Looking to buy PDA/Pocket PC

[newbie101]

I am in the market for buying a PDA/Pocket PC. I will be using it mostly for organization in for classes, taking notes, internet, instant message, email, ect but school and note taking will be the most important. What should I buy i am looking for something between $250 - $400 any suggestions?

[thefultonhow]

Note-taking on a PDA is not an easy thing to do. I'd recommend getting a used laptop on eBay, or saving up for a new one, if you want to take notes.

[sgtspector]

Get a digital recorder. My wife has an olympus that records lectures and then can be downloaded into a laptop for storage with a usb cradle. You can than make cd's that you play anytime to hear the lecture over again. I dont know how accruate it would be since i've never used one but a speech to text program could even type your notes for you.

[Panama Red]

Last Christmas I bought my daughter a Palm Tungsten E and a keyboard accessory that folds up for easy transport. The Palm sits in the keyboard cradle and uses the infrared signal to connect the keyboard. It came with MS Word and Excel installed so typing files and transferring them to her other pc's is a snap. Not only is a great for scheduling (she's a nursing student and works at a local hospital) but she also uses it like an iPod. The Palm accepts an SD card as a plug-in so she just downloads the songs she wants to listen to using her computer's card reader onto the SD, plug it into the Palm, plug in the headphones and she's good to go. I don't know about email or IM'ing with a Palm tho.

[thefultonhow]

Originally Posted by Panama Red I don't know about email or IM'ing with a Palm tho.

That's what I get for not reading the post properly -- I miss stuff!

Newbie, it sounds like you really want a laptop but don't want to pay the extra money. None of those functions you outlined except the organizer one work well on a PDA.

[Panama Red]

Originally Posted by thefultonhow That's what I get for not reading the post properly -- I miss stuff! Newbie, it sounds like you really want a laptop but don't want to pay the extra money. None of those functions you outlined except the organizer one work well on a PDA.

And here I thought you were the Gadget Man, Fulton!

[thefultonhow]

Originally Posted by Panama Red And here I thought you were the Gadget Man, Fulton!

Well, in this case the Gadget Man can't. This is a job for Laptop Man.

[kstatefan40]

I've been very happy with my Tungsten E2 for school note taking. With the external keyboard, it really works well. I listen to MP3s, type notes, assignments, I can check my email via bluetooth, IM my friends with another app over bluetooth.

The total cost around $500: E2, Keyboard, 512MB SD card, and a linksys bluetooth adapter.

[Statica]

Palm? Isn't that company saying that they were wrong all along? hehe Treo with Windows Mobile .. other PDA's with RIM? Sorry, after my experiences with Palm, I have a hard time recommending them at all .. go with something that has Windows Mobile or Symbian would be my suggestion.

[kstatefan40]

Originally Posted by Statica Palm? Isn't that company saying that they were wrong all along? hehe Treo with Windows Mobile .. other PDA's with RIM? Sorry, after my experiences with Palm, I have a hard time recommending them at all .. go with something that has Windows Mobile or Symbian would be my suggestion.

What problems have you had? All the stuff on my E2 seems rock solid. Just curious what you didn't like.

TT

[Statica]

The OS by itself is very solid .. but introduce any 3rd party app into the picture and things become extremely flaky. But this is true of nearly every Palm environment I've been in. While I do realize that this could be an issue with the software mfger than the platform, Palm is still one of the easier mobility platforms to write to... and yet experiences more crashes than any other port of the program. I also dont like the fact that a lot of these crashes take down the system. If you can believe it, I've had palm devices (v.4.xx) that required more resets than my Win 98 From my experience, accessories are always more dicey to recognize on a palm device than with any other PDA I've ever owned. Honestly, every palm I've worked with, has been adequate at a number of tasks but never good at it... most, required too much coaxing and cajoling. I havent had that experience with the alternatives.

I just find it funny that after years of trying to take over a blossoming market of combining a PDA+Phone with the "merger" with Handspring, I find it funny that the Treo wants to feature a Microsoft or a Blackberry OS

[pillainp]

Try the Palm LifeDrive. It has a 4 GB Hard Disk and works pretty well as an organizer, MP3 player and video player. It also has voice recording (I just recorded 2 hours worth of meetings today, and that is with about 1 GB of songs on the hard disk).

It also comes with Bluetooth and Wi-Fi built in, so you can surf the web as well.

Another huge advantage as far as I am concerned is the fact that it can be used as a portable hard disk.

Sure it's a little expensive, but for me, well worth the price.

[doctorgonzo]

Funny, I'd say just the opposite. I've had very few problems with Palm devices, but lots of problem with devices based on a Windows Mobile platform. It is mainly due to the environment we have here: we use Groupwise for our groupware software, and it is easy to sync Palms and Groupwise using Intellisync software. However, getting any Windows-based PDA to talk to Groupwise was a huge problem. Sure, it's a unique situation, but that's my experience.

I'd recommend a lifedrive too. A user just bought one of those and is very happy with it. The Wi-Fi is a very nice feature.

[pillainp]

Also, the LifeDrive takes SD/MMC cards, so in case you aren't satisfied by the space the HDD offers, you can pop in a card and expand up to 6 or 8 GB.

Music playback is pretty good and the screen is very nice.

[thefultonhow]

Originally Posted by Statica If you can believe it, I've had palm devices (v.4.xx) that required more resets than my Win 98

Well, my Treo 650 (PalmOS 5) has only required two or three resets since I got the initial configuration worked out, and that was nearly two months ago. There are certainly applications that make the platform unstable, but the trick is not to run any of them. Including the preinstalled apps, I have 55 apps installed, and none of them gives me all that much trouble -- the worst they do is not perform as advertized; they rarely make the system unstable.

Frankly, though, I still think a cheap laptop will serve you much better than a PDA for taking notes.

[newbie101]

I have a laptop, i want something smaller, more mobile. Laptop is great but the desks in the classes are so small the laptop takes the whole thing up. i really want a tablet PC but cost way too much. nevertheless, i want a decent mobile device. I was looking at an HP for about 270 and an Asus for about 350. I just want to know some good ones to get.

oh and mp3 player is nice also.

what about note taking with a stylus? hand writing it that is.

any suggestions?

[Floppyman]

I'm very content with my Dell Axim X30. Lately Dell has had a lot of sales of the X50 (slightly nicer) for around $300. HTH

[Statica]

The Dell's are great devices; so are the Asus'. HP/Compaq is, of course, the traditional player with a very successful line of Ipaqs

Personally, handwriting is not really a very effective way of taking notes if you're faced with volume and speed .. a key point here or there quickly is fine, but extensive note taking is much better done with a pen and paper or a keyboard. While I dont cling to the old notions, and I do use technology extensively, I find that there nothing out there that can replace the free form of a sheet of paper.
For a lecture setting, I find that the recording feature is more useful than an MP3 feature .. subject to obtaining permission from the speaker.

[Floppyman]

Originally Posted by Statica The Dell's are great devices; so are the Asus'. HP/Compaq is, of course, the traditional player with a very successful line of Ipaqs Personally, handwriting is not really a very effective way of taking notes if you're faced with volume and speed .. a key point here or there quickly is fine, but extensive note taking is much better done with a pen and paper or a keyboard. While I dont cling to the old notions, and I do use technology extensively, I find that there nothing out there that can replace the free form of a sheet of paper. For a lecture setting, I find that the recording feature is more useful than an MP3 feature .. subject to obtaining permission from the speaker.

I agree. I can actually type faster than I can write so I prefer taking a laptop into lectures to take notes when I can.

[newbie101]

i prefer typing as well, but i am not a huge note taker anyway. I listen and read the book and jot down some things. I never have sheets and sheets of notes. I just have a small problem with organizing paper and just want to get rid of paper all together

[thefultonhow]

Originally Posted by newbie101 I just have a small problem with organizing paper and just want to get rid of paper all together

You're going to have to get a sheetfed scanner for that as wel, because of the fact that teachers love to give out handouts.

[newbie101]

i am looking into that as well...

Can anyone should me accouple of decent models

i dont want to spend over $400 if possible

[azscary]

You may want to check out the UTStarcom XV6700. They bought out Audiovox, or they merged or whatever.

The keyboard slides out from the side instead of the bottom and when it opens the display automatically switches to landscape.

You can hold it in both hands and thumb type the keyboard. It has WiFi, Bluetooth, CDMA and IR.

It is also running the new Windows Mobile 5 Platform.

http://www.evdoinfo.com/The_News/Lat...n_20051104617/

[LocoCoyote]

Originally Posted by thefultonhow Note-taking on a PDA is not an easy thing to do. I'd recommend getting a used laptop on eBay, or saving up for a new one, if you want to take notes.

I disagree! I am (granted) a relativly new owner of a IPAQ hx4700 and I use it to take notes all the time. In fact, I find the ablility to jot down anything (be it a quick drawing or a telephone number,etc) to be worht the price of the thing alone.

I am currently using the provided note taking feature in conjunction with MS Onenote on my work desktop. Onenote downloads any note I made automaticly, giving me a copy on both devices.

There is also a voice recording option that I haven't played with much yet.

[Mac Medic]

I had a lifedrive for about a week and then returned it, I'm too used to PPC I suppose and had all my software already. It was a good device though, except I find the OS limiting compared to PPC's multitasking abilities. Plus the lifedrive bluetooth stack seemed to have DUN crippled, I couldn't get my Razr to connect via GPRS no matter what I tried. The digital camera SD card transfer software was fantastic but not enough to keep me interested, so I'm back to my ipaq 5555 which does everything I need, it's even a media remote for my Powermac over wireless and surprisingly syncs perfectly with my powerbook using pocketmac.

[Mac Medic]

oh I forgot, the new Palm Treo is going to be a Windows Mobile device and looks pretty sweet so far. Should be available this year from what I have seen.

[thefultonhow]

Originally Posted by Mac Medic oh I forgot, the new Palm Treo is going to be a Windows Mobile device and looks pretty sweet so far. Should be available this year from what I have seen.

Early next year; I've heard late February, early March. It doesn't have built-in WiFi, but other than that I think it's really cool. Hopefully they'll fix some of the limitations of the 650, like low volume over a BT headset, no voice dial, an no MP3 ringtones (all of those are third-party apps on the 650).

I'll still stick with my 650 until the Treo 800 comes out though. The 650 is working fine and does what I need it to do, although the reception is not the best (on par with my old Kyocera POS phone).