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Handhelds Hardware

Review of the Handspring Treo 251

Posted by timothy from the just-happy-to-see-you dept.
axlrosen writes: "Walter Mossberg of the Wall Street Journal reviews the new Handspring Treo, and loves it. 'For the past week, I have been carrying around a new hand-held, wireless device that is simultaneously the best personal digital assistant I have ever used and the most capable cellphone.'"
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Review of the Handspring Treo More

Review of the Handspring Treo

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  • joy (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Cinematique ( 167333 )
    another pointless cell phone. how about making the networks better before trying to make kick-ass phones?
    • I totally agree with you. While new phones might be cool and ABLE to access the internet (limited as they may be), the existing cell network was not designed to this, and as anyone knows who has surfed the web on a phone or similar device, it SUCKS. When they come out with a network with decent speeds for data, then things like this will b worth their price.

      I used to have a net-enabled phone. I found it so worthless I stopped using it. Everytime I tried to access something, it just takes forever. I have settled with the Motorola P935 Two-way pager/pda and am much happier.
  • Too bad that the color version won't be available to real consumers for ... how long? 2Q 2002?

    Ack!

    • Yeah, I would not even consider buying a cell/phone pda unless it was color and thinner than the treo.

    • Re:Too bad (Score:2, Insightful)

      by citizenv ( 75511 )
      You people crack me up. Contrary to your idealistic view, the vast majority of cellphones have simple monochrome screens. And while color PDA's (like Sony's N610C) are starting to get cheap enough to be widely used by average consumers (as opposed to 'prosumers'), many people still use monochrome PDA's. I have both a cellphone and monochrome PDA; the Treo makes perfect sense for consolidating the number of devices I need to carry around. Also, instead of having two different address books, I'll have all my contacts in one unified book. What's not to love?

  • Goodie (Score:4, Insightful)

    by TedCheshireAcad ( 311748 ) <ted@fUMLAUTc.rit.edu minus punct> on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:21PM (#2633457) Homepage
    I think we have to work more on improving cellular and digital networks around the country/world before we get excited over some fancy new phone that can make a 5 course meal if you press *2211. What good is a phone like this if you don't have service? I live in Connecticut, and my StarTac doesn't work in my house, at my office, intermittently in NYC streets, and never in a subway train. Cool phones are great, but more service would be better.

    • I honestly have no idea what you are talking about. Connecticut, I agree, is a wasteland. Mostly this is the fault of municipalities like Greenwich that don't want too many cell towers mucking up the multimillion dollar estate landscape. I have no problems whatsoever on NYC streets. I have Voicestream. SprintPCS seems to be mostly okay too, as far as I can tell (many friends of mine have it). I don't WANT cell phones to work in a packed subway train - it's just downright rude to have loud conversations on your cell phone on public transportation.

    • Re:Goodie (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Namarrgon ( 105036 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @07:20PM (#2633791) Homepage
      Who says it's a one-or-the-other choice? How does a fancy new phone being available exclude you personally from having good service?

      Why is it that, everytime something new is announced, someone always complains that this thing is no good because they don't have what they want yet?

    • Sorry to say, buddy, but you've got a shitty phone or a bad service provider. I suggest you switch one or the other, or both. My phone (a sweet little Nokia) works like a champ with Voicestream in places where my Ericsson with AT&T got zero signal bars. Hell, I can take calls in some of the shallower subway stations. But service in a subway train? That's only possible on the elevated trains: parts of the 7, F, N, 1-9, 4-5-6, J-M-Z and B, and probably on the LIRR and Metro North above aground, at least until we get leaky cell antennas in all the tunnels.

  • Yet another... (Score:2, Interesting)

    by ackthpt ( 218170 )
    Yet another one of these fine toys in a comoditized market. Heard on the way in that Palm is hacking off (or will be soon) another 18% of their workforce. I'm not complaning, mind you, far from it, but it's increasingly fascinating to see such a pace of innovation and roll-out while the cell phone and hand held markets are flat or imploding.

    I guess it's something like treading water until the boom comes back and everyone needs one of these again.

  • other hybrids (Score:4, Informative)

    by nate1138 ( 325593 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:23PM (#2633470)
    It's sad to see something like this just coming out in the US. This and the VisorPhone, and the Kyocera palm phone are really the only PDA/Phone combos available here. I had the Kyocera, and it was terrible. This just pales in comparison to iMode, even without the buggy 3G enhancements they just rolled out. When will we get some decent wireless data service?? Japan has color, video, IM, web, games, and just plain awesome looking phones, and we get a cell/palm hybrid. yeah......

    • Re:other hybrids (Score:5, Insightful)

      by WhyCause ( 179039 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:55PM (#2633678)
      When will we get some decent wireless data service?? Japan has color, video, IM, web, games, and just plain awesome looking phones, and we get a cell/palm hybrid. yeah...

      One thing you fail to realize, I (and others in the US, thus, partially, the lack of the option) don't want super-integrated, ultra-bitchin', mega-color, web-surfin' on a screen that is 2" by 2". What I really want is an easy way to hook my computer (whether that be a handheld, laptop, whatever) into my cell phone so that I can dial into any service I want, not just the distilled pablum that the cell-phone companies try to shove down my throat because someone paid them an ass-load of cash. I've seen the 'wireless web', and it's just ugly. I didn't even use it during the free trial period. God knows I'm not going to pay for it.

      I don't want integrated everything because something always gets left out in the process. Whether it's ease of use, ability to expand, ability to use it on a plane ("sir, you'll have to turn off your phone," what then?), easy to find batteries, what have you.

      Damn, where did all that vitreol come from. That was a little more brutal than I intended. The message is, however, clear. I don't care about having ready access to movies and audio and internet on my cell phone because I have much better means of accessing it already available virtually everywhere.

      • Well, that's you. I for one would like a medium screen sized unit, (like the lengthwise clamshell that nokia showed off), in color, with all the connectivity I could possibly ask for. And as for carrying around two devices, why bother when one (good) integrated unit can do the job with fewer pieces of crap to tote around with me. On top of that, iMode phones mostly have a java runtime, J2ME, that will allow me to write my own network apps to access whatever the hell I want, given the time to code it. Did you miss the fact that these units are wildly popular in places that have the infrastructure to support them?? Our networks suck and our providers don't give a damn that it sucks. And they aren't going to do anything about it until (IF) 3G rolls out. And given the problems NTT DoCoMo (arguably the worlds most competent provider) has had with it, I suspect it'll be at least 2 or 3 years before it hits here. I'm just sick and tired of all the cool toys going overseas because we are stuck with an inferior system....

      • Re:other hybrids (Score:4, Insightful)

        by MtViewGuy ( 197597 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @08:12PM (#2634009)
        One thing you fail to realize, I (and others in the US, thus, partially, the lack of the option) don't want super-integrated, ultra-bitchin', mega-color, web-surfin' on a screen that is 2" by 2". What I really want is an easy way to hook my computer (whether that be a handheld, laptop, whatever) into my cell phone so that I can dial into any service I want, not just the distilled pablum that the cell-phone companies try to shove down my throat because someone paid them an ass-load of cash. I've seen the 'wireless web', and it's just ugly. I didn't even use it during the free trial period. God knows I'm not going to pay for it.

        That is exactly why the iMode concept isn't going to fly in the USA. Who wants a screen that is essentially a tiny cartoon-like color display that is not that useful? For American cellphone users, they'd rather wait for larger displays with full Palm OS functionality on their 3G phones so at least the cellphone have some real functionality for a change. The other thing Americans will probably want is the cdma2000 digital cellular format so high-speed data transfers over cellullar connections (read at least 256 kilobits per second bi-directional) becomes useful for laptop users.

      • Re:other hybrids (Score:2, Interesting)

        by Sokie ( 60732 )
        I've seen the 'wireless web', and it's just ugly. I didn't even use it during the free trial period. God knows I'm not going to pay for it.

        You *obviously* haven't discovered WAP porn (or WAPr0n as I like to call it). My roomate has a WAP phone and WAPr0n is the coolest thing I've seen someone do with a cell phone.

      • Re:other hybrids (Score:2, Insightful)

        by singularity ( 2031 )
        I agree. I would much rather be able to hook my laptop or PDA up to my cell phone and use that.

        My current phone is a Samsung SCH-3500 on Sprint's network. I bought it because I read it got good reception and did everything I wanted it to - voice dialing, and Caller-ID I can see without flipping the phone open. It is also small enough that I can keep it in my pocket during the day.

        There is going to be a struggle to figure out what size screen everyone wants. If it is such a useful product (phone, PDA, etc.) that I am going to keep it on my person every hour of the day, it had better be small enough that I can do so comfortably. At the same time, if it is going to do everything, I want to do those things (browse the web, check contact information, and take notes) in comfort. This generally means a large enough screen and a decent input device.

        These two things are always going to be at odds with each other. About the only soultion I can come up with is either a highly-foldable screen or some sort of projection device (the hologram-type imaging you see in SciFi movies).

        I have my Samsung phone and my Handspring Visor Neo. Until someone comes up with a device integrating those those with the form-factor of the phone (or even smaller) and with the screen size of the Visor, I will stick with the seperate parts.
        • Two good reasons for integrating these two (at least for me):

          1. I wound up carrying both my Palm Pro and Qualcomm ThinPhone everywhere anyway, and I got tired of carrying two boxes around.

          2. After living with the Kyocera 6035, I would never, ever want to go back to a phone that didn't have all my contact information in it. *All* my numbers are at hand and dialable with a tap or two. I never wish I'd programmed another number in the phone or have to change it in two places. Sometimes integration doesn't provide real value - but here it does. Phone + Palm = BIG WIN
    • It's a GSM 900/1900 handset. So order one from the US and get it shipped to you. As long as you've got GSM 900 service (and you purchase a unit that's not simlocked), you'll be fine.

    • Re:other hybrids (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Cutriss ( 262920 )
      I'll bite. What makes the Kyocera 6035 so terrible? My girlfriend and I were looking at getting one for Christmas. Personally, we think the Treo is butt-ugly, and the Kyocera looks much sleeker and easier to work with. The VisorPhone is practically right out, unless you use the headset exclusively. But please - Tell me what's wrong with the Kyocera.

    • Re:other hybrids (Score:3, Informative)

      by dublin ( 31215 )
      I had the Kyocera, and it was terrible.

      You don't explain your complaint with it, but I've had one for a few months and it's quite simply the best and most functional piece of electronic gear I've ever owned. It's small, rugged, integrates phone and Palm functions quite well,is completely compatible with all the Palm software I use, some of which dates back to the original 1000 (only one program, ToDo+, needed a new version, free for registered users), and the batteries last darn near forever. If you took away all my electronics and computers one by one, the Kyocera 6035 would be the last thing left, and you'd have to fight me for it.

      By the way, there are other choices: Samsung has a new Palm phone out with a larger screen - the smaller screen is my only (minor) complaint about the Kyocera.

      I agree with others that say they don't want and won't pay for the ridiculous Japanese 3G foo-foo of movies and animated icons on a tiny screen. A faster data connection and a real web browser would be nice, but I can't think of much else I'd want. I'm not even considering the Linux-based handhelds for a while - It's nice to be able to get all kinds of things to run on them, but unfortunately, none of them are capable of doing the basics nearly so well as the Palm, so I'll stick with what works...

  • The Treo is a world phone. It works on the GSM standard and is equipped for use in both the U.S. and Europe. In the U.S., it will work with carriers like VoiceStream and Cingular.

    Yeah, GSM. So I spend $400-$600 on a cell phone/organizer, plus steep monthly fees for cell phone/internet access. And to top it off, I'm locked into GSM, which here in the USA isn't exactly the leading protocol.

    The Gardener

    • Incoming!! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by sphealey ( 2855 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:37PM (#2633551)
      Yeah, GSM. So I spend $400-$600 on a cell phone/organizer, plus steep monthly fees for cell phone/internet access. And to top it off, I'm locked into GSM, which here in the USA isn't exactly the leading protocol.
      Just to preempt the tidal wave of comments from our EC friends:
      • While having a single standard is a good thing, having competition among multiple technologies is also a good thing

      • Many US cell networks were built before GSM was created, and must provide legacy support for the older standards

        In terms of voice quality, no system out there beats the original Motorola analog

        While GSM is an impressive technical and political achievement, do remember that one of its unstated purposes was to prevent Motorola from dominating the EC mobile market the way it dominated the US, and to give Ericsson, Nokia, etc. a competitive edge. In this it succeeded, with assistance from poor management at Motorola of course

      sPh

      • Re:Incoming!! (Score:2, Insightful)

        by czardonic ( 526710 )
        having competition among multiple technologies is also a good thing

        In the early stages yes. But, in instances like this, the longer that "competition" persists, the more detrimental it is to the development of the market.

        As long as the standard is not controlled by a single entity (for its own profit), it is better to have a SINGLE standard.
      • In terms of voice quality, no system out there beats the original Motorola analog

        And of course, real audiophiles use grammaphone players and vinyl records. Hey, who needs this CD and DVD shit?

        :-)

        • And of course, real audiophiles use grammaphone players and vinyl records. Hey, who needs this CD and DVD shit?
          Well, I have always lusted after a vaccumn tube preamp ;-)

          Seriously, there is no law of nature that says that if there are two ways to accomplish a task, one analog and one digital, the digital way will necessarily be superior. Most of the advantage of programmable digital electronics lies in the greater flexibility of feature and manufacturing changes, not necessarily usability or quality improvements for the consumer.

          sPh

    • Re:Price (Score:2, Informative)

      by jyellis ( 225562 )
      The GSM model is coming out first. However, according to Palm Developers Program, the CDMA model is soon to follow. That will allow the phone to work with services such as Sprint PCS. So keep your pants on. Personally, its the best combo Palm/phone I've seen and I'm willing to switch to Cingular to free up a pocket.

      You say you have to pay steep monthly fees for cell phone/internet access. However, you pay only about $10/month more than normal cell phone service as opposed to paying Palm.net or something of the sort $20 or $30 a month for internet access for your Palm on top of your cell phone service. If $10/month is too steep for you, the Treo will still be a great combination of a Palm w/o internet and a cell phone.
    • I believe that several of the TDMA carriers are planning on switching to GSM over the next couple of years.

      Here's [yahoo.com] a ZDNet article from late October about Cingular's plans to do so; the article mentions that Verizon is considering doing the same:

      Analysts and industry insiders say the Cingular announcement Tuesday coupled with a possible switch by Verizon could swing enough new customers into GSM-based networks to ensure it remains the dominant global standard.

  • Point of View (Score:3, Insightful)

    by thinmac ( 98095 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:24PM (#2633474) Homepage
    My boss and I were looking at these this morning on handspring's site, and we came to the conclusion that they either look really good or really bad, depending on your point of view.

    For PDA users, this is great because it's smaller than you're PDA and it's also a phone, so you don't have to carry another device.

    Most phone users, though, don't have a PDA, so they won't get to carry fewer devices, and the form factor really sucks in comparison to the newer phones on the market. Plus, if a PDA was something they wanted to have, they'd have gotten one in addition to a phone already. Why carry something as bulky as my phone a year ago just to have a set of features I don't really want or need?

    For me, this looks pretty cool. For most of the people I work with, it's just bulky and expensive.

  • Dumb dumb dumb (Score:1, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    When will it be understood that this kind of phone is never going to be useful?

    Too big to be a good phone. Too small to be a decent PDA.

    It's a large clunky prototype of what is to come. I assure you the future isn't in handsets.

    • DUMBASS is more like it. (Score:3, Informative)

      by tekrex ( 88642 )
      What a dork, call this a flame if you want but have you even held one of these things??? Obviously not since you are complaining about how big it is. The Treo is a good bit smaller then the standard Nokia, which is the number one phone on the market. Heck, except for it's antenna, it's smaller then my wallet.

      Get a clue before you post. Some fool might think you know what your talking about.
    • I agree, the future isn't in the handsets, its in the wearables.

      But I disagree that the size should matter.
      Size doesn't matter, usage and implementation does.

      I believe we will see even smaller devices that will succeed, but not just for any application or in any environment.

      In the US and many other places you can forget about any 'real' data communication using a pda device until the service issue has been sorted out. But in Europe where GSM is good and you can almost smell the 3G networks, and Japan where the networks are extraordinaire, its the other way around. The service is there. We scream for devices that are not just a mobile phone with a game and some SMS features. Here the market are ripe, so if the American manufacturers wants some business, all they need to do is deliver the advances products and launch it here with the same initiatives they would have done in the States. But mark my words if they are not going for keeps they should rather stay away and leave it up to japs and eurotrash such as yours truely :)

      Here we have the service and even if the device is the size of a wristwatch, if only implemented with the right applications to suit the environment, it will rock the blueeyed danish and swedish blondes panties off.

      my favourite fantasy, should I have the opportunity, would be my own personal modified version of the wristwatch from IBM labs in Zurich which are equipped with microphone, bluetoothed earplugs, linux, sandisc flashcard, 1.3inches color display and camera combined with webservices applications for advanced management (and later on blessed with a projector or visor and 'virtual keyboard'). Even without the wishware in the parantheses you would have a client device that in collaboration with web services would give you so many new advantages to make you daily life simpler and more organized, that leaves you with more time for real fun.

      imagine the applications with the programmable device connected to the internet utilizing administration and communication software that sorts and organize all the information and makes it available to and for you, on your command.

      when the IBM wristwatch with linux was covered here on slashdot a while back I posted some of my fantasies as well and I made a small note about if IBM, Nokia, Ericsson should be interested, I would be happy to cooperate. Amazingly some good IBM professor from Zurich wrote me an email encouraging me to take contact. Greetings to you, if you should read this again. I would love to at least initiate some sort of communication regarding the subject. Unfortunately I lost your address when my thinkpad's harddrive suddenly said: NO MORE. so just to leave it up to mr. chance here is my address again: caspera@sophistic.com

      Why did I just write all this again?

  • phone/PDA integration (Score:1, Insightful)

    by Myko ( 11551 )
    No metion of how well the PDA and native phone functions integrate. The Kyocera Palm OS phone is BAD at this, as you can't dial numbers out of synced contacts.

    Anyone know how this unit handles this?
    • The Kyocera Palm OS phone is BAD at this, as you can't dial numbers out of synced contacts.

      Yes you can. I have one. You can do it either from the address book or from the jog rocker thingy on the side. It's how I call people.

      This thing likely works in a very similar fashion (I notice they also have the jog thingy on the side). Unfortunately, as so many people have already pointed out, CDMA is the ruling technology in the states, even if they're not yet close to 3G.

      I did hear an odd rumor about AT&T wireless perhaps moving from TDMA to GSM, but that's probably not reliable.

      The real problem with the kyocera is that it's basically an okay phone attached to an okay PDA. It does neither particularly well, and does integration slightly worse.

      That said, I wouldn't give mine up. Half the people I know only call me, and the other half only email me. And most of that time, I'm not at home or work.

  • design (Score:3, Informative)

    by Doppler00 ( 534739 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:29PM (#2633504) Homepage Journal
    I think the design is very well done expect for perhaps the keypad. I don't understand why they continue to arrange alphanumeric characters in a QWERTY arrangement on such a small keyboard, when a different layout would make much more sense. The auto word complete feature mentioned though is a good idea (Windows CE had this). Also, the resolution of the LCDs used in these things are very low and it makes text readablity difficult. That is one reason I prefer the windows devices (240x320 resolution) over the palm models. Finally, I believe that the ability to be able to access a document or search for information from anywhere is very important. If I have a question, I want to be able to go to Google and find the answer within 30 seconds. Will this be possible with the bandwidth and limited screen space that this device has?

    • ... is simple. It's what people are used to, and what they expect. I know exactly where to find a "A", or an "R", on a QWERTY keyboard. I don't want to have to re-learn this just for my handheld.

      • One of the major reasons that I got into computing is that I can't alphabetize for crap. Most people know intuitively whether W comes before or after T, but I actually have to think about it. However, after years of typing at a QWERTY keyboard QWERTY has become part of my subconscious. I can guarantee you that if they were to arrange the keys in alphabetical order I would quickly find myself singing the ABC song in order to find the 'M' key. That would be bad.

        And don't give me any crap about how "learning another keyboard layout is easy." I have tried. Apparently my brain is miswired for this sort of thing.

    • Have you seen the screen of the Sony colour CLIE models? It runs at double the resolution of the regular Palm, and it shows - the screen is just stunning.

      I saw it in Fry's and fell deeply in lust with it; pity I'm so good at losing tiny but horrendously expensive electronic devices ...

      D
    • >I don't understand why they continue to arrange
      >alphanumeric characters in a QWERTY arrangement
      >on such a small keyboard, when a different layout
      >would make much more sense.

      It makes sense to me. I'm a touch typist, and I absolutely refuse to use any keyboard that is not QWERTY, even if, no, especially if it's on a small device like this.

      Having to search for the letters is a pain in the butt, especially when the labels are so tiny. I know where the letter 'o' is supposed to be, so I shouldn't have to hunt it down on a non-standard keyboard.

  • ALMOST there (Score:3, Insightful)

    by MikeyNg ( 88437 ) <mikeyng AT gmail DOT com> on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:34PM (#2633535) Homepage

    Note to Handspring (and whomever else):

    Add voice recognition capability!


    How many people have phones now that you can add voice tags to people's numbers? This should actually be rather easy to implement in the Treo, I'd imagine. (I didn't see it explicitly stated in the review.) Imagine just saying someone's name, and their business card comes up and it asks you if you want to dial their number. Sounds like a winning deal to me.


    Other than that, add some Bluetooth or 802.11b capability in there. Then I can use this as an uplink for my laptop. Or I can beam business cards with RF instead of IR. Or imagine being able to zap someone your business card through SMS. That's another cool feature.


    These devices are ALMOST there. We're almost to convergence, and I think I'll wait a generation or two and take another serious look at it.

    • I think voice recognition is as useful with this device as it would be on a typical cellphone. By either jog-scrolling a couple lines, or even better, by typing the first couple characters on the device you have the name right there.

      I haven't used the cellphone feature before, but I'd be worried about calling my boss when some guy walking by me on the street happens to say "Dave". It's the same problem you run into using voice recognition in a busy office.

    • Re:ALMOST there (Score:2, Informative)

      by Karrade ( 137360 )
      >Or imagine being able to zap someone your business card through SMS. That's another cool feature.

      FYI Nokia phones already support this capability.
    • I don't know about bluetooth, but voice recognition needs a crazy amount of CPU oomph (to use a technical term). I could see it on an ipag, but on a 30something mhz dragonball? I don't want to say I don't believe it can be done, but I'm a little skeptical. Also, I seem to recall the PalmOS being designed for a PDA that would be running fairly lightweight, simple apps. Is that OS the right choice for a PDA if you want to do this? EPOC ER5 runs on PDAs with processing power similar to that of a high-end PalmOS machine, but also provides multitasking and better memory management.

      Just my uninformed, ignorant, kneejerk responses (as I'm sure dozens of people will be telling me very shortly.)
    • The Kyocera Smart Phone (6035) does this now, and it works quite well. Right down to asking you if you'd like to call so-and-so if it's not entirely sure what you said.) Although I don't know for sure, the new Samsung Palm phone probably has voice dialing as well, as most of thier regular phones have had it for some time...

  • Handspring limits (Score:2, Informative)

    by castellan ( 123741 )
    Treo: Great toy features
    - hardware keyboard (Treo 180) OR grafitti (Treo 180g) but no sense of which is cheaper.
    - 8 hour battery life: This seems short for either a cell phone OR a pda.
    - only GSM network -- great everywhere but US, where it can be called "OK" at best.

    It's not really there yet: only 16MB of RAM, not upgradeable, and no plans for a springboard module for EITHER additional RAM OR an MP3 player. Too bad: That would be useful integration!

    • Re:Handspring limits (Score:2, Informative)

      by Lish ( 95509 )
      hardware keyboard (Treo 180) OR grafitti (Treo 180g) but no sense of which is cheaper

      They cost the same. It's purely personal preference as to which you get.

      8 hour battery life: This seems short for either a cell phone OR a pda

      Where did you get that number? It's 2.5 hours talk time, 60 hours standby time, which is quite reasonable. Look here [handspring.com].
  • Well what can I say, SPH-I300 vs. Treo. I should think that SPH-I300 easily tops most any pda/phone currently on the market. Allbeit the I300 is not compatible with 3G networks, but come on we barely have 2.5 networks... lets face north-america is quite far behind when it comes to cellphone technology. I live in canada, and we have only one major GSM provider.

    I'd like to see this Treo mate with a SCP-6000 and see what happens. Also has anyone noticed the likeness between this Treo and the old Motorola I1000-plus phones. But its definately a step in the right direction.

    Fighting for Peace, is Like Fucking for Virginity.
  • This looks like a nice, solid product.

    I like the keyboard, I'm curious how the Graffiti works. Do you just write anywhere on the screen, or do you have to bring up a writing area?

    It's too bad they don't have a springboard slot. If this could take my Soundsgood MP3 player and my GPS it would really sweeten the deal.

    This looks like a great upgrade to my current Visor. I was going to get a springboard phone just before I ended up moving to North Dakota where Handspring didn't have coverage. If their coverage expands, this will let me finally stop having to carry a cell and a PDA.

    And 16MB of memory, lord what will I do with it all? I'm doing great with 2!

  • You must walk before you can fly (Score:5, Insightful)

    by fireboy1919 ( 257783 ) <rustyp AT freeshell DOT org> on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:40PM (#2633568) Homepage Journal
    This, like many innovations, is just another step. Handsprings are slightly more modular than other forms of PDAs, while still having the minimal power consumption associated with palm pilots.

    Many people, including myself, believe that the next frontier of technology is small, portable devices that communicate with each other wirelessly, though each device has a specialized function.

    In order to make that happen, we need to start with devices such as handhelds - which CAN be easily specialized through software, and which have readily available wireless capability.

    Its true that its "Just another handheld," similar to all of the other handhelds, but its more functional. Its not like another model car, which is exactly like the previous model, except that its "new and improved" (i.e. new and the current fashion); this is another piece of the puzzle.

    And IT DOES MATTER that its slightly more functional. The advent of the 386 chipset allowed a whole new class of problems to be solvable that where previously too slow to do research - I know that this is the case for my field, which is computer vision. As time progresses, even more problems are being researched.

    I'm looking forward to using technology such as this -perhaps even this model - in the near future (when it becomes pretty inexpensive - perhaps two or three years from now) as a module for home automation - it would be just about perfect for the purpose.
  • Its called the SL-5000D Zaurus PDA [sharpplace.com] and is currently for developers only.

    And yes, it does run linux (2.4 to be exact) along with PalmTop, QT, and Personal Java.

  • SprintPCS Service - Samsung SPH-I300 avaliable now (Score:5, Informative)

    by MooRogue ( 223321 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @06:44PM (#2633604)
    I just picked up the Samsung SPH-I300 avaliable with SprintPCS last weekend.

    It's a color PalmOS, 8MB memory which is shorter and narrower then my Palm Vx, though just slightly thicker. It does have the ability to dial from the sync'ed address book, and all the usual PalmOS features.

    And it's avaliable now, though you may have to search a little to find it at a SprintPCS store. From what I can see, it has all the features the Treo has and more, except the physical buttons

    More information on the phone can be found at http://samsungusa.com/i300/

  • Not really a world phone (Score:2, Informative)

    by JeffL ( 5070 )
    Once again, a bit shortsighted, because I can't believe this is a design limitation. The Treo comes in two models 900/1900 (US) and 900/1800 (Europe/Asia). There are 900/1800/1900 tri-band phones out there for much cheaper than $400...

    I can mostly deal with it being a GSM only device, and not have TDMA or CDMA, but calling it a dual-band world phone is pretty much an outright lie. Yeah, its a "world phone" if you never travel across oceans.

    I still might get one if the service plans are good, but being able to go to the UK and stick a £10 Virgin pay as you go sim card in it would make the thing a true winner.

  • I hadn't heard it until I went to Handspring's web site after reading the article, but a color version is due "mid 2002." It's the Treo 270. No real details other than it has a color screen and will be $599.

  • iPod (Score:5, Funny)

    by foo fighter ( 151863 ) on Thursday November 29, 2001 @07:05PM (#2633732) Homepage
    I think for their next iPod, Apple should add a couple features:

    1) Cellphone that works with all the cell networks
    in the world.

    2) 802.11x or whatever that new superfast wireless
    standard is that works with 802.11b, v.92 modem,
    Gigabit ethernet, and the LCD backlight should be
    able to blink morse code.

    3) Military GPS accurate to 1"

    4) A keyboard and also hand recognition (but not
    graffiti crap, REAL hand recognition). And voice
    recognition.

    5) It's screen should be color and widescreen
    format so I can watch my cracked DVDs on it.

    6) It should run linux, but have virtual machines
    so it can also run Palm and Windows apps. Oh, and
    a gameboy advance emulator.

    7) The battery should last at least a week,
    preferably two.

    8) None of this SDMI crap. I can put on and take
    off anything. In fact, it should have a video and
    audio in, so I can take input straight from my DVD
    player into the device and share them with my
    friends.

    9) It should be the same size it is now, and still
    use firewire.

    10) Flash card, Smartmedia, multimedia card and
    PCMCIA slots.

    Oh, and I won't pay more than $150 for it.

    That'd be cool! ;-)
  • I have a Qualicomm QPC it never leaves the cradle and it hasn't had service for almost a year now. You know the Qualicomm phone with the palm pilot in it.

    Battery life sucked, the unit expected to be placed on it's cradle 3-5 times a day (It will completely recharge in 30 minutes) and if you left digital land your freshly charged battery died within minutes on standby or seconds in a call.

    If this unit cannot give me 2 days without needing a charge (which means within 3 months it will need daily charging due to battery life loss) It is worthless.

    I really hope they have improved the battery life or at least offer a battery backpack for those of us that use a phone to death and dont sit at a desk most of the day.

  • My CIS teacher today was talking about using 802.11b in lieu of Excite@Home and what not (he may be getting cut off tomorrow.) That got me to thinking about an iPaq/Yopy (or any of the other linux/pocket pc capable PDA's), 802.11b PCMCIA/CompactFlash card and a VOIP application, all combined with a nice NAN (Neighborhood Area Network.)

    About 5 linksys WAPS ($139 a Piece on Pricewatch) would cover our entire campus (I have my own personal one but it just covers the dorm.) Anyway, carrying around a little PDA (or using your laptop) would give you nice voice/video/data as long as you were in range, spread those WAP puppies around the city and that would be pretty pimp. Imagine roaming with nice speeds anywhere in town.

    That brings me to the point where I am clueless. Can anybody help, how do you provide seamless transitions between WAPs? I'd hate to be downloading a file and wander out of one WAPs range, can another closeby pick me up seamlessly? (I know I can connect to either, but can it switch automatically without interrupting communcation?) Linux seems to usually be the most ahead in these types of bleeding edge apps... Anybody have any URLs?

    worldLOG [worldlog.com] Connecting the lives of friends and family.

    My sig, http://www.jdhodges.com [jdhodges.com]

  • Hrm, Treo [netdoktor.dk] is also a Danish pain killer.
  • Seemed ok. I agree with others that the networks around here need more improvement for these convergent devices to really take off.

    My main rant with this is the keyboard - too small for my tastes. Perhaps it's big fingers, but it was *not* very ergonomic for me, and that lowered my impression of the overall product. I had to really concentrate to work the buttons. I would probably rather fight the Graffiti system (or tap a virtual keypad) then try and punch on that keyboard. But then again maybe if you have small fingers, or really sharp nails, it might work good for you.

    I didn't see that new 'sideways' Nokia phone (at Comdex) with keys on either side of the screen (I'm sure it was there). But I would gather that *might* be better as the keys could be spaced a bit farther apart. Or, they could be close together and have more of them (which gives the same result). I'm not sure, I wish I spent the time to check that.

    Anyway, some food for thought for those of you with larger digits.

    - A non-productive mind is with absolutely zero balance.
    - AC

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