Slashdot Mirror

← Back to Stories (view on slashdot.org)

New Linux PDA Available

Posted by michael on from the things-to-lose dept.

Jacob writes: "I just ran across an article about a new Linux-based PDA called the Powerplay III Linux PDA. The PDA is manufactured in Taiwan but is being sold by Canadian Linux company, Empower. This PDA is Palm IIIxe compatible (dragonball processor), is shipped with Empower's Linux DA O/S, and get this: its only $89! I'll be getting one..." We mentioned this operating system a few weeks ago. They now have some sort of source download available, which seems like a step in the right direction.

3 of 182 comments (clear)

  1. Re:6 to 8 Weeks.....SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT by darkPHi3er · · Score: 4, Interesting

    "...makes me wonder if it is real or not...."

    and here, brothers and sisters, is as succinctly as it could be said, the reason why trying to crack an existing market in technolgy products is so tough....

    i (and all my friends) usually expect our "devices" to have a major brand name on them...

    whether that name is Sony or Palm or Compaq or Casio or Nintendo or Atari

    it's up to us to take a chance, roll the dice on the $89, and if it's cool or even just usuable...

    WE HAVE TO TELL EVERYONE WE KNOW

    --
    Ten quid, she's so easy to blind. And not a word is spoken...
  2. Interesting Idea by VertigoAce · · Score: 2, Interesting

    A cheap Linux PDA is certainly an interesting path to go, but there are some issues based on that data sheet:

    "6 month Linux DA O/S software upgrade" - This better be a stable OS if you only get 6 months of upgrades (setting aside whatever license restrictions there are)

    8MB RAM and 2MB flash seems a bit small. Doubling the RAM wouldn't be very expensive, but you'd see a large performance increase (speaking from my work with the Agenda VR3). I'm not suggesting that Linux can't run in that space, but it might prevent much in the way of third party applications (assuming that it doesn't contain any software on a ROM chip).

    For the price, however, it would be a good choice for a regular user (read: non-hacker). Most of the people who use it probably won't care that it's Linux anyway.

    -Sean

  3. something doesn't seem right by mj6798 · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I downloaded the Linux source from their site. It seems to be some kind of derivative of uClinux. Whether they have made any useful modifications is hard to tell. In any case, they certainly don't seem to be interested in a high quality release or community input: there is no documentation, not even a README. To top it all off, the kernel tarball has a 7.6M core dump from "netscape-commun" in it.

    Altogether, I'd stay away. If you want a nice, functional Linux PDA, take a look at the Agenda. HP also will be coming out with a real Linux PDA.