Smartphone/PDA watch thread!

[editor]

After six months with a MDA Compact (aka imate JAM) and using Windows Mobile 2003 I can honestly say I wish I'd stuck with the Palm platform and bought a Treo 650.

Although the Windows OS is high on features and gloss, the Palm was infinitely more usable, more intuitive and simpler to use.

If they sort out wi-fi in the next Treo for the Palm (not the windows version), I'm switching straight back.

There's tons more software available too.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Other than the usual office/email software what else did you use on the palm os?

 

[editor]

Other than the usual office/email software what else did you use on the palm os?

Blogging software, games, diary software - just about everything worked better on the Palm.

Sure, some of the apps weren't as slick - but for all-round general use, I've realised that the Palm just kicks the Pocket PC's butt.

Take your main diary/address book functionality. The class-leader on the Pocket PC is Pocket Informant, a hugely powerful PIM app with a ton of options. The equivalent on the Palm was Agendus and it was just worked so much better.

The same applies for the desktop app.

I loathe having to use the clunky beast that is Outlook and dream of going back to the lean and mean functionality of the Agendus desktop.

And when it comes to the file structure of Windows Mobile - wtf? It's indecipherably complex and every app seems to weigh in at about five times the size of its Palm equivalent.

There's things I love about my Pocket PC: the wi-fi, the battery life and the phone functionality, but things just seemed to be simpler on the Palm.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

I see. Never used palm software tbh but don't really need to blog on the go and have two portable gaming devices as it is! You're right about the wm pc ware being quite chunky in size though...

 

[the B]

Thought Treos of the future were going to switch to Windows Mobile and that the nails were in on Palm OS (which my brother is very disappointed about)

 

[Kid_Eternity]

there are rumours of a palm os treo coming out a little bit after the 700w...still doesn't look like we'll see a wifi treo anytime soon though.

 

[editor]

Thought Treos of the future were going to switch to Windows Mobile and that the nails were in on Palm OS (which my brother is very disappointed about)

I think everyone thought that the writing was on the wall for the Palm, but their Treo has been a massive seller - particularly in the States - notching up nearly a half million sales overall in the last quarter.

The Windows Treo 700 doesn't look as good - the screen resolution is much worse, for starters.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Very true but I aint interested until they use their noodle and add wifi!

(and get rid of that bloody ariel!)

 

[Piers Gibbon]

I have finally given up on waiting for the perfect device after my treo 270 died months ago

have got a palm treo 650, on vodafone, free

seems just fine so far

sad that it doesnt have wifi but at least I can get myself up and running (am a Mac user so didnt want to go windows which seems to be the other major option)

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Have you found the bluetooth restrictive? I read in a few places last year that it was crippled on the 650 (much to the annoyance of Treo fans).

 

[the B]

There are quite a few bits of software that cost only moderate amounts (ten, twenty?) to allow Mac to Windows Mobile exchange.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Which reminds me...a question for palm smartphone users; how easy is it to migrate from windows mobile to the palm mobile os in terms of syncing with your pc? If I decided to get a Treo later on in the year would it recognise my synced stuff (which comes up in Outlook 2003 at the mo)?

 

[editor]

Which reminds me...a question for palm smartphone users; how easy is it to migrate from windows mobile to the palm mobile os in terms of syncing with your pc? If I decided to get a Treo later on in the year would it recognise my synced stuff (which comes up in Outlook 2003 at the mo)?

Should be able to export the data into the Palm, no bother.

If a Treo comes out with wi-fi support, I'll be switching back to Palm as quick as you like. I can't believe how fiddly everything is on my Pocket PC and I defo regret switching platforms.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

How do you export to palm? I heard there are four different Treos coming out in the course of 2006. Rumoured to have wifi on the latter ones...

 

[Piers Gibbon]

Have you found the bluetooth restrictive? I read in a few places last year that it was crippled on the 650 (much to the annoyance of Treo fans).

um well I haven't heard that bt was restricted - have paired it with mac...but so far cannot send sms via address book which I could with an old sony ericson 610

 

[Piers Gibbon]

um well I haven't heard that bt was restricted - have paired it with mac...but so far cannot send sms via address book which I could with an old sony ericson 610

and by that I mean I can send sms from the phone but cant seem to send it via the address book on the mac

otherwise good

other Treo 650 annoyances:

will have to download some form of graffiti as this is no longer part of the palm os..weird

am loving Plucker which is a free ebook reader - gullivers travels at the mo......also using adobe's palm reader for pdf's is a great way of reading dull software manuals in dull moments

 

[editor]

am loving Plucker which is a free ebook reader - gullivers travels at the mo......also using adobe's palm reader for pdf's is a great way of reading dull software manuals in dull moments

They 'upgraded' the graffiti system, but everyone preferred the original. You should have no problem picking up the original.

Handstory is a great app for downloading mobile versions of websites on the move and Agendus is a 'must have' app!

 

[Piers Gibbon]

many thanks! will grab graffiti asap..but afaik there is not even an "upgraded" version on my treo or CD right now..so it seems they upgraded and then dumped it entirely from the core offering?....and yet they left the graffiti symbols in when you look at menus..gofigger

have also found there is a kludgy way of getting wifi on treo 650 right now

http://www.expansys.com/product.asp?code=120505

 

[Piers Gibbon]

aargh well I tried to install graffiti...but without an SD card you need some PalmRAM disky app that completely hosed my whole Palm...or maybe it was that app in conjunction with one of the others I was rushing to install

have zeroed and reinstalled everything slowly

arse

all fine now

its a reminder to take things real slow..one app at a time and minimise the number of hacky things I guess

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Been reading about the Treo a bit the last few days (mainly because of the Treo 700w just being released), if they were to drop the ariel, make it 3G, add wifi and a 2 megapixel camera I'd seriously consider switching to a palm os! I really like the keyboard and screen layout but that fucking ariel...sheesh.

Edited to add: There's a excellent (and not as biased as Treonauts) review of the 700w with comparisons to the 650 here.

 

[WWWeed]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/01/06/dualcor_cpc_pda_pc/

The company's cPC combines a Windows Mobile 5.0 system running on a 400MHz Intel PXA263 with Windows XP Tablet PC Edition running on a 1.5GHz VIA C7-M processor. Both processors take separate partitions of the machine's 1GB of DDR 2 SDRAM and 1GB of NAND Flash but share the 40GB hard drive, allowing documents created by one OS to be accessed by the other.

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Holy fuck!

 

[the B]

That is fucking boss

 

[Kid_Eternity]

It fucking should be at $1500!

 

[the B]

It fucking should be at $1500!

 

[Kid_Eternity]

Exactly. And while that translates to about £850 it's not a phone so no free/cheap price due to getting it on contract...at that price I'd rather get a laptop.

 

[Crispy]

All windows mobile users rejoice! Opera has finally been ported to your OS!

http://www.opera.com/products/mobile/products/winmobileppc/

Finally, a world-class browser for the pocketPC

 

[editor]

Opera Pocket PC mini- review:
http://msmobiles.com/news.php/4812.html

It's not freeware though

 

[Kid_Eternity]

That's still fecking good news though, I hate IE...

 

[Crispy]

K_E, how are you finding the vario after having it for a month? Any niggles? Happy with it? I'm still wavering on getting a smart phone, so I'd like to know how you're getting on with yours...