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palmOne Releases Two New Zire Handhelds
wPageUp writes "palmOne today announced two new additions to their consumer Zire PDA line. According to PalmInfoCenter, the Zire 72 has a 1.2 MP digital camera, 32MB of ram and a 312MHz Intel processor for $299. On the low end side, the new Zire 31 is the first sub-$150 color handheld to include MP3 audio and a memory expansion slot."
Linux to play oggs? Why not just write a native decoder and keep access to the thousands of other Palm apps...
I love linux and run it on my desktop, but it doesn't make sense everywhere!
I think PDA:s will never reach the main-stream and may very well have seen their peak as consumer products.
The new smartphones will edge PDA:s out of the mainstream market (why have two devices?), but I do however think that PDA:s will have roles to fill in niche-markets for corporate users.
Palm would probably do best trying to retrench into devices that have more specific uses for the corporate and public sectors, such as wlan enabled (like the Tungsten C) PDA:s for warehouse workers, POS, healthcare etc.
Trying to compete with smartphones is a fools cause (and CEO:s ego cause) as long as they cannot keep up with Nokia, SonyEricsson, Motorola et al at their own game.
i think one Japanese girl hit something like 95wpm. ;)
The fact she's known for that proves not everyone is able to achieve those rates
Plus, there's a big possibility predictive texting would improve qwerty keyboard typing too...
Hey Palm: take a lesson from Jobs and cut back to three or four models max instead of seven. Focus on developement and not just marketing. Bring the prices down to something a little more reasonable like:
$100 for a Zire 31 with a 320x320 screen
$250 for a Tungsten C without the 802.11b
They also need to bring back something like the springboard for GSM, 802.11b, bluetooth, whatever. IMO palm is a real mess compared to their early days.
"And a voice was screaming: 'Holy Jesus! What are these goddamn animals?'" - HST
I think PDA:s will never reach the main-stream and may very well have seen their peak as consumer products.
Why would you say that? You might as easily say PDAs will eventually replace cellphones. They're already making PalmOs cellphones (the Treo 600 to mention one, have a look) and to me it makes more sense to have a PDA/cellphone than, say, a Nokia Communicator. I like the Palm way of doing things and have had a Palm for years so I guess I am biased.
To think they couldn't keep up with Nokia et al may be justified. That remains to be seen. I sure hope they will, because for most my needs Palm has been the right answer and Nokia most certainly has not.
I know PDAs are not selling as much as cellphones. But they ARE selling better than smartphones at the moment I think. To me that says people want a phone that is not too smart and prefer to use a PDA for stuff like that.
Sigs for Nerds. Sigs that Matter.
That's a pretty low resolution screen these days. The old Palm IIIc and some of the Treo's use it, but it pales in comparison to a 320x320 screen. Yeah it's color, but pictures look grainy at that resolution. $50 bucks more will get you a Sony Clie TJ27 or Palm Tungsten E with 320x320 screen. It's a better investment.
AnimeNEXT 2004 (NY/NJ/CT, June 18-20) "the next evolution of anime convention"
Such as:
- surfing the web via WiFi
- email
- viewing digital photos
- transferring from SD card to a microdrive
- listening to mp3s
- viewing video
- playing games (I'm thinking Chess here)
- viewing DivX that you've recorded with your PVR
- looking up maps
- looking up dictionaries
- storing and reading PDF manuals
I use my PDA for all of these things. Sure there are probably devices that can do some of these individual tasks better, but a PDA is a single general purpose device that can do all of these.
Meanwhile my m515 serves me fairly well, but the color screen - as you say - is of little benefit, drains the battery, and makes the unit both thicker and heavier than the Palm V, though not by much. All these new photo-taking Palms are even thicker and heavier. As far as I'm concerned (and I've used 3 different Palm organizers daily for the past 5 years) they're headed the wrong direction.
BUT this seem to cut off the air supply of some of the "Pro" versions.
They don't. Neither the 72 nor the 31 has that most essential feature in a palm--the Universal Connector.
I can't buy a Zire 72 and give my 71 to my wife, or buy her a 31, because the cradle, keyboard, and car charger all won't work.
And anyone who would buy a Tungsten knows that they'll be updated in about six months--probably with OS 6, to boot.