Which is actually Danish and means "I don't think it matters if you smell a little of piss".
I think someone has been having some fun with teaching Bender Unit 22 some bogus Danish phrases. Or he has gotten his hands on a Monty Python dictionary.
Is it really worth it?
by
dancedance
·
· Score: 5, Insightful
I have always liked the look and power of the zaurus line, and I really want a linux pda, however I don't think the cost of the imported zaurus is really worth it. For $850 you can get a laptop and install linux on that. I understand that there are size and usage differences, however if I were to choose between a zaurus, or a 12inch ibook (say off of ebay) I think I would have to go with the ibook. It seems that the laptop is much more useful than the pda for a similar price.
Sharp's marketing seems to be broken in that despite the thriving user community and demand for a zaurus model with that form factor in us/europe they seem reluctant to actually release it over here. Companies such as dynamismor shirtpocket import them or better still get someone visiting japan to bring you one back. They can be easily re-flashed to remove the japanese software and instead start speaking english which I for one find a whole lot easier to deal with;-)
There is an iminent (nobody knows quite when due to the brokenness of sharp's marketing dept.) launch of a model in the states called the Sl-6000 which is a similar (well slightly improved) set of innards and screen to the sl-c860 but in a more conventional pda form factor, very like the sl-5600 as released in the US.
Re:The Problem with the Zaurus
by
Makenai
·
· Score: 5, Informative
Also, unless you back up/sync your Zaurus religiously, when the battery power is gone, so is all your data, programs, etc.
Um.. sorry. That's absolutely wrong. NAND memory does not go away when you let the battery drain. It even mentions it in the review.
Re:The Problem with the Zaurus
by
terzyva
·
· Score: 5, Informative
Did you read the article? One of the main improvements in current models is that the user filesystem is in non-volatile flash ROM. This started with the SL-C700 and SL-5600 models, which were released about a year ago.
Only the old SL-5500 model used a RAM disk for storage.
-Klaus
Re:Its small for a laptop, but HUGE for a PDA
by
Michael+Spencer+Jr.
·
· Score: 5, Interesting
The C860 is the same size as the C700 I've been carrying around in my pocket for the past year. Usually I'm carrying it with the network card sticking out the top, and I haven't had anything bad happen to the extra bit of plastic that sticks out. There's a noticable Zaurus-shaped rectangular outline where my pocket is, but nothing sticks out the top of my pocket and nothing gets bent or sheared off. Nobody notices my pocket -- I think that qualifies the Zaurus as pocket-sized.:) I think "small" or "HUGE" aren't really precise enough. Let's talk about whether it's too big for something or too small for something. Those statements are *useful* statements. My C700 is small enough to carry around in your pocket, everywhere you go. The AC adapter folds its prongs into the body and it's small enough to carry around in your other pocket.
The 640x480 screen apparently has led people to mistakenly conclude the screen is large. It's not -- it's just got unusually high dots-per-inch.
The screen is still pretty readable though. People always comment on how small the text is, but when they hold the unit closer (which is normal and natural with a small hand-held device) they can read it clearly. I've found people who need reading glasses to read small print on paper are the only people who have trouble with this screen.
I suppose some people are fashion-conscious enough that how small something looks matters. To me, it just needs to be small enough to comfortably hold in one hand, light enough to not tire that hand out, and small enough to carry in my pocket everywhere I go. That's precisely what it's been for me, for the past year.
I'd love to get a Zaurus, but Sharp's regional distribution policies have me really puzzled. It might simply boil down to "only sells good enough in Japan", but it sure looks more like Sharp is randomly releasing/not releasing certain Sharp models in certain countries: no clamshell models in the US, but the new SL-6000 (with built-in WiFi and Bluetooth) apparently to be released there real soon. Old SL-5000 models discontinued in Europe (but still available in stores in e.g. Germany) and no new models planned for release there, either. No Zaurus at all in Canada. Does anybody have an insight on why they are doing this?
Also, before I ask some Japanese friends to bring me a Zaurus from Japan, I'd rather hold out for a clamshell model with built-in WiFi and Bluetooth. Given that the new SL-6000 has both (*and* the VGA screen), does anybody know if that means they are switching away from the clamshell idea for future models, or are they planning to release an updated clamshell model as well?
To all naysayers...I own a Palm, a PocketPC (iPaq 5555), Zaurus 5600, and...ding-ding...Zaurus C760 (basically the exact same thing as a C860 with a different color).
Yeah...Sharp is real stupid for not marketing these bad boys in USA. For you Clie wannabe lovers, here is what you can do with a Zaurus C760:
Opera 7 browser...I mean a real browser with Java and Javascript. Not a "I wish I was a real IE on IPAQ" or Pal. This is the real deal...full 100% browser.
Bash shell/terminal. ssh into your favorite box.
GCC. Bored? Compile your favorite software and run it in that lamo meeting you are in.
VPNC - Need access to your corporate Cisco VPN? Use vpnc...its the freeware Cisco VPN client. Gets you right into your company. Yeah try that on a Palm or pay some $$ on the iPaq for that.
Email - All flavors...pop, IMAP, jeez...even notes.
Sniff? Wanna see who is using wireless? Use Kismet or Wellenreiter.. Talk about Warwalking/driving...this is the shit.
Do Windows? rdesktop baby! Pull your Windblowz box on this puppy. Yeah I know iPaq/PocketPC can do this...but can your Palm?
Apache/PHP/MySQL - Yeah this is not shit. Run a full web app on this PDA...yeah PDA. Get iPaq/PocketPC and Palm to play that game. Good luck.
This is just the beginning folks. All of this on a PDA. I invite any other PDA to do the above.
mplayer...yes...I said mplayer. I constantly carry around 2-3 full length feature films on my CF card plugged into the C760. I can watch a full movie with mplayer..this includes DIVX, MPEG4, OGG...you name it. Its the same proggy you use on your home Linux box.
Do that with your CLIE;-)
some additional things
by
gullevek
·
· Score: 5, Informative
well I also own a C860, but there are some things which should be noticed:
- display: thought it is amazing, and 640x480 is something you never want to trade away, especially if you read and write japanese, the display itself is horrible in daylight. You can't read anything unless you have at least 50-60% backlight running, and still it looks dark.
- weight. Something you should never underestimate for a PDA. It it is at least 2/3s more heave then the Toshiba PDA Pocket PC eGenious. If you hold the Zaurus only in one hand, eg in train rides, it can get a little bit heavy.
- no built in WLAN. Thought this is dismissable, there are a lot of CF WLAN cards, but they stick out a bit and then are a little bit blocky when typing on the keyborad.
- western on screen writing is a bit bad in recognition. Yeah, but it is developted for japanese;) so its okay. and with the keyboard you are 10 times faster anyway.
- the PIM software is nice, but might not kick ass for business people. Especially that the ToDos are not completly included into the Calendar is a mystery to me... but at the end, for me it is enought.
- actually no games, except Mah Jong (2 versions, the "real" Mah Jong, and the Solitair Mah Jong) and both are "shareware"
But enought negavite, this thing rocks.
- login via ssh to servers and fix things:) This is just WOW and yeah if you can do this on a train ride (geek thing perhaps)
- easy to install other distros.
- SD & CF slot and they work great.
- The Display, thought I ranted about it, it still rocks, because if you watch you digital camera pictures on that display, it is just wow, especially because the image viewer software can fullscreen & slideshow.
- Battery life. Even if you use the WLAN/dialupcard and have 40% backlight on, you can use it quite long, at least two days. I use it most time in the morning and evening on my train ride to office and back. Takes me one hour each, and then during day, but then without WLAN most.
- Keyboard. It is really very good and you can type extremly fast with only two fingers. The only thing that comes to my mind is a missing Alt-key... but might be that the terminal is not transmitting the Alt key or so... (another geek thing).
- supergreat dictionary and japanese translator. For me as a japanese learner I love that dictionary and...
- great kanji writing system. Yeah thats another cool thing, when you can write the kanji right on the display and they get recognized. helps me a lot if I see something but can't read it.
- easy to connect in linux. Just plugin USB, have the Zaurus net connect in USB part compiled in and set up the usb network, bingo, thats it and you can login via ssh (if sshd is running on the zaurus) or mount the zaurus via samba...
- the browser. Hey it has TABBED views. Okay, even IE on windows doesn't get that. Did I mention TABBED views. Yeah:) and it views frame pages very well. Zoom in and Out, etc. This is a powerful little browser: NetFront 3.0
- the Hancom Word and Spreadsheet programs are really great. They work very well, thought the word sometimes feels a bit sluggiesh, but hey, this aint no P4 3Ghz...
- very small Charger, can easily be taken anywhere.
- smart placemnt of outside "scrollwheel". Very usefull to scroll through webpages if you have to hold the Zaurus with only one hand.
Well, thats all. I hope I didn't miss anything...
-- "Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden"
- Rosa Luxemburg, 1871 - 1919
Slashdot Mirror
My favorite use of this device is this :)
Which is actually Danish and means "I don't think it matters if you smell a little of piss".
I think someone has been having some fun with teaching Bender Unit 22 some bogus Danish phrases. Or he has gotten his hands on a Monty Python dictionary.
I have always liked the look and power of the zaurus line, and I really want a linux pda, however I don't think the cost of the imported zaurus is really worth it. For $850 you can get a laptop and install linux on that. I understand that there are size and usage differences, however if I were to choose between a zaurus, or a 12inch ibook (say off of ebay) I think I would have to go with the ibook. It seems that the laptop is much more useful than the pda for a similar price.
Sharp's marketing seems to be broken in that despite the thriving user community and demand for a zaurus model with that form factor in us/europe they seem reluctant to actually release it over here. Companies such as dynamismor shirtpocket import them or better still get someone visiting japan to bring you one back. They can be easily re-flashed to remove the japanese software and instead start speaking english which I for one find a whole lot easier to deal with ;-)
There is an iminent (nobody knows quite when due to the brokenness of sharp's marketing dept.) launch of a model in the states called the Sl-6000 which is a similar (well slightly improved) set of innards and screen to the sl-c860 but in a more conventional pda form factor, very like the sl-5600 as released in the US.
Also, unless you back up/sync your Zaurus religiously, when the battery power is gone, so is all your data, programs, etc. Um.. sorry. That's absolutely wrong. NAND memory does not go away when you let the battery drain. It even mentions it in the review.
Did you read the article? One of the main improvements in current models is that the user filesystem is in non-volatile flash ROM. This started with the SL-C700 and SL-5600 models, which were released about a year ago.
Only the old SL-5500 model used a RAM disk for storage.
-Klaus
The C860 is the same size as the C700 I've been carrying around in my pocket for the past year. Usually I'm carrying it with the network card sticking out the top, and I haven't had anything bad happen to the extra bit of plastic that sticks out. There's a noticable Zaurus-shaped rectangular outline where my pocket is, but nothing sticks out the top of my pocket and nothing gets bent or sheared off. Nobody notices my pocket -- I think that qualifies the Zaurus as pocket-sized. :) I think "small" or "HUGE" aren't really precise enough. Let's talk about whether it's too big for something or too small for something. Those statements are *useful* statements. My C700 is small enough to carry around in your pocket, everywhere you go. The AC adapter folds its prongs into the body and it's small enough to carry around in your other pocket.
The 640x480 screen apparently has led people to mistakenly conclude the screen is large. It's not -- it's just got unusually high dots-per-inch.
The screen is still pretty readable though. People always comment on how small the text is, but when they hold the unit closer (which is normal and natural with a small hand-held device) they can read it clearly. I've found people who need reading glasses to read small print on paper are the only people who have trouble with this screen.
I suppose some people are fashion-conscious enough that how small something looks matters. To me, it just needs to be small enough to comfortably hold in one hand, light enough to not tire that hand out, and small enough to carry in my pocket everywhere I go. That's precisely what it's been for me, for the past year.
I'd love to get a Zaurus, but Sharp's regional distribution policies have me really puzzled. It might simply boil down to "only sells good enough in Japan", but it sure looks more like Sharp is randomly releasing/not releasing certain Sharp models in certain countries: no clamshell models in the US, but the new SL-6000 (with built-in WiFi and Bluetooth) apparently to be released there real soon. Old SL-5000 models discontinued in Europe (but still available in stores in e.g. Germany) and no new models planned for release there, either. No Zaurus at all in Canada. Does anybody have an insight on why they are doing this?
Also, before I ask some Japanese friends to bring me a Zaurus from Japan, I'd rather hold out for a clamshell model with built-in WiFi and Bluetooth. Given that the new SL-6000 has both (*and* the VGA screen), does anybody know if that means they are switching away from the clamshell idea for future models, or are they planning to release an updated clamshell model as well?
To all naysayers...I own a Palm, a PocketPC (iPaq 5555), Zaurus 5600, and...ding-ding...Zaurus C760 (basically the exact same thing as a C860 with a different color). Yeah...Sharp is real stupid for not marketing these bad boys in USA. For you Clie wannabe lovers, here is what you can do with a Zaurus C760: Opera 7 browser...I mean a real browser with Java and Javascript. Not a "I wish I was a real IE on IPAQ" or Pal. This is the real deal...full 100% browser. Bash shell/terminal. ssh into your favorite box. GCC. Bored? Compile your favorite software and run it in that lamo meeting you are in. VPNC - Need access to your corporate Cisco VPN? Use vpnc...its the freeware Cisco VPN client. Gets you right into your company. Yeah try that on a Palm or pay some $$ on the iPaq for that. Email - All flavors...pop, IMAP, jeez...even notes. Sniff? Wanna see who is using wireless? Use Kismet or Wellenreiter.. Talk about Warwalking/driving...this is the shit. Do Windows? rdesktop baby! Pull your Windblowz box on this puppy. Yeah I know iPaq/PocketPC can do this...but can your Palm? Apache/PHP/MySQL - Yeah this is not shit. Run a full web app on this PDA...yeah PDA. Get iPaq/PocketPC and Palm to play that game. Good luck. This is just the beginning folks. All of this on a PDA. I invite any other PDA to do the above. mplayer...yes...I said mplayer. I constantly carry around 2-3 full length feature films on my CF card plugged into the C760. I can watch a full movie with mplayer..this includes DIVX, MPEG4, OGG...you name it. Its the same proggy you use on your home Linux box. Do that with your CLIE ;-)
well I also own a C860, but there are some things which should be noticed:
;) so its okay. and with the keyboard you are 10 times faster anyway.
... but at the end, for me it is enought.
:) This is just WOW and yeah if you can do this on a train ride (geek thing perhaps)
... but might be that the terminal is not transmitting the Alt key or so ... (another geek thing).
...
...
:) and it views frame pages very well. Zoom in and Out, etc. This is a powerful little browser: NetFront 3.0
...
- display: thought it is amazing, and 640x480 is something you never want to trade away, especially if you read and write japanese, the display itself is horrible in daylight. You can't read anything unless you have at least 50-60% backlight running, and still it looks dark.
- weight. Something you should never underestimate for a PDA. It it is at least 2/3s more heave then the Toshiba PDA Pocket PC eGenious. If you hold the Zaurus only in one hand, eg in train rides, it can get a little bit heavy.
- no built in WLAN. Thought this is dismissable, there are a lot of CF WLAN cards, but they stick out a bit and then are a little bit blocky when typing on the keyborad.
- western on screen writing is a bit bad in recognition. Yeah, but it is developted for japanese
- the PIM software is nice, but might not kick ass for business people. Especially that the ToDos are not completly included into the Calendar is a mystery to me
- actually no games, except Mah Jong (2 versions, the "real" Mah Jong, and the Solitair Mah Jong) and both are "shareware"
But enought negavite, this thing rocks.
- login via ssh to servers and fix things
- easy to install other distros.
- SD & CF slot and they work great.
- The Display, thought I ranted about it, it still rocks, because if you watch you digital camera pictures on that display, it is just wow, especially because the image viewer software can fullscreen & slideshow.
- Battery life. Even if you use the WLAN/dialupcard and have 40% backlight on, you can use it quite long, at least two days. I use it most time in the morning and evening on my train ride to office and back. Takes me one hour each, and then during day, but then without WLAN most.
- Keyboard. It is really very good and you can type extremly fast with only two fingers. The only thing that comes to my mind is a missing Alt-key
- supergreat dictionary and japanese translator. For me as a japanese learner I love that dictionary and
- great kanji writing system. Yeah thats another cool thing, when you can write the kanji right on the display and they get recognized. helps me a lot if I see something but can't read it.
- easy to connect in linux. Just plugin USB, have the Zaurus net connect in USB part compiled in and set up the usb network, bingo, thats it and you can login via ssh (if sshd is running on the zaurus) or mount the zaurus via samba
- the browser. Hey it has TABBED views. Okay, even IE on windows doesn't get that. Did I mention TABBED views. Yeah
- the Hancom Word and Spreadsheet programs are really great. They work very well, thought the word sometimes feels a bit sluggiesh, but hey, this aint no P4 3Ghz
- very small Charger, can easily be taken anywhere.
- smart placemnt of outside "scrollwheel". Very usefull to scroll through webpages if you have to hold the Zaurus with only one hand.
Well, thats all. I hope I didn't miss anything...
"Freiheit ist immer auch die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden" - Rosa Luxemburg, 1871 - 1919