500. It's by far the most useful toy I've ever had.

I've been carrying a Kyocera 7135 PalmOS SmartPhone for the last three weeks, as seen on TV. I like it -- it feels like a phone that does useful things, rather than like a PDA that can also make phonecalls. I get real wireless Web browsing on it, that's a given. The MP3 player gets a little choppy sometimes; I haven't figure out why yet -- but mostly it plays pretty well. The MMC/SD slot enables me to hook in all sorts of cool gizmos: VGA adapters, printers, keyboards, cameras, etc. Cost a little under $500. It's by far the most useful toy I've ever had.

I've been carrying a Kyocera 7135 PalmOS SmartPhone for the last three weeks, as seen on TV. I like it -- it feels like a phone that does useful things, rather than like a PDA that can also make phonecalls. I get real wireless Web browsing on it, that's a given. The MP3 player gets a little choppy sometimes; I haven't figure out why yet -- but mostly it plays pretty well. The MMC/SD slot enables me to hook in all sorts of cool gizmos: VGA adapters, printers, keyboards, cameras, etc. Cost a little under $500. It's by far the most useful toy I've ever had.

I currently have a 'brick' phone -- an older (though not ancient) block-shaped phone. I've been thinking of ditching it and buying something smaller, perhaps a clamshell phone with a color screen. Kyocera's 7135 seemed extremely appealing; it's got PalmOS and an MP3 player.

As weird of a question as this may sound... Where would you put the Treo 600 when you're not using it? As I typically don't wear a suitcoat with an inside pocket, I usually find myself shoving the phone into a pants pocket, but this can be uncomfortable, and I sometimes fear what people might think of the enormous bulge in my pocket. Wearing the type of phone I have on your belt isn't really an option either, as it looks incredibly tacky. A nice clamshell flip-phone would fit nicely into my pocket, or I could wear it on a belt easily. But where on Earth do people carry their Treo 600s?

The Kyocera 7135 gives you a Cell phone + PalmPilot + Mp3 + Color for games

perhaps you could put MAME on it to get all of the classic games.

Then the only thing you are missing is the mega capacity of the iPod.

You might take alook at the Kyocera 7135. It is a phone first, with PDA functionality. MP3 player too. And, unlike the Samsung i500, it has a Secure Digital card slot and speakerphone. Another cool feature is the pager style display on the top of the phone. It runs on Palm OS 4.1 and so far works great for me. Here is a review from PC Magazine.

I used to have a Kyocero SmartPhone.

The Kyocera 7135 is a pretty cool smartphone, and you can download the SDK for it for free here. I doubt if this would be enough information to allow you to replace the underlying Palm OS with your own OS, but you could probably write whatever sorts of programs you like to run on top of it. Have a look and see if it's what you're after.

I've been with Verizon Wireless for some time now, and I must say that they are hands-down the best wireless provider out there.

First of all, I live in a decent-sized city, but I often end up travelling out through the country to get various places around here. Even out in the middle of nowhere, I'm able to at least get a good-quality analog signal on my phone (I currently have the Kyocera 7135 smartphone, which is awesome).

As far as price goes, Verizon may be a bit higher than others, but you definitely get what you pay for. My current plan gives me 500 anytime minutes, unlimited nights and weekends, plus 1000 mobile-to-mobile minutes to talk to Verizon customers - all for $50/month (~$60 with taxes). Plus, all of the minutes are nationwide. I make full use of text messaging, and mobile web, and both of these services are nearly flawless.

Verizon's customer service is also top-notch. I've had to call a couple of times with a billing problem and both times, I've gotten more of a discount than I've asked for. One time, they even told me that I could switch to another plan which would give me more minutes for less money. Now that's something that definitely wasn't in their interest.

I don't mean to sound like Verizon's shill, but I really do recommend their service to anyone looking for a cell phone provider.

I have been using the same set up for years also. If you don't like the bulk and blk/wht display you could just go for the new smartphone.

Palm VNC client and TopGun SSH are a bit of a strain on the phone's CPU, but still usable -- even over a dialup connection. It comes in handy if I need to access my servers when I'm away from my desk.

Kyocera's been making the SmartPhone series like this for some time. The QCP-6035 is superior to the m125 in features - It only lacks the SD Memory slot. The QCP-7135 has PalmOS 4.1, a color screen, smaller profile, the SD Memory slot, and a more ergonomic feel.

My fiancee has the QCP-6035 and it's really nice. EudoraWeb is decent, but I've since installed Blazer (from HandSpring) and it works great. The main downside is that the phones are PCS, meaning that you'll have to have service through Verizon or Sprint. The 7135 is available via ALLTEL, but you can transfer it over to a different CDMA network.

There's also a fairly large hacking and customization community over at SmartPhoneSource.com, that can give you all the tips and tricks to using your phone, as well as setting up your phone to switch providers, load OS updates (both phones use a custom version of the OS), and other cool stuff.

Kyocera's been making the SmartPhone series like this for some time. The QCP-6035 is superior to the m125 in features - It only lacks the SD Memory slot. The QCP-7135 has PalmOS 4.1, a color screen, smaller profile, the SD Memory slot, and a more ergonomic feel.

My fiancee has the QCP-6035 and it's really nice. EudoraWeb is decent, but I've since installed Blazer (from HandSpring) and it works great. The main downside is that the phones are PCS, meaning that you'll have to have service through Verizon or Sprint. The 7135 is available via ALLTEL, but you can transfer it over to a different CDMA network.

There's also a fairly large hacking and customization community over at SmartPhoneSource.com, that can give you all the tips and tricks to using your phone, as well as setting up your phone to switch providers, load OS updates (both phones use a custom version of the OS), and other cool stuff.

I just recieved my 7135 smartphone, and oh baby is it sweet. Only a little bigger than a Motorola StarTac too. 65k color screen, Palm OS 4.1. What's interesting is the phone itself is a palm application - if a call comes in while you're firing off an e-mail or playing Lemmings, it'll pause that app so you can take the call. Even upload MP3s as ringers ;)

Supports the standard Palm OS TCP/IP stack over 1xRTT. You can do whatever you want. SMS, MMS (Soon) WAP or open up the included browser and surf with full HTML/SSL/Javascript support. Renders most pages extremely well. There is a bevy of networking apps available for PalmOS as well - from VNC to MSN Messenger.

http://www.kyocera-wireless.com/7100_phone/7100_ph one_series.htm

Other ramblings:

- Pooploads of software available (obviously)

- Screen is crisp and clear, even in direct sunlight

- Very annoying delay when pressing buttons to dial a number - easily fixed by reconfiguring the touchtone sound to the standard palm "click" sound. (they should really fix this with the next software update)

- New 1GB SD cards are on the way; Throw a couple of Family Guy episodes on it! (Ahem or whatever "cultural" videos you want)

- This thing is solid. Very sturdy construction and a polished insignia on the outer case just below the external caller ID display on the hinge area

- The external speaker is very high quality. Ringers and MP3's sound very crisp, almost stereo-like. Surprises the hell out of people :)

- Coolest thing I've done so far: Reconfigured the company mail server via SSH over 1xRTT ;) I gotta buy the little keyboard I guess.



I love this thing! Can't you tell?

Mo

On the other hand, MP3 players, digital cameras, and video cameras do not belong with integrated phones or PDAs. These media device require a lot more storage space, which at the moment, means a hard drive. My MP3 player, a Creative Nomad Jukebox 3 has a 20GB hard drive, which is fantastic! I love carrying around all the music I own on it. My digital camera, which is at the low-end of the spectrum (1.3 MP), currently has a 128MB card, which is adequate for a trip of approx 2 weeks or so. I can imagine that if I purchased a camera with a better resolution, I'd want a lot more storage on the camera, perhaps somewhere in the range of 1GB. (BTW, can the cameras that take CF cards use the microdrives?) I currently don't own a video camera, but have been working with digital video at my job, and it's fantastic. If I were to get a video camera, why not get one that has a HD built in? With the addition of a firewire or network port, you could transfer the video over quite quickly. Unite the media devices around the fact that they need a lot of storage, which requires a larger form factor.

I'm actually not convinced that a MP3 player should be integrated with anything, as I can forsee situations where that'd be really inconvenient. However, I'd love to have a combo digicam / DV cam, and hope that more device like that are produced. Sadly, all of the video cameras I've seen that also take still photos don't do a good job of that, and all the digicams I've seen that take videos don't do a good job of that.

Todd

> In other words, try making a cell phone out of an organiser, not the other way around.

Well actually Kyocera has done a decent job of this. I just recieved my 7135 smartphone, and oh baby is it sweet. Only a little bigger than a Motorola StarTac too. 65k color screen, Palm OS 4.1. What's interesting is the phone itself is a palm application - if a call comes in while you're firing off an e-mail or playing Lemmings, it'll pause that app so you can take the call. Even upload MP3s as ringers ;)

Supports the standard Palm OS TCP/IP stack over 1xRTT. You can do whatever you want. SMS, MMS (Soon) WAP or open up the included browser and surf with full HTML/SSL/Javascript support. Renders most pages extremely well. There is a bevy of networking apps available for PalmOS as well - from VNC to MSN Messenger.

http://www.kyocera-wireless.com/7100_phone/7100_ph one_series.htm

Other ramblings:

- Pooploads of software available (obviously)

- Screen is crisp and clear, even in direct sunlight

- Very annoying delay when pressing buttons to dial a number - easily fixed by reconfiguring the touchtone sound to the standard palm "click" sound. (they should really fix this with the next software update)

- New 1GB SD cards are on the way; Throw a couple of Family Guy episodes on it! (Ahem or whatever "cultural" videos you want)

- This thing is solid. Very sturdy construction and a polished insignia on the outer case just below the external caller ID display on the hinge area

- The external speaker is very high quality. Ringers and MP3's sound very crisp, almost stereo-like. Surprises the hell out of people :)

- Coolest thing I've done with this thing so far: Reconfigured the company mail server via SSH over 1xRTT ;) I gotta buy the little keyboard I guess.

I love this thing! Can't you tell?

Mo

I'm very happy with the Kyocera,
the new smartphone from Verizon

IMHO it's worth time looking at individual apps
on wireless PDA sites like Handango.
The right apps that fit your needs can make
a huge difference in your satisfaction.

Cheers, Joel

So far, I've been most impressed with the Danger Hiptop. It's not color but has a real crisp greyscale display. It's Java based and a SDK should be available soon. True desktop syncing with your PIM should be here shortly too, but the export to the T-Mobile website isn't too bad. It's been available for as little as $50 with rebates recently. It has it's own mail and can check other POP accounts (and IMAP in a limited/unsupported fashion), you can browse regular websites, it does AIM and overall can be considered a consumer version of the Blackberry.

Another device to consider if you're a CDMA fan (Sprint & Verizon) is the Kyocera QCP-7135. I don't have an eval unit yet as Verizon hasn't certified it yet, but it looks to be one of the best Palm/phone combos.

It'll be nice to finally see a P800 after all this hype, but there are other good options now.

First off, there are basically three O/Ses to choose from:

1. Palm: This is the old faithful. Palm has a number of SmartPhones out there to choose from including the Tungsten W (their own model), Kyocera's 6135 (black and white model) and 7135 (color model), Handspring's line of Treos, and Samsung's i300. Palm is a great O/S for SmartPhones because of its low power consumption and easy integration with different form factors. The best of these in my opinion are the Kyocera SmartPhones for their depth of integration and focus on being a phone first and a PDA second. You can find Palm-based phones for both GSM (i.e. AT&T Wireless, Cingular, etc.) systems and CDMA (i.e. Verizon, Sprint, etc.) systems.
2. PocketPC: PocketPC phones are out there and there are a lot of providers to choose from. Aside from the clunky first-generation PocketPC phones like the AudioVox Thera, the newer ones use a version of PocketPC specifically designed for phone use. These models are powerful, fast, and look very cool. They generally only have one form factor - a normal PDA shape with an antenna attached. So don't go looking for a flip-phone model. PocketPC phones have a few downsides, however, as they tend to be battery drainers (don't expect to be away from a plug for days on end) and the O/S can crash (sometimes in the middle of a call). However, if you want PDA-first, phone-second functionality, this is a good choice. At the moment, PocketPC Phones only come in GSM models, the only CDMA model out there is the AudioVox Thera.

   You may also have heard of SmartPhone 2002 which is another effort to bring windows to cell phones. The only model currently out is the Orange SA phone and based on the early reviews, your choice here is simple - STAY AWAY UNTIL REVISION 2!

3. Symbian OS: Symbian O/S is the descendent of the EPOC O/S which ran PDAs in Europe like the Revo and exists today as a powerful PDA operating system specifically made for cellular phone integration. Nokia is the main owner of this O/S and has the most interesting offerings, but Sony Ericsson is where you will find the best phones in the USA. Their P800 will be a great choice when it comes out here and the t68i is already a hit for AT&T Wireless and Apple with its built-in BlueTooth technology. Symbian phones are only available for GSM networks at this time.

For the Northeastern USA, the best choice will probably be the Kyocera 7135 SmartPhone. You are right that it is not selling on the Verizon system yet, but you can buy it from the Kyocera store activated for Alltell and then have your local Verizon store activate it for you. (Yes, they will do that.) You will want to check out SmartPhoneSource for a good community of people who have done this and for directions on doing it.

Hope this is helpful.

I currently have the Kyocera 6035 and it works perfectly with Verizon: 2-way SMS, free POP3/SMTP access, web. I'm waiting for the Kyocera 7135 that will be offered on Verizon probably within a month. It's a very sweet phone/PDA.

I can strongly recommend against Sprint. Sprint has the largest all-digital network, but it's still smaller than Verizon's digital + analog network. The upshot is that if you're on analog on Verizon, there's no roaming charges since they own the analog towers; with Sprint, any time you are on analog, you are roaming by definition, and pay roaming charges accordingly. Note how Sprint never mentions this in their commercials. Anyway, Verizon is all-digital in cities and is converting the rest.

I was in downtown Sunnyvale, smack in the middle of Santa Clara ("Silicon") valley, and was roaming with Sprint. Also virtually no signal on the bay side of 101 in Mountain View; same on the north end of downtown Santa Cruz.

Sprint doens't offer true 2-way SMS; they never worked right with the Kyocera 6035 (*2 was broken a lot), and no free e-mail/web access.

Sprint does tend to have some cooler phones (and some dumb ones with silly features like screensavers), but do you want a phone that looks cool or works well?

(No, I don't work for Verizon.)

I currently have the Kyocera 6035 and it works perfectly with Verizon: 2-way SMS, free POP3/SMTP access, web. I'm waiting for the Kyocera 7135 that will be offered on Verizon probably within a month. It's a very sweet phone/PDA.

I can strongly recommend against Sprint. Sprint has the largest all-digital network, but it's still smaller than Verizon's digital + analog network. The upshot is that if you're on analog on Verizon, there's no roaming charges since they own the analog towers; with Sprint, any time you are on analog, you are roaming by definition, and pay roaming charges accordingly. Note how Sprint never mentions this in their commercials. Anyway, Verizon is all-digital in cities and is converting the rest.

I was in downtown Sunnyvale, smack in the middle of Santa Clara ("Silicon") valley, and was roaming with Sprint. Also virtually no signal on the bay side of 101 in Mountain View; same on the north end of downtown Santa Cruz.

Sprint doens't offer true 2-way SMS; they never worked right with the Kyocera 6035 (*2 was broken a lot), and no free e-mail/web access.

Sprint does tend to have some cooler phones (and some dumb ones with silly features like screensavers), but do you want a phone that looks cool or works well?

(No, I don't work for Verizon.)

But instead, they STILL don't have a PalmOS/mobile combination out.

Funny.. that sounds just like my Kyocera 6035. (And the Clie with a phone is on its way... the Kyocera 7135 sometime this quarter).
Kyocera did it right... full powered Palm, tri-mode phone with a real keypad.

I could do without the dropped calls,but my list is similar (plus SSH client, amortization calculator). I have been using a kyocera QCP 6035 Smartphone for over a year, and have enjoyed all of the above functionality. Its NOT just a phone, its a unified device which relieves me from carrying a laptop. Did I mention that it has an ssh client? I'll race you to the parking lot, and we'll see who can login to work first ;)

I've been using a PDA since the original Palm Pilot debuted in 1996. Since then, I've upgraded to a Palm Vx, but I've always been very pleased. Truly, I only use the basic functionality of the system (e.g. contacts, appointments, to-do list, and notes) and having ready access to that information anytime, anywhere has been a tremendous benefit. Additionally, being able to sync with Entourage (for Mac OS X) and beam records (e.g., my business card) to other Palm users is of equal importance.

It's ironic, but when I first started working for my present employer back in 1997, I was the only person using a Palm PDA. Slowly but surely, dozens others have adopted this techology, including people in sales, marketing, engineering, and management.

Now, I'm looking forward to the introduction of the Kyocera 7135 so I can combine my Palm and mobile phone into a single device.

Ron
:-)