Looks nice, but nothing really special or new. If I hadn't just bought a Toshiba, I might have picked up one of these.
It'd be nice if they'd make a ruggedized version for field use too. My company currently has to go to companies like Symbol and Intermec for ruggedized Pocket PC devices. (We get nearly everything else from Dell.)
Re:Guess the OS
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Why run Linux when you could run Pocket PC?:P
The cheaper one is most interesting
by
uradu
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
This should be the first handheld with TFT color, 32MB RAM and two expansion slots for under $200. Except for the porky-looking dimensions this should beat the pants off Palm or Sony. Maybe Sony will lower the price on the PEG-SJ30 to under $200 in response.
Obligatory Palm question
by
Mr_Silver
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
Given that yet another manufacturer has released yet another PPC, can anyone speculate why there is this rash of companies eager to jump on the PPC bandwagon but only Sony who are with Palm?
(yes, I know there is Handera and Handspring, but one has pretty much vanished and the other is doing smartphones)
How did Microsoft manage to attract all these companies and Palm fail rather miserably? What is MS doing that Palm isn't?
-- Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
Re:Obligatory Palm question
by
johnburton
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
Basically palm introduced their PDA a few years ago and they were good at the time, but they've gone nowhere since. PPC's are a generation later and are more powerful, have better software, faster, more memory and are more compatible with the software people use on their computers.
Basically the palm you can buy now is identical to the one you could get four years ago except it's in a new box and has a bit more memory maybe.
Because the pocket pc things are "bigger" machines, a lot more of the interesting software has been developed for them.
The new palms look a bit better but they still seem rather outdated compared with their competition. Their new OS6 when it comes out next year looks interesting though.
-- Sig is taking a break!
Re:Obligatory Palm question
by
AKnightCowboy
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
What is MS doing that Palm isn't?
Marketing? I'd much rather have a PPC than a Palm these days. The 802.11b adapter for the Palm sucks, there's no decent web browser and it's nothing but an expensive datebook. The PPC on the other hand has a nice windows media player, pocket internet explorer, pocket office apps, compact flash slots to accomodate 802.11b wireless cards, etc. Yea, we can all pretend to hate Microsoft, but the PPC stuff is just fabulous. Xbox, Pocket PC, mice, keyboards, etc. If only Microsoft could turn a profit in these other areas where they actually DO produce something cool and not lame old Windows and Office it'd be exciting.
Re:Obligatory Palm question
by
Cyn
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
I don't believe dell has restricted itself to PPC only - unlike many of the other PPC Licensees. That doesn't mean they will be making any Palm devices, just that they can. [could use same hardware too... hmmmmmm - tho screen would need to change]
-- cyn, free software and *nix operating systems enthusiast.
Well these are okay but...
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 1, Interesting
When you want a PDA you might as well go balls out and get some kind of integrated Bluetooth and make sure you get a USB host ability.
I found out the hardway when I got my first PDA is that I couldn't expand the device beyond what I needed it for.
It sure gets expensive to get add-ons or hell if your even lucky to get some, I only have a SD slot on mine and have to special order the BT card for almost $175 online.
for the conspiracy theorists
by
F2F
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
and this one runs a host of other, non-MS operating systems...
Re:What about...
by
Mwongozi
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
They obviously didn't pay CmdrTaco to endorse this product.
My estimate: Linux in less than a week
by
ishmalius
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Very little time will pass until someone ports some Linux flavor such as Familiar or OpenZaurus to this
thing. It already exists on XScale PDAs. It will probably be announced on/., too!
of ports and batteries
by
fermion
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
First, I wonder what the battery life is on these puppies. Even the X-Scale is an ARM, Intel is not known for making chips that sip power, and MS is certainly not know for it's power management. I wonder if I will get the several days I am used to on my rechargeable Palm. Why don't PDA vendors list battery life anymore?
Second, this seems to be a prime example of customers being forced to pay for crippled technology. Although Dell get our appreciation graciously allowing us access to our own data by including unprotected memory, is then any end user reason to waste money and real estate on secure digital slot? Does anyone really want to spend $100 on crippled memory? I assume that unlike other PDA vendors, they are not using integrated slots. I could be wrong because the detail in the copy is pretty limited.
I aso assume that this will only work with windows, probably only windows XP and 2000, and will include MS viral licensing for updates.
I am not MS or dell bashing. I don't really like any of the PDA options right now. If I ran windows this machine would be good inexpensive option. It just seems that we have gotten overrun with feature we don't want and don't need. For instance, we want a bigger battery. Instead, we got an extra crippled slot.
-- "She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide."
Orphan Black
Re:Size matters...
by
purplemonkeydan
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
Try the Viewsonic V35. It's the thinnest Pocket PC available, and seems to be on par with Palm thickness wise.
Re:XScale processor?
by
ceswiedler
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· Score: 4, Interesting
I do development on PocketPC, and I can confirm that the Toshiba e740 (which is XScale) does run slower per mhz than other chips. It's several hundred mhz faster than the Casio (MIPS) device we use, but from a user perspective it runs about the same. (For some operations it's much faster.) I've read that Intel requires changes to the PPC kernel to take better advantage of the XScale. When we upgraded the firmware on some of the devices (upgrading the PPC kernel in the process) they did run a little bit faster. Under PPC 2002, they stopped supporting multiple instruction sets (ARM, MIPS, SH4 etc) and standardized on the ARM op set. Whether there's much overhead in doing this on the XScale, I don't know.
Re:Rebate? What-EVER
by
That_Dan_Guy
·
· Score: 3, Interesting
My wife lives on Rebates. So far, of the 30 or 40 we've sent in over the last year only one has failed to show up.
If I were you, I'd take extra care in filling out those forms legibily and completely. Then keep track of what you've sent. Most of the time you can find out the status of your rebates if you write down some phone numbers before you send off the forms. A few can even be checked on the Web.
The rules also must be followed. Many times the employees at the stores are clueless and think everything can be rebated. Store managers are only a little better, and only if you get them to read the forms, which you can do anyway.
Try Sitescooper (http://sitescooper.org/) set for HTML files. It's a perl program which runs on your desktop and dumps the content of websites to condensed files. Actually,it's better than avantgo for the Palm as well. Although I havent tried this yet it may be possible to run sitescooper on the zaurus itself. Zepo (http://www.alterna.tv/zepo/) does much the same thing but performs the operations naitively on the Zaurus. As a result, when on the road, you can snarf a fresh days worth of reading with your 802.11b at the Starbucks while getting your coffee (I've done this).
Re:What about...
by
kaphka
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
Because for $199 you can't recharge it or connect it to your PC
The $199 model does of course include an AC adapter and USB sync cable, though I admit it's hard to figure that out from Dell's info. (Check here and here.) All that's missing is the drop-in USB cradle.
I'm just going to cut and paste a reply to a similar post.
"I don't doubt serious Unix admins and coders make more than their Windows counterparts. The only thing is there are less of them. So its only a factor when the Unix folks actually have jobs. Otherwise its the Windows weenies who are the ones who have the money to buy these things."
-- Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.
Slashdot Mirror
Can anyone run through a quick comparison on specs/features versus a top-of-the-line iPaq? Any reviews of the Dell handheld?
Looks nice, but nothing really special or new. If I hadn't just bought a Toshiba, I might have picked up one of these. It'd be nice if they'd make a ruggedized version for field use too. My company currently has to go to companies like Symbol and Intermec for ruggedized Pocket PC devices. (We get nearly everything else from Dell.)
Why run Linux when you could run Pocket PC? :P
This should be the first handheld with TFT color, 32MB RAM and two expansion slots for under $200. Except for the porky-looking dimensions this should beat the pants off Palm or Sony. Maybe Sony will lower the price on the PEG-SJ30 to under $200 in response.
(yes, I know there is Handera and Handspring, but one has pretty much vanished and the other is doing smartphones)
How did Microsoft manage to attract all these companies and Palm fail rather miserably? What is MS doing that Palm isn't?
Avantslash - View Slashdot cleanly on your mobile phone.
When you want a PDA you might as well go balls out and get some kind of integrated Bluetooth and make sure you get a USB host ability.
I found out the hardway when I got my first PDA is that I couldn't expand the device beyond what I needed it for.
It sure gets expensive to get add-ons or hell if your even lucky to get some, I only have a SD slot on mine and have to special order the BT card for almost $175 online.
wonder why no mention of the new HP iPAQ released today with the very same price ($299) http://www.theregister.co.uk/content/54/28146.html ..
and this one runs a host of other, non-MS operating systems...
They obviously didn't pay CmdrTaco to endorse this product.
Very little time will pass until someone ports some Linux flavor such as Familiar or OpenZaurus to this thing. It already exists on XScale PDAs. It will probably be announced on /., too!
Second, this seems to be a prime example of customers being forced to pay for crippled technology. Although Dell get our appreciation graciously allowing us access to our own data by including unprotected memory, is then any end user reason to waste money and real estate on secure digital slot? Does anyone really want to spend $100 on crippled memory? I assume that unlike other PDA vendors, they are not using integrated slots. I could be wrong because the detail in the copy is pretty limited.
I aso assume that this will only work with windows, probably only windows XP and 2000, and will include MS viral licensing for updates.
I am not MS or dell bashing. I don't really like any of the PDA options right now. If I ran windows this machine would be good inexpensive option. It just seems that we have gotten overrun with feature we don't want and don't need. For instance, we want a bigger battery. Instead, we got an extra crippled slot.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
Try the Viewsonic V35. It's the thinnest Pocket PC available, and seems to be on par with Palm thickness wise.
Check out the preview on Pocket PC Thoughts for more info.
I do development on PocketPC, and I can confirm that the Toshiba e740 (which is XScale) does run slower per mhz than other chips. It's several hundred mhz faster than the Casio (MIPS) device we use, but from a user perspective it runs about the same. (For some operations it's much faster.) I've read that Intel requires changes to the PPC kernel to take better advantage of the XScale. When we upgraded the firmware on some of the devices (upgrading the PPC kernel in the process) they did run a little bit faster. Under PPC 2002, they stopped supporting multiple instruction sets (ARM, MIPS, SH4 etc) and standardized on the ARM op set. Whether there's much overhead in doing this on the XScale, I don't know.
My wife lives on Rebates. So far, of the 30 or 40 we've sent in over the last year only one has failed to show up.
If I were you, I'd take extra care in filling out those forms legibily and completely. Then keep track of what you've sent. Most of the time you can find out the status of your rebates if you write down some phone numbers before you send off the forms. A few can even be checked on the Web.
The rules also must be followed. Many times the employees at the stores are clueless and think everything can be rebated. Store managers are only a little better, and only if you get them to read the forms, which you can do anyway.
Try Sitescooper (http://sitescooper.org/) set for HTML files. It's a perl program which runs on your desktop and dumps the content of websites to condensed files. Actually,it's better than avantgo for the Palm as well. Although I havent tried this yet it may be possible to run sitescooper on the zaurus itself.
Zepo (http://www.alterna.tv/zepo/) does much the same thing but performs the operations naitively on the Zaurus. As a result, when on the road, you can snarf a fresh days worth of reading with your 802.11b at the Starbucks while getting your coffee (I've done this).
MSK
I'm just going to cut and paste a reply to a similar post.
"I don't doubt serious Unix admins and coders make more than their Windows counterparts. The only thing is there are less of them. So its only a factor when the Unix folks actually have jobs. Otherwise its the Windows weenies who are the ones who have the money to buy these things."
Mac OS X and Windows XP working side by side to fight back the night.