Palm Tungsten Models Reviewed 211
Jason Weill writes "MSNBC has a slightly premature review of Palm's brand-new Tungsten models. These models, currently (as of 11:10 PM EST Sunday) unavailable on Palm's own web site, are the Tungsten T and Tungsten W. The Tungsten T includes a fold-out Graffiti area, new cross-key keypad, 144 MHz ARM processor, Palm OS 5, a 320x320 full-color screen, and 16 MB of on-board RAM. At $499, it's more expensive than most handhelds currently on the market. The Tungsten W replaces the Graffiti area with a thumb keyboard and includes GSM/GPRS phone capabilities. Unlike the Handspring Treo devices, the Tungsten W only works with a handset -- you can't put it up to your ear. The Tungsten W will cost $549, although most American service providers will subsidize at least part of the cost. These models will officially be unveiled Monday, October 28."
Another Review Here (Score:5, Informative)
Looks nice, but I don't see myself replacing my PalmIIIc yet (c'mon... someone make a non-Sony Palm that's as compelling!)
Stowaway XT AKA Palm Ultra-Thin (Score:5, Informative)
Finally... (Score:4, Informative)
I think Palm OS 5 will be a winner, as long as it does its mainstay well, while adding on some new features and doing those well too. In other words, it does all the organizing you need it to do and it puts that ARM to use.
The only problem I see with the T is the sliding mechanism. Anytime there's physical movement involved with a product like this, you have to wonder how long it'll last. If it's nice and durable, there goes my one complaint about the T. If it's really fragile, users won't like that much at all.
Myself, I hope to get one of these things after they come down in price.
Hey it wasn't FAKE (Score:1, Informative)
Keep it comming...
Re:Wow (Score:2, Informative)
Don't buy into the megahertz myth. Just because the clock speed is greater means nothing. I'd still bank on the pentium.
Until recently [embedded.com], ARM chips designed for handhelds didn't do harware floating point math!
Tungsten W (Score:2, Informative)
However, the URL for Tungsten W is pretty easy to guess - http://www.palm.com/products/handhelds/tungsten-w
Sounds good... I guess (Score:5, Informative)
What I have always liked best about Palm PDAs is that they run forever on their batteries. Palm is claiming the new device is good for a week of typical use, but how much is that? The InfoSync [infosync.no] review notes that under a torture test, the battery life was a little under 3 hours.
I was pleased to read that the emulation mode runs current PalmOS programs fast enough. Recompiled applications should be very fast.
While in many ways it sounds tasty, I don't really want one right now. And the price is going to need to fall in half before I'll even consider it.
steveha
naive (Score:4, Informative)
My Palm m505 already has video clips on it, thanks to MGI's PhotoSuite, which came *included* with the Palm m505. As for it being able to do wave files... so what? PCM Wave files are big. One song takes around 40mb. With 16mb, we'll only be getting maybe audio clips of thirty seconds. So what's the point of having it? And one last gripe... graphics-intensive games are also usually space intensive - Diablo 2 didn't come on 3 CD's because of it's story line, I can tell you that much!
Zaurus - more value for your money (Score:5, Informative)
The Raven
decent hardware, hamstrung OS (Score:5, Informative)
However, the software isn't all that great. Basically, under PalmOS 5, your application code runs as interpreted 68k instructions. Only system calls and some specially written subroutines (which, presumably, cannot make system calls), run as native ARM code. Presumably, this will get fixed with PalmOS 6.
What apparently won't get fixed is the basic PalmOS architecture. PalmOS was designed as a very lightweight OS for simple PDA applications: calendaring, TODO lists, etc., on very simple devices. It was fine for that: small and memory efficient.
But $500 devices like the Tungsten are in a different class. With ARM processors, they are more powerful than many workstations of a few years ago. You don't need that kind of device for basic PDA functionality--just buy a $100 Zire instead.
The reason why people pay $500 for a PDA is either because they want an executive toy, or it is for running "enterprise applications", multimedia apps, scientific apps, speech recognition, etc. And for that, PalmOS just sucks: the window system and toolkit are resolution dependent and simplistic, the file system is a hack, the system lacks installers or package managers, multitasking is poor, image support is poor, and on and on.
So, what does it all mean? If you want a PDA, get a Sony SJ-30 or a Palm Zire, or a Palm m500--they are great PDAs with great built-in apps. If you want a handheld to develop custom apps for, to port software to, etc., get a Linux PDA (or a PocketPC if you must)--you'll pay less and get something that's a whole lot better for the purpose.
Re:decent hardware, hamstrung OS (Score:4, Informative)
They actually do: because they just run Linux and store things in a Linux file system, you can use any of a large number of methods for synchronizing (rsync, unison, NFS, etc.) and remote access (ssh, X11, VNC, etc.).
the only reasonable way to put a PDA to use today for a Unix user is to buy a Palm
Well, as I was saying, for basic PDA functionality using the built-in Palm applications, I agree.
My point is: for anything beyond basic PDA functionality, PalmOS is not a good platform, at least not in the near future. And for custom or third party apps apps, you don't get any support from Palm for hotsyncing on Linux anyway--you are definitely better off there with Linux and Linux tools.
Re:I couldn't agree more (Score:2, Informative)
Tungsten T: 101 x 77 x 15 mm
Zaurus: 138 x 74 x 21 mm
No built-in bluetooth either. Although wi-fi is easier to hook up with the CF slot.
That being said, your PDA decision isn't all about hardware. The breadth and depth of Palm peripherals and software is pretty compelling.
Check out the New SONY Clies based on the ARM (Score:1, Informative)
Her's the specs and check the link belwo for a tasty screen shot of the PDA and palm OS5
Model
PEG-NX70V/NX60V
Palm OS® software v. 5.0*1
On-board CPU 200 MHz
Memory 16 MB RAM/ 16 MB (ROM)
Built-in digital camera (310,000 effective pixels) 640 x 480 pixels (VGA)
Video recording and playback*2 (MPEG4)
Integrated wireless communication slot*3
High resolution TFT color display (320 x 480 pixels)
Voice recorder function
http://www.twomobile.com/content/1305.php
Harjtt
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Re:How do they sell anything in Japan? (Score:3, Informative)
NTT does make an adapter that connects to a standard serial port with accompanying software to backup info on your PC. Additionally, the phone has a 8M memory stick that I can save anything I want on. I will admit that the ability to sync the phone to software such as outlook is missing, but then again, I've tried using that feature with my palm before and after the coolness factor wore off, I realized that I wasn't nearly busy enough to benefit from it. I am however, a mid-level executive with 40 people working for me and I travel about once every two or three months. I am also single and have a fairly active social calender. I would say a vast majority of people do not fall into a category of being more busy than I am and would come to the same conclusion. I also kind of enjoy the seperation. My cell phone is tied to my personal life. Sure, I keep my work calendar on it and receive work related phone calls, but the emails I get on it are entirely just from friends. I really wouldn't want to be reading work emails on my time off.
The phone has a Java VM on it and there are tons of applications to download for entertainment, or PDA like functions. FAQs and HOWTOs are available on the net on how to write apps for the phone, so I can even do my own custom code if I wanted.
As far as the camera being useless....It takes 640x480 256K