Review of the Handspring Treo

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.'"

joy

another pointless cell phone. how about making the networks better before trying to make kick-ass phones?

Too bad

Too bad that the color version won't be available to real consumers for ... how long? 2Q 2002?

Ack!

Goodie

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.

Re:Goodie

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?

Yet another...

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

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

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.

Re:other hybrids

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.

Price

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!!

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

Point of View

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

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.

phone/PDA integration

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?

design

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?

ALMOST there

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.

Handspring limits

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!

Samsung I300 vs. Handspring Treo

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.

Looks great.

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

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.

Sharp's new PDA just released

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

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

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.

Color coming mid 2002

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.

Good thing...

Every Treo communicator comes with Blazer(tm)--the award-winning wireless web browser

Good thing: If this trend with 'web-browser in your hand computer thingy' catches on, perhaps sites starts providing pages which I can surf without resorting to Netscape 4.5:s "future proof" mode (view source, cut, paste).

Why Netscape 4.5? In digital unix you kind of take what's offered to you... :-)

iPod

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! ;-)

Antennas - A Pet Peeve

&ltrant&gt
Why do cell phones and these things have external antennas? It's not as if the case is metal. I'm sure they could find enough room inside the case to place that stubbly little wart of an antenna if they really wanted to. (Say along the edge of the flip up lid.)
&lt/rant&gt

Handwriting recognition. (OT?)

Rant: Handwriting recognition. It'll never work. It can't ever work. People can't read my handwriting. I can't read my handwriting and consequently I've given up doing it for anything more important than a shopping list. And I usually fail to get something at the shops for exactly this reason.

I like that PDA's are sprouting keyboards, and I like the idea of attempting to use a Zaurus or similar for my email, but I'll probably be waiting for a Symbian based phone+pda combination. Once again, bring it on, the money's sitting in my bank account waiting for you to make things that don't suck.

Dave

Nice but what's it's battery life?

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.

Neat idea, but...

Cell-phone/PDA combos are a neat idea, but until there is a major advancement in display technology, either the phone is going to be too big or the screen is going to be too small. Not even the whiz-bang new Japanese phones address this.

Most interesting innovation from the PDA market

This is probably the most interesting innnovation from the PDA market for a long time now. The launch of the new PocketPC from MS is not that nice to begin with, it was basically a non events.

Speaking of lack of Innovation, Palm has been doing nothing but staring at the wall for the past year, I am one of those that own a m505, it's cool but it is but no means innovative.

Palm was suppose to come out the Palm m705 (bascially a smaller form vector version of the illfated Palm VII), I am pretty sure they canned that thing probably because when they see Tero is going to murder it like crazy.

Tero is an innovative PDA/Phone hybird, not because they understand the lack of graffit, form factor, ease of use is the key for that market segment.

Now, I have a question to ask, unless you are a diehard Tero fan without a PDA, why don't you just get a really crappy cellphone then hook it up to your PDA? It's probably cheaper too.

PDA/802.11b/VOIP instead of cell phone(s)

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]

Samsung SPH-I300

I picked up a Samsung SPH-I300 at my local Best Buy two weeks ago, if for nothing else because the sales drone offered me 24 months 0% financing and the Sprint rep was willing to throw in 2 free Palm M100s and a $30 rebate. It was a sweet deal for a sweet... phone... or is it a PDA? Hard to say really. And I think that's where these convergence devices are going to be stuck just until they figure out exactly what it is they want to be.

I'm not saying that I don't love my SPH-I300, because I really do. It's a really wonderful little Palm (160x240, Virtual Graffiti, slim form factor, weighs around 6 oz.) and being able to check my e-mail and have (albeit slow) wireless web access is really an amazing thing. But it certainly doesn't excel as a phone. It's not nearly as durable or as tiny as I like my phones and the virtual keypad is, well, not as good as a real thing.

It is, however, a good compromise for those of us that need a PDA and have very limited phone use -which, in my opinion, is really the only market for these $500 PDA-Phone combos anyway. If you're looking to buy one of these devices and are expecting to get a phone with PDA capabilities, you're bound to be disappointed.

Against headaches?

Hrm, Treo [netdoktor.dk] is also a Danish pain killer.

Saw one at Comdex already.

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

I want one

The Treo is a really cool device, but you'll have to make some decisions: Keyboard or graffiti pad, get it now or wait for the color screen.

Probably i'll never get one, I'm from Holland and all of the cool stuff isn't available here: You can only buy an AIBO directly from Sony, I can't find the Kyosera Smartphone anywhere and my guess for the Treo is that I won't be able to get my hands on one.

Remote Control

I'm surprised that there is nothing out on the market for this device as well as any other wireless PDA that would allow remote control of a PC. Something like PC Anywhere running on a device like this would be very useful. I know Carbon Copy (now out of business) had a version that would run on Windows CE devices, but I never heard much about it. Does anyone know of any other programs that would allow wireless remote control of a PC.

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

And still we have hands-free device laws in exactly zero states.

Not true. [msnbc.com]

Re:$399

This wasn't funny as a comment on the 3Com story, and it's not funny here.

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

I only wish that companies like Handspring would consider the impact of their actions before unleashing something like this on innocent commuters.

I do agree that driving while distracted is a bad thing. I curse at more cellphone yakking drivers a day than anything else. But to say that the manufacturers of the device are to blame? I can't abide by that logic. The devices aren't to blame, it's the stupidity of the user. I tried talking on a cell phone and driving ONCE...and I realized how my driving suffered, so I never did it again. It seems some people are unable to make that logical jump, or they're unwilling to sacrifice that "convenience" to possibly save their life or someone else's.

Aside from that part of the argument, I don't see how a Treo makes the situation worse. Cell phones already exist, as do PDAs. Any of the above behavior is already out there, and I don't think the Treo's audience is Joe Blow. Most average folk won't pony up $400 for a phone when (insert phone company name here) is giving them away with service. Two handed dialing? Maybe that'll make em realize how stupid phone use and driving put together are when they can't dial without releasing the wheel.

Re:But does it do Linux?

Uhh... first of all it's not out yet, so it probably hasn't been hacked, second, I (and I think most people) don't care what OS my phone/pda uses as long as it is easy to use and intuitive.

An operating system is just a platform. Who care's about the platform on something that only has a few functions? personally I would rather have it run Palm OS rather than linux because I know Palm has a very nice and stable OS, and there are tons of programs for the Palm. Why you would put linux on something like this is beyond me.

Re:But does it do Linux?

I really don't get it. I spent the last year getting my oven and fridge run linux. Finally, this thansgiving dinner, I astounded everyone when I typed

tar -xzf /fridge/turkey.tgz /
&& echo 380 > /proc/oven/preheat /
&& cat turkey > /dev/oven

e Voila! dinner is done without me entering the kitchen.

And you're telling me you don't care!?

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

No state may have such laws, but many cities do.

And while I hate the idiots that are talking on the phone while they're driving, you also have to face the facts. Wish I could find a reference, but on the news around a year ago, I saw some statistics about the apparent causes of accidents. Number one cause was food, at 21%, I believe. Futzing with the radio was at 11%, methinks. Should there be laws against eating while driving, or having a stereo which has no on-wheel controls?

Re:This is still cooler...

You haven't been nice, according to my list.

Coal for you this year.

Dancin Santa

Re:$399

Glock 21 .45ACP

at least that's on my list....

or

PS2
Grand Theft Auto 3
Metal Gear Solid 2

Yeah baby.

Re:$399

Polls don't belong in comments. They belong in the... poll section. You're not funny. It wasn't funny the first time in the 3com article.

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

So did you actually read the article you linked to? It gives a few good reasons why cell phone usage in cars should not be banned.

Re:But does it do Linux?

Uhhhh.....I'm not good at math or english but that looked like two questions to me.

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

> Does anyone know how hard it would be to make a
> cell phone deactivate itself if it starts
> moving faster than 40 miles per hour? Could you
> perhaps triangulate the three nearest PCS
> towers?

Yeah, and when I'm on a train or am the PASSENGER in a car, what good is that?

Then again, on the train, i wish people would shut the **** up!

Re:And only $400 to $600!?

And I reserve the right to castigate you for not selling your computer and disconnecting your ISP in order to divert the money to the homeless, as your doctrine apparently states you should.

When you're no longer posting on Slashdot I'll believe that you've lived up to the courage of your convictions ;-)

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

Oh, puh-lease.

The accidents that can be shown to have been caused by cellphone usage are still a tiny fraction of accidents. Most studies I've read say it's something like 2%, which is far below a lot of other distractions. If you're going to outlaw cellphone usage, how about:
- Talking to others in the car. (I see people so into a conversation they're all over the road).
- Eating/Drinking.
- Fiddling with the stereo.
- Putting on makeup
- Shaving.
- Driving while tired.
etc...

Hell, you can buy a car with a fucking TV in it these days! How screwed up is that? And don't tell me it's just for the kiddies in the back seat, I've seen plenty of models where the TV is far enough forward that it could easily be a distraction to the driver.

How about people start taking some responsibility for their actions for a change? If you can't handle a phone and drive at the same time, then don't do it. I know that I can, as long as it's a short conversation that doesn't require much thought (i.e. I'm going to the store, need anything?).

Cell phone usage in cars when related to accidents is getting a horrible rap for 2 reasons:

1. Yes, some buffoons can't handle the phone and drive... then again, there's a pretty damn high percentage of people on the road that can't drive worth a damn even without distractions. I'd rather get those people off the road before outlawing cellphones.

2. The cell phone users are the easiest to see in comparison to most other distractions. It's really easy to see them holding a phone up to their ear for minutes at a time.

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

What we really need to do is have a bright red light on the back of all new cars that would warn others around them that they are talking on a cell phone. I would steer clear of anyone with the light on.

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

Actually, New York has become the first to implement a statewide ban [nysdmv.com]

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

In NY, using a cellphone in a car without a handsfree kit is illegal, or at least that's what they say on those signs above the highways in the NY Metro area and points east. Of course, this is pretty much unenforceable since there are so many loons doing it (including NY State police!).

I do share the concern from a commuter's point of view, however. My motorcycle is my primary mode of transportation, and I've had my share of close calls from cell-phoning oblivious idiots. There's nothing like a 2-ton cage bunting you onto the shoulder to ruin that nice-day-life-is-great feeling on a sunny morning.

Re:Idiot (RANT)

Jerkin!

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

Sorry to say this but the idiot in front of you on his cell phone will just find something else to do if you remove it from his use. It's not the cell phone that's the problem, it's his complete lack of moral development.

He doesn't understand that there is anyone else out there besides him. Laws about hands free don't solve the crux issue which is his lack of morals. He's not thought about and understood consequences of his decisions...or he doesn't care.

I'm going to not talk on my phone because when I become distracted I might kill someone through my reduced reaction time

So while you might solve the preceived issue through legislation... you will not solve the issue which is that people don't think about the consequences of their actions when they are behind the wheel.

For Instance take these examples...

the guy who went flying around the curve on I-95 below Hanscom Field in the inside lane at 85 on my way to work this morning seems to have a similar problem...

Or the Saab who did the four lane sweep out of US3 onto 128...

Or the lady with her kids bouncing around in the back of her minivan on rte 62 yesterday afternoon...

Or the guy I watched eating a burger as we were both going through the Hooksett tolls on Saturday...

or mayhaps the State Trooper on the Pike last thursday who while seeming in no legal rush was flying West from Allston-Brighton at 80+ MPH suspicously close to shift change...

Or mayhaps the owner of the El-Camino with Maine tags I parked next to at Dunkin' Donuts this morning that had bald tires...

Or mayhaps the low riding, detailed out Ford Contour with the stereo pumping out the latest hip-hop jam I had the joy of sitting next to at a light in Woburn a week past on a warm day...

Laws about hands free don't solve the issue that these drivers got their licenses out of cracker jack boxes and obviously didn't learn the potential impact of their actions.

Personally I didn't really realize myself until years after I got my license. I mean I knew it intellectually... and I follow the law... but it did not sink in on that gutt level.

For me the transition from an intellectual knowledge to that gutt knowledge happened when I watched from a house in Castine Maine the Hancock County Mounties scrape a young kid off a guard-rail on Maine Route 166 when he tried to take his bike around a steep curve at 110 while inebriated. People just don't realize till it affects them. I really think we should make it a requirement for kids getting their license to help clean up one traffic accident.

So while cell phones usage while driving may be a great campaign issue for politicians in seach of re-election (calling Swifty). It side steps the real issue which is that many drivers on the road today (and not just those in New England) don't really have a sense of what the impact of some of their preceived minor actions might be, the loss of their lives or even more sadly some innocent bystanders

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

Since it's too much for most people to THINK before they post, i know it'll be impossible to get people to research before they post. NY has a hands free cellular law.

Slashdot, where strong opinion trumps logic and reason.

Re:But does it do Linux?

Because it's Free (as in speech), powerful, and extendible. Your opinions of Linux asside, many people do care about putting linux on device, especially if they can interface with there computers.

Imagine hooking up you PDA to your home/office computer network as just another system,. Imagine not only running the same commands, but the same programs you run everyday on your home/office computer on your PDA! And then imagine customizing your PDA to do whatever you want. You know that little pet peeve you have with the way the software works? The way this or that iss designed? Well, you can get rid of it!

Re:Oppenheimer's Ghost

Does anyone know how hard it would be to make a cell phone deactivate itself if it starts moving faster than 40 miles per hour? Could you perhaps triangulate the three nearest PCS towers?

I doubt it would be that hard since if you are going 40MPH you are probably changing cells pretty quickly and you can base it on that. However it is a bad idea. Why are you preventing the passengers from using the phone? Or the guy that got kidnapped and stuck in a trunk?

Re:but you can't use it on a plane!

This WSJ article [wsj.com] says "You can also run the organizer functions with the phone functionality turned off..."

You just have to convince the flight attendant.