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A Palm for Every Purpose
fm6 writes "We can look forward to a round of niche devices running PalmOS. According to the Forbes article, we're looking at PalmOS in: a game device called Helix , a platform for developing 'customized handheld instruments' called the Meazura, and of course, the usual round of PalmOS cell phones. On the other hand, fewer manufacturers seem to show any interest in making general-purpose PalmOS PDAs. Food for thought."
There seems to be a battle growing between integration and segration in the Computer Industry.
First it was the internet appliances, with the thinking that people would eventually want seperate "computers" for web browsing, typing, etc.
Now we have the idea of tablets as alternatives to laptops, and a camears being integrated into phones and PDAs.
It seems that people can't decide how many devices they want on them at any givem time. Will we ever see a balance between integration and segragation of digital devices?
Modular Redundancy--Because 4 out of 5 Nodes agree
I am helping with a computer science course involved with microcontrollers. We basicly teach ARM and controlling IO. I was just wondering if teaching assembly is old hat now days where handhelds come with OS's capable of doing all that for you, and where handlelds are today washing machines and tosters will be tommorow.
So is there a point in teaching low level coding or should microcontrollers be programmed in higher level languages?
Mouse powered Chips, Open source Processors and Lego
When the PDA really took fire three years ago, we all began to speculate that everyone would have a handheld and would go everywhere with it. My how times have changed and not necessarily for the worse. I have a Palm IIIxe and find myself not taking it to all the places I used too. It got to the point that is was very bulky and I found I didn't take it out as much so I left it at home. However, when I was in school I used all the time. Hooked up with one of the Palm keyboards I could take all my notes in class and not have to worry about lugging a laptop.
The simple fact of the matter is, handhelds are starting to go back into their niche and take the place of paper where it makes sense. Currently, we have an internally produced application that interfaces with our system of record to update inspections for home sites. It makes a lot of sense because the inspector no longer has to use a pen and pad and we can process draws for borrowers at any point in the week instead of waiting for the inspectors to come back in on Thursday.
I predict you will see more and more of this as time progresses. The time for everyone having a PDA with 20 applications has passed. Its now Blackberrys (wireless email, calendar, contact info) and/or hardened PDAs for every day, one to two applications use.
We need more cell phones that run Palm OS like the SPH-i500 it's the size of a normal phone but with all the palm stuff built in
Of course the SPH-i600 would kick it's ass, but I don't think that will ever make it to market
Why buy a Zire when you can buy a refurbished Clie SL-10 for 80 bucks from Sony? It's got 4 times the ram, the processor is twice as fast, the display has 4 times the resolution, it's got a lot more bundled apps, and it's got a memory stick slot (I'd rather have SD/MMC, but it's better than nothing). Or a Palm m105 for the same price? Or maybe a Visor Neo for a buck more? How about a refurbished Clie S360 for 15 bucks more? I'd rather have any of those over the original Zire.
Well, almost, they aren't remotely as innovative as Macs are.
Palm tried to ride out the "got there first" mentality by charging WTFM (way to f-in much) for their device which had limited functionality and cheesy, if not hostile interoperability with the PC and the 'net. Since they chose to charge so much and give so little, they didn't gain the market share that being there first would have afforded them and now they are left wondering WTFH (what the F happened) to their market.
Most people I know who are looking for a PDA don't even consider a Palm device, they go straight for the WinCE ones.
Just the way it is.
You know you're a geek if you've ever replied to a tagline.
I've had a few Palm devices. My favorite for gaming is the Handspring Visor Prism.
I play mostly old-school games like "Galaga", "Spy Hunter", "Defender" and "Frogger". For these games the Prism is great. It has a good, 8-bit color screen and a decent key layout. I know the operating system is on the old side and it doesn't have Bluetooth.
If the target audience is people in their thirties who like to play games, there is fair chance that the games they want to play are retro games like "Defender", which the Prism is totally sufficient for. It is a great PDA in many other respects too.
Handspring is selling refurbished Prisms at their web site for $169.
Actually the Nokia 9210, 7650 and 3650 use very good batteries that last quite a long time. The reason is probably the low clock speed on these devices, on the 9210 it's around 66MHz.
These aren't PocketPC battery sapping PDAs. Symbian is a much more compact OS and has a long heritage with ARM processors. It needs more programmer effort, unlike Windows CE which is designed to be familiar to exisiting Windows programmers.
There is, IMHO, a "holy grail" of handheld devices, and it would contain...
1. a cell-phone
2. 16-bit color Nintendo and/or Sega compatibility
(maybe emulated MAME-like?)
3. embedded Linux
4. 80G hard drive ala I-pod.
5. Can easily fit in my pocket...
6. 802.11g
Build it, and I will come...nothing else makes sense to me
never bring a twinkie to a food fight.
I think that one of the things that may need to be specified is that there are two primary ways to use a PDA. You can use it as an application specific device (ASD), or you can use it as a general computing device (GCD).
What PalmOS is doing is expanding their sales into more ASD, as they discover that the market seems to be saturated for GCD type PDAs at the level that Palm, Sony and a couple of other companies have been selling.
In all honesty, WinCE (whatever version) and Embeded Linux (in a variety of forms) with appropriate hardware make better GCD based PDAs than PalmOS (in current implementations) does. That may change with PalmOS 6.0, depending upon how much of what was in BeIA that they stripped out and or replaced.
On the other hand, if you need a device for inventory management, or a phone list on a cell phone, or for package tracking, etc. the lower hardware costs associated with a PalmOS device can significantly reduce the cost of each device, making a device that you can sell more of to your customers, because you can pass the savings on, or draw more profit off of the ongoing service charges.
Then again, who knows what will happen with PalmOS 6.0. All the cost savings may be out the window.
-Rusty
You never know...