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Sharp Zaurus SL-C750 English Conversion
DavonZ writes "I have just released a small review/information on the Sharp Zaurus SL-C750 and the Dynamism English conversion. This is one sweet unit. You can check it out at nvmax.com."
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Try this instead.
Dynamism link should be http://www.dynamism.com/index.shtml
(hope I got that right)
It has been announced that they have decided to follow in google's footsteps. The Pig Latin, Hacker(h4x04) and Klingon translations are coming soon.
Contact Me (got tired of viruses emailing me).
...for letting you override that abysmal colour scheme.
Finally! A year of moderation! Ready for 2019?
the real question isn't how much better the 750 is, but how good is the translation?
Still, the Zaurus IMHO is now superceded by the Sony Clie NZ90. When the new Clies hit the street this summer (an NZ90 slimmer version with integrated 802.11b and 400Mhz Xscale) I'm a buyer.
About the only thing I think exciting about this model is its ability to possibly run a scaled down version of Mac On Linux or the Mac System 6 emulator that already exists. Using Photoshop and REAL Word on a PDA is pretty neat!
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
What's with the... uh... bunny on the left of the page?
What kind of company is this?
As Nick Burns, the company computer guy, might say.
Thank you, Microsoft, for making my favorite browser Internet Explorer.
Here's another minor review and pictures via brighthand.
Also, a user at externe has posted about his first impressions in the Zaurus forums.
Good info in case the importer's/converter's website gets slashdotted.
Loomis
"The television is the retina of the mind's eye" - Videodrome
I have owned several Zaurus machines (both the English SL-5500 as well as several Japanese versions). I have also owned an iPaq and several Palm devices from both Palm and Handspring.
The Zaurus line is by far my favorite. I have really enjoyed the functionality of the SL-5500 and the flexibility of the Japanese versions I owned. I especially like the expansion modules available for my DBII machine.
The Zaurus machines seem a lot more sturdy to me as well. I was a bit concerned regarding the SL-5500's sliding keyboard cover before I purchased it, but it has proven to be sturdy and well made.
I really like the looks of this new offering from Sharp and look forward to using one.
Running on this thing Mac-On-Linux isn't going to happen. MOL (just) helps virtualize the PowerPC hardware so that MacOS can run. This PDA is based on Intel's new ARM chips; it's a totally different platform.
Why not put a dvorak keyboard on it? I suppose it may be software-configurable like every other OS.
-Libertarian secular transhumanist
While they obviously lack the English conversion, you can also see the SL-C750 and SL-C760 at the Japenese eZaurus.com site.
There are SEVERAL emulations in the works, the Xscale is a RISC processor and better able to emulate the PPC (PPC on the whole is a better chip for emulation) - this is one reason Virtual Game Station for the Mac was a lot smoother - PSX ran on RISC chip/RISC better for emulation.
This new Zaurus hasn't promised a thing, thus it breaks no promises...it's just a little better than the previous. I'm waiting for the YOPY to arrive on the market; it will be my next purchase! My GeForceFX is more promising. Why? Not because it was slower at first release... Look at it [GeForceFX] a different way, can your mother^H^H^H^H^H^Honly girl you know use a Zaurus to do this with her hair? Or can a Zaurus clean your neighborhood?
I rest my unmodded case...
... or is $800 too expensive for a handheld ? For that price you can get a halfway decent notebook (in English no less!)
wget -o foo.txt http://osnippets.org/ && cat foo.txt | pig >> bar.txt && mv bar.txt foo.txt
Replace osnippets.org with whatever domain you want to get, and be sure to have a pightml renderer.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
That said, I don't like these small widgets. Try typing
on it.It hurts.
Is there is some large untapped handheld market or do people own 2,3 and 4 handhelds? I bought one a few years ago and its not the kinda item that I think needs to be "upgraded" yet. All these gadets look really cool, but I can't justify buying a new one every year, or even every 2 years ( I can jsutify 2 years with a PC). I just always feel left in the dust and like by the time I can get a new one, I'll have missed out one something good. Or maybe just get in on something better.
Déjà vu?
My advice: restrain your impulsive nature and wait a few months (at most?) for the English market version. It will be a very different -- and lower cost -- beast. Well worth the wait, if you are interested in this flipin' mini unit.
It is cool, that's for sure.
-- @rjamestaylor on Ello
Damnit! When I read the Zaurus had "English conversion", I thought we had entered the era of the babelfish.
Six hours and still not satisfied?! Are you sure you know what you're doing?
The liver is evil and must be punished.
If you don't need a full English conversion, you can buy the units a lot cheaper at conics.net. Then, you can change one line in a config file to set the default locale to English (which changes most of the text, but isn't nearly as complete as the dynamism conversion), or install Debian on it (see my web page at www.w-m-p.com/pocketworkstation/).
I'm not being paid by Dynamism or Conics (or Sharp for that matter), but have bought from and can recommend both suppliers.
The C750 is an excellent machine, it's a Linux workstation you can put in your shirt pocket. The landscape form factor along with the 640x480 screen can display 80x30 characters in a well-legible font, with a full keyboard that's easy to type on despite the small size. With 64 MB RAM and a 512 MB SD card for storage, along with a 400 MHz XScale CPU, its performance is equivalent to desktop PCs a couple of years ago.
The C750 finally has a PXA255 with a 200 MHz memory clock, which is the main reason for the improved speed compared to the older C700, along with the doubled RAM.
Note that the display is flippable 180 degrees, so you can also use the system with a portrait display and no keyboard if you prefer that.
-Klaus
Uh... I think you misspelled Mozilla :-)
Did you notice that the lizard supports more bookmarklets than IE?
Make sure everyone's vote counts: Verified Voting
This is one sweet unit.
Take your homosexual tendencies elsewhere, buddy.
Did you notice that the lizard supports more bookmarklets than IE?
No, I'm sorry that I missed that. I was too busy surfing through all the web site that IE supports and Mozilla does not to wait for Mozilla to reload its own windowing environment for the nth time.
Do you have a list of those sites? Or are you too busy closing all the pop-ups to make one?
Not to be sarcastic, and at the risk of being nailed to a cross, I wonder if anyone has tried to flash one of these guys with a Pocket PC 2002 ROM. I have used many devices with Pocket PC, and the software, as well as visuals are incredible. It's very responsive with the Xscale processor, as well as on the older ARM 206 mHz processors. I am likely to get one of these Zaurus devices, and probably will enjoy the Linux operating system on it, but still I think that maybe it would be interesting to screw around with Pocket PC on it.
pxgray
End of Post
You are at the end of the post. To the north lies the post.
There is a sig here.
You'll be able to play eight-track tapes on it.
What I want to know is this:
My criteria for a PDA is that it must be expandable, and not bulky.
Does this come with any kind of wireless built in, or a non-bulky wireless addon?
is if these things support either Citrix's or Tarantella's Java clients. Using that VGA screen with a CDPD card installed would be great for my remote service techs.
I've had my 5500 for a couple of months. I've upgraded to ROM 3.10.
I love the bash shell, the free and easy downloads, the easy ROM upgrades.
That said, it is:
- hard to read the screen
- hard to enter text
I think what I'm getting from this experience is that the clamshell design is what you need for the usable ultra-portable device.
Oh, and built-in wifi.
668: Neighbour of the Beast
I recently have been looking at these units and am pretty positive I am going to buy one. That being said, I would much rather prefer to order from Dynamism rather than conics.net, because of their technical support and English OS. However, you can't argue with the conics price ($629, vs. $699 at Dynamism), so I emailed them and asked them to match. Here's the offers they gave:
Package (1)
Zaurus C750 (in Japanese) $629
Shipping from our Tokyo office (3-5 days) $19
(you will also have to pay import duties on the shipment)
 No Dynamism technical support as the unit you get will be in Japanese
 Japanese OS
 Warranty service, but you will have to pay for shipping to our Tokyo office â" BTW, if Conics goes out of business, it will be basically impossible to get your unit repaired as Sharp Japan will NOT accept shipments from outside of the US. Also, by installing an English OS invalidates the warranty (we cover that if purchased through us).
Package (2)
Zaurus C750 (with our English OS) $677
Shipping $17
 Full Dynamism tech support for the lifetime of the unit
 Fed-ex rescue service (we pay all shipping while the unit is under warranty)
 English interface
They said that they would have to match the offer, not only the price, but they still were very receptive to dropping it a couple bucks, which is really cool of them to do.
pxgray
End of Post
You are at the end of the post. To the north lies the post.
There is a sig here.
I tried it with a lowercase 'o' and thought the feature was unimplemented.
You can't judge a book by the way it wears its hair.
What a waste of space.
I've been lusting over these things for a long time, and what keeps me interested is the 640x480 screen. I've read some reviews on the older models, and just about everyone said the screen was the best selling point
In terms of hardware, I'd much rather see the "B" series coming to the US: they are actually PDA-sized machines.
In terms of software, I think these machines have their own set of problems. As a PDA, I think the Zaurus lags behind Palm and even PPC. And the lack of X11 support by the default window system means that most Linux GUI applications require a complete rewrite of their UI, rather than just a simple port.
I have a Zaurus 5500, but I'm probably going to be replacing it with a Yopy.
I've made ipkg's for X on the c700 ( they'll probably work on the c75xx too ). Grab em here;
t s. html
http://handhelds.org/~mallum/xpkgs
There a packaged in OZ's buildroot. Touchscreen and keyboard works fine.
Some crappy screenshots here ( about half way down the page );
http://handhelds.org/~mallum/matchbox/screensho
I'm in Japan. Just bought one for 60000 yen (about 300 quid, probably about 450 dollars).
/home/zaurus/Settings/locale.conf so that it says "en" instead of "jp", the whole thing, apart from HancomWord and HancomSheet, switches over to English. Dynamism are putting a serious premium on it. I'd avoid them and order direct from Japan.
If you edit
By the way, the thing as absolutely fantastic. The screen is unbelievable!
Did you notice that the lizard supports more bookmarklets than IE?
Yes, but keep in mind that the author of most of those bookmarklets (me) is a Mozilla contributor.
The shareholder is always right.