| | A draft post: For those who still use Xanga and have interest in Pocket PCs... I must admit that my Pocket PC gets little usage nowadays. How should I say this... Other devices have entered my life, such as my iPod nano and my laptop computer. How and why have they usurped the important place my iPAQ had in my life?
In the area of music, transferring and refreshing music on my Pocket PC had always been a slow and burdensome task. The transfer rates via the usb cable and Windows Media were simply abominable. My version of Windows Mobile (Pocket PC 2003 1st Edition) came with Windows Media Player 8/9 and didn't support the purchase of digitally rights management. At the same time, the iTunes music experience caused allowed me to slowly aquire a collection of music that could only be played on the iPod. It was a cleaner, simpler interface.
Connectivity was always a big reason I was enthusiastic about the Pocket PC. It could do everything. It sported a Skype Client, Internet Explorer, Flash, streaming and offline Windows Media and Real Media, a limited SSH client, and more. But, the wireless card I had was not built in, had weaker reception (understandably), and if used, would drain the battery for the rest of the day. In general, it was also limited by the low resolution and the increasing use of javascript unsupported on Pocket IE.
In the area of personal information management, some things just wouldn't synchronize and my use of outlook was slowly worn away with my conscientious use of Google Calendar. Soon, my appointments appeared on my iPod because of the iCal export features of GCal and were too tedious to enter a second time onto either my PC to be synchronized.
And, when it came down to it, my pockets got too small for the Pocket PC and my phone and my wallet. What about all the other things the pocket pc can do? Mobile Office Document creation? Third-party applications? Video viewing?
Video viewing was inhibited by the same slow transfer rates I had for my 256MB secure digital card, but for mobile productivity and creation, I bought a bluetooth wireless keyboard. Unfortunately, I think in trying to get the fastest transfer rates with my PC, I put the PPC's bluetooth radio too close to that of the my USB dongle and burned out the radios such that the reception is weak and unstable. That caused typing on the keyboard to be slow and tedious in addition to the fact that the keyboard required practice as it sacrificed the number/symbol row for larger keys.
In October, I bought a laptop, realizing that to remain productive anywhere I went I needed a laptop as the 24-hour computer lab was no longer a short sprint away. This effectively relegated the Pocket PC to situations where I needed instant information my iPod couldn't supply.
What will be my relationship with handhelds in the future? I was at a Circuit City recently and was very impressed with the responsiveness of the hp rx1955. It has Windows Mobile 5.0 (PPC Edition), built-in wifi, a Samsung 300 Mhz processor, 32 MB ram and 36 MB flash ram. Most hardware specs besides the built-in Wifi was worse than my current pocket pc (which has built-in bluetooth), but overall, it seemed to perform better. The software was better by a long shot, with a rotating screen for landscape view, upgraded versions of Pocket Word, Excel, Outlook, and Powerpoint, as well as a sup'd up version of Internet Explorer. Memory management is also supposed to be better. Of course, it's also lighter and smaller.
With each iteration on Pocket PCs, I convince myself that there is a killer feature that will make all the old inhibitions melt away. My current iPaq had an interchangeable battery and more efficient power consumption that'd let me use it for twice as long. The new pocket pcs have integrated connectivity and often have built in keyboard input. In a world where nothing is perfect, simply demonstrated by the innovation that continues to take place, when do we settle and where can we compromise?
For some, their approach is early adoption. A more affordable approach is that of finding what's most appropriate in the present. There are several people who have purchased computers with knowledge of the pending Apple MacBook release, myself included. Thankfully, I have used my laptop sufficiently in the last 7 months effectively to the point where I have no regret.
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| | Posted 5/23/2006 4:11 PM - 116 Views - 2 eProps - 2 comments
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