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Handhelds Hardware

Palm m100s - A Pattern of Defects? 383

Posted by Cliff from the then-inevitable-slide-downhill dept.
An Anonymous Coward writes about his experience with a brand-new Palm: "Having a few years experience watching co-workers scratching out Grafitti on their little palm-sized toys and being reminded of appointments by musical ring-tones, I decided to take the plunge. More of a dip into a wading pool, as I chose the Palm m105. It was inexpensive enough ($149), and the 8 MB of memory seemed a more prudent choice over the tiny 1 MB in the $99 m100. My experiences quickly turned from elation to dread, however." This is the story of a piece of hardware's inexplicable degradation within 14 days. I thought we were making hardware better than this, but over the past few years, this is becoming more the rule than the exception. Is hardware issue limited to Palm, a case of bad manufacturing of a specific product, or a sign of things to come?

"I took it home and started playing with it. The Windows Palm desktop software installed and worked fine, the HotSync cradle did what it was supposed to do, and I happily started filling up the address and date books using the stylus. Only a few hours after I started using it, the display started acting up. The lower-left corner of the touch-screen started becoming insensitive and inaccurate. Not only were the neatest attempts at Graffiti input reduced to unrecognizable scrawls (using the Graffiti tutorial to trace out what the unit thought I was writing on the screen), but buttons on the screen above the input area were being activated (despite my going nowhere near them with the stylus). Repeated attempts at recalibrating the digitizer, as well as both a soft and hard reset, failed to fix the problem.

A quick search of Google Groups yielded several threads about this issue from others experiencing the exact problem. These experiences were also confirmed by negative reviewers at CNet. Some of them went back and forth with either Palm or the retailer with multiple replacement units, none completely working and defect-free.

Having had my m105 for less than 14 days, I promptly took it back to Office Depot for another one, which they were cheerfully willing to do. The second one worked just fine except that the top power button was inoperative! I was almost willing to live with this (as I could turn it on via other buttons, and have it automatically turn off), but the power button also controls the backlight and the hard reset. Based on my experiences with two defective units, and the bad experiences others have had going through both replacement and repair with Palm, I'm wasn't sure that I wanted to try a third. I took it back for a refund (also cheerfully done, and with apologies).

Obviously my experiences are not unique or even rare. Furthermore, repeated attempts to fix the problem via replacement or repair are not successful. Is this just a poorly-engineered and manufactured product to meet a price-point? Have there been quality control problems at their new assembly plant in Mexico (Previously all Palms were made in the United States)? Should I just forget about trying to get a low-priced starter Palm for the time being?"
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Palm m100s - A Pattern of Defects? More

Palm m100s - A Pattern of Defects?

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  • No kidding, I'm not the only one? (Score:3)

    by webslacker ( 15723 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:25PM (#3623337)
    My IBM C3 (a rebranded Palm V) has gone all to hell. The digitizer in the screen has to be recalibrated almost every two days now! Sometimes I can't even reach the menu bar to recalibrate the digitizer because the sensor is so far off!
    • BTW, sometimes the digitizer would be so far off that I'd tap the screen, and the PDA would think I tapped somewhere A CENTIMETER AWAY.

      Screw Palm, none of my friends who bought a Clie seemed to have these problems, so that's what I'm going to replace this shiny metal turd with.
    • The c3's actually a rebranded/recolored Palm Vx (that little x makes a difference!)...

      ...Having used my c3 for a year now, I've had virtually no problems, save for the button defect on it (a design defect on all Palm V/x's...nothing to do with manufacturing) that caused my battery to drain, taking all my info with it...but it was partially my fault...

      At any rate, PalmOS PDA's are getting quite cheap now. If one's going to go drop around $150-$200, I don't think the Handspring Visor Edge can be beat for the money!
    • I've got a Palm V that worked great for about a year then started having that exact same digitizer problem. I was hoping the OS Upgrade would help this issue (Only reason I dropped the $30) but it didn't. My first Palm III worked great for a couple of years and I gave it to my room mate when I upgraded to the V. My room mate almost immediately experienced problems with the III to the point where it wouldn't even power on anymore. I ended up taking the III apart and reseating some of the components, which seems to have fixed it.


      I've pretty much decided to go with some other company when the V finally gives up the ghost. I'm still trying to decide what to get.

    • Many, many people have this problem. Nobody has a fix. The Palm V digitizer bug is pretty well known, but Palm will not acknowledge that there is a problem. The OS upgrade has not helped.

  • That's really too bad (Score:4, Informative)

    by DaveWood ( 101146 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:28PM (#3623350) Homepage
    I've owned a Palm V and a Plam Vx; both have been rather durable and pretty reliable, although I have noticed that, as they get older, you have to continually recalibrate the "digitizer" (the touch sensors in the screen are calibrated by tapping on top of a target placed at two corners and then the center of the screen), otherwise there seems to be some "drift." Still, this is manageable.

    I would not be at all surprised to see growing pains of this kind as the company attempts to cut costs in order to move into new markets and increase profitability.

    I hope that the negative attention they're getting will force them to improve; while far from perfect, I like their work, and hope they continue to stick around.

    For an ordinary person looking for a PDA but not interested in shelling out $3-600 for an all singing all dancing 8 hour battery life Windows CE wonder, I'd recommend going on half.com or ebay and snapping up a Palm V or Vx. These can be had in perfect condition for about $60 and $100, respectively. I guess they don't make 'em like the used to - but the older models are still excellent PDAs - palm's virtue (and curse) has always been keeping things simple, so little has changed over the years.

    -David
    • For an ordinary person looking for a PDA but not interested in shelling out $3-600 for an all singing all dancing 8 hour battery life Windows CE wonder

      Fun - well I have a compaq ipaq - and when I bought it the Palm V was 499$ for a monochrome 8 meg pda. The Ipaq was 599$ for a 32 meg color display. So I bought it. 8 hours doesn't sound like a lot, but then you think about how often you use a pda constantly for 8 hours. In normal use the Ipaq seems to be perfectly fine for about 3 weeks. If you listen to mp3's on it on your way to work (like on the bus or something) like I do - and you use a solid state CF card (not the micro drive), and you know how to set up a hotkey in windows media player to turn off the screen the ipaq is actually good for about 4-5 days. Only reason I know this is because I've been working temp jobs lately where I haven't had the chance/time to charge it.

      But back when I had steady work I used to just drop it in the sync cradle and it charges all the way up in 10-30 minutes.

      And finally - I had a co-worker who had a color handspring visor (I forget the model) - it seemed to have about the same battery life as the ipaq - actually I thought it was worse since it seemed to have a little bit less conservative backlight management. Not to mention the actual display looked worse too.

      So nyahh
  • Maybe you got a Willard instead of a Wizard.

  • Handspring (Score:3, Informative)

    by Apreche ( 239272 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:35PM (#3623374) Homepage Journal
    Handsprings, from my experience are the most reliable PDAs. Everyone I know who has one loves it and never has a problem with it. I'm also prone to playing with PDAs on display in Staples and such, and the Handspring models are always functional. I can't say the same for any other brand. Handspring PDAs are also the most stylish.
    • I love my handsprings (this is the 3rd one i've owned) but I have definitely had problems with my Prisms.

      The first Prism I had crashed a lot - hard reset-requiring crashes that made me reload all my data. It got so bad, I bought JBBackup so that I could schedule automatic backups to my 8mb Flash Module every 6 hours.

      The buttons seem to be made poorly. The power button on my original Prism stopped working - the only way to turn it on was using an app hardkey.

      I sent the Prism back for warranty, and got another. It didn't crash any more, but several months later, the buttons were broken again. Of course now it is beyond warranty period so I am screwed. Also, the Address Book key doesn't work either. Very annoying.

      I love the device. Super expandable, nice brilliant display (much better than m505's dim, almost color-less display). But the buttons should have been made better.
  • unfortunately, my experiences with all handhelds has been less than satisfactory when I have purchased one for under 200.00, I guess you can say that you get what you pay for. Honestly it's somewhat hard to be able to validate paying more than 200 though for something that doesn't do everything I would like it to as easily as I would like it to yet. It's still somewhat new (and often somewhat proprietary) technology, so things change every quarter or two....

    I went through multiple windows ce units, as well as a TI Avigo and now I'm using a palm m100. I often have many problems with syncing, the software will freeze up or the palm won't talk to my desktop properly. The unit also had a dark spot in the bottom right hand side of the screen though. My favorite pda so far that I've ever owned is a tie between my Ti Avigo and my Hp JORNADA (although I don't like running windows).
    The biggest problem I've found with pda's? It's too easy to break the screen, and often they are too bulky. I like that many of them have screen covers now though, more than used to. It means fewer scratches, and units seem to be a bit better built than they were a while ago, still, you often get a flimsy plastic case when your in the 200.00 and under market, while if you go up in price you get metal alloy's or a thicker plastic case...

  • spend a little more and get a quality product (Score:5, Informative)

    by Sokie ( 60732 ) <`jesse' `at' `edgefactor.com'> on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:39PM (#3623393)
    About two and a half weeks ago, I took receipt of a refurbished Sony Clie PEG-N610C. It cost me $239 + shipping for a 320x320 16-bit color screen and overall a very high quality device. The case is aluminum and it has a nice, attractive flip cover that protects the screen.

    Since I've owned it I've "dropped" it twice. Once I knocked it out of the hotsync cradle and onto the floor about 3 feet below. No damage. The second time I brushed it against my leg while I was walking and it went spinning out onto the ground. Again, no damage. My brother dropped his Visor off the kitchen counter and shattered his screen. It you are looking to be a little more budget and don't need/want a color screen, I would recommend the PDA my roommate has, the Sony PEG-T415 (320x320 B&W, 8mb, around $200) or the Sony PEG-S320 (160x160 B&W, 8mb, around $150).

    Why Sony you may ask? While they are a bit more expensive that a lot of PDAs, the 320x320 screen on the 415 and the color models is gorgeous and they all are well built and snug in their aluminum cases. They also have Li-Ion batteries that charge when they are on the cradle (although mine has a slick system where the charger plugs into the cradle normally, but can be plugged directly into the unit and used as a travel charger) so you don't have to buy batteries for it.

    Anywho, enough advertising. I don't work for Sony, I've just been very happy with their PDAs. Clearance Club [clearanceclub.com] is where I got mine and they have quite a few refurbished B&W models still.

    I did quite a bit of research on PDA forums and such and had pretty bad luck finding anyone who had bad things to say about the 610 I got, and so far, I'd have to agree with the good things everyone had to say about it. Everyone I show a high res picture to just ooo's and ahh's and is incredulous when I told them I paid under $250 for it.

    -Sokie
    • I've had some trouble (with my 415) with the stylus input losing calibration from time to time. Every so often, I have to recalibrate the input.

      I'm not sure if this is a hardware problem or a software problem--it only seems to happen after I've been playing solitaire on the damn thing.

      That's only complaint though. All in all, I'm really happy with it.
    • Don't give the visor's too much grief. I have a handspring Visor Prism which survived a 12 foot fall onto concrete with almost no damage. Not that I'd recommend anyone trying this, but they are built to last.

      -Wrexsoul

    • Re:spend a little more and get a quality product (Score:5, Informative)

      by nathanh ( 1214 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @07:11PM (#3624295) Homepage
      Since I've owned it I've "dropped" it twice. Once I knocked it out of the hotsync cradle and onto the floor about 3 feet below. No damage.

      Your cradle is probably in the study or bedroom, which is likely carpetted.

      The second time I brushed it against my leg while I was walking and it went spinning out onto the ground. Again, no damage.

      Spinning in what way? If it spins the right way then it would avoid sharp impact, even if hitting concrete.

      My brother dropped his Visor off the kitchen counter and shattered his screen.

      And the kitchen is tiled, right?

      Your anecdotal story is interesting but it's doesn't prove anything. Both the CLIE and PALM use glass and they both run the risk of dying even from sudden short falls (1-2 foot) onto hard surfaces. It really depends on how they fall, what edge they hit first, and how high they bounce.

      • If you'd read some of the subsequent messages under this thread you'd notice I did extrapolate a bit on my brother's Visor. When I knocked mine off the cradle it was onto very cheap, old, dorm room carpet which is about as soft as the wall. There is no pad under it and it really is about as hard as the concrete underneath.

        But you really misinterpreted my opinion, I wasn't trying to present a weak, anecdotal example as evidence that Visor's are obviously inferior and break at the slightest instance of abuse. At least, I don't recall making that assertion anywhere.

        Of course it's possible for a Clie screen to break, but just saying they both use glass and therefore have an equal risk of breaking from a drop lacks logical merit even more than my anecdote. Perhaps one manufacturer mounts the screen inside the case differently. Perhaps the flex undergone by a plastic case tweaks the screen in such a way as to cause fracture more often. Perhaps the higher g-force shock created by a metal case makes dropping a Clie more likely to create a quantum singularity.

        Typically comments and opinions expressed publically, especially in a forum like slashdot, are anecdotal examples of a person's experience. That's what I gave. I'll readily admit that I haven't spent 18 months researching the durability of every make and model of PDA available. Nor have I forensically analyzed the likely causes of fracture in dozens of PDA's with broken screens.

        I personally believe that Clie's are physically built a little better than Visor's, based on the visible componenture and the relative heft of the units. But I don't really have any evidence to back this up besides anecdotal accounts. If someone wants to send me a bunch of Visors and Clie's (even dead ones so long as they are physically in good condition), I'd be happy to bash, drop, smash, and jar them equally and come up with some empirical evidence as to who makes a more durable PDA. But until then, anecdotal is the best I can do, that's why I didn't say anything about who made a more durable PDA in my first post.

        Whew...better stop now before the ghosts of my argumentation teachers completely take control of my body.

        -Sokie
    • Personal experience with Sony products show that they're only useful up until their warrantee expires. Our family Sony Trinitron's color started fading about a month after the warrantee expired. The headphone connecter to a Sony radio started failing after one year (6 month warrantee). The battery warning of my second Sony radio says the batteries are dead when it gets jolted a bit. (I didn't learn the first time.)

      Now I have a Sony VAIO PCG-XR1G. It was the top of the line when I bought it. After using it for six months, I started getting BIOS errors warning me of imbeeding hard disk failure. I backed everything up when I got it to boot, then took it in. Of course, it booted fine every time I tried to explain the problem to the dealer. So after it really failed a week later, they took it and sent it in to Sony.

      Sony replaced the disk controller, but not the hard disk. They did restore the pre-installed Windows against my wishes, despite detailed instructions on how to login and shutdown FreeBSD. If they'd have replaced the hard disk, as the BIOS was telling me was necessary, I wouldn't have minded, but...

      So, the machine worked find for another six months. Then the same BIOS errors started coming up. Again, I backed up everything and brought it in for repair. This time the warrantee was one month expired and I had to pay for a new hard disk. But the worst part was to follow.

      After another month, the "R" key on the keyboard started getting hard to press. Also, the right mouse button wasn't always working. The mouse pad quickly degraded to where I had to buy an external mouse. Other keys slowly degraded and, being a touch typist, many tasks started to become frustrating - like logging in to other servers without any "*" echos. I'm seriously considering getting a USB keyboard for my notebook computer!

      It just seems to me that Sony products have some sort of self distruct mechanism built in to go off right after their warrantee expires. I need to gaman with this keyboard for another half year or so. But I'm definately not getting a Sony computer again. No matter how good they look.

      • My father has had a Sony Vaio laptop for about 3 years and it's still humming along just fine. That is wierd about your laptop, but just as anecdotal as everything I said about dropping PDAs.

        Have you found accounts of other people with similar problems with your laptop model? If so, then there is probably a problem with the design or manufacturing controls. But it's also possible you just got a lemon. Despite QA and all those good things, the auto manufacturers still put out cars that will have any and all conceivable problems and nothing can fix them. I imagine that the same applies with laptops, PDA's, and everything else.

        Personally, I just do research and try to find accounts from as many other people as possible on their experience with a product I'm looking to buy. It takes some pretty extraordinary circumstances for me to blacklist a manufacturer completely. If 500 other people tell me model XYZ has worked flawlessly for them for a year and it does everything I need at I price I like, I wouldn't exclude that product from consideration just because I had bad luck with my model PQR from the same company. Sure, I would think about my experience with PQR, but I would take the accounts of 500 other people over my single experience.

        Don't get me wrong though. Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and based on your experiences, I really don't blame you for considering Sony to be a manufacturer with a bad reputation. My experiences with them have been just the opposite though, but that doesn't mean that I will now buy exclusively Sony products.

        BTW: the warrantee on my Clie is 90 days (refurb) so if it dies by the end of the summer, I'll probably think about your conspiracy theory a bit more. ;)

        -Sokie

  • Refurbished is better than new (Score:5, Informative)

    by yardgnome ( 190624 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:40PM (#3623398) Homepage
    Palm.com refurbished store [palm.com].

    Oddly enough, I have never had a problem with a refurbished Palm device (even the ultra-old 3Com Pilot I bought long ago worked like a charm until I ditched it voluntarily). I know it seems counterintuitive, but maybe the best bet now is to go with something that has already broken once in the past (and has now been fixed and extensively retested by Palm). Plus, the refurbished devices can be half as expensive.

    At the moment only the m500, m505, and Vx are available in the refurbished section, but sometimes older (and even cheaper) equipment pops up.

  • I've got quite a bit of experience with this (Score:5, Insightful)

    by FallLine ( 12211 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:41PM (#3623401)
    Having deployed a couple hundred Palm M100 and M105s at work, I can say with certainty that the M100, and to a much lesser extent, the M105 have a problem with defective manufacture (something around 5% it seems) but are also of generally poorer construction than all other Palms. I dislike this, but I feel it is unfair to compare this series of Palm to other manufacturers because they're first generation devices and they're one of the few modern PDAs that are designed to enter the sub-100 dollar price range. All other Palms in my experience (from the IIIs, to the V series, and so on) are exceptionally reliable when you consider the amount of abuse they withstand. It's really an apples and oranges comparison. If you're willing to spend the same amount of money on a Palm as you are on the other handhelds, you can get as good, if not greater, quality.
    • I have an m100, and I agree that the quality just isn't there. It was a good choice for me, being a student and wanting an inexpensive organizer, but after having it for a while it's acquired a few quirks. The power button was the first thing to go. There was a point where you could still work it as long as you pressed very hard, but that time has long gone.

      The date book button also just got harder and harder to activate until one day it just stopped working. The way the m100s flip-cover works, it will move out of the way and allow the button to be repeatedly pressed in your pocket continually throughout the day (if it doesn't come off). This is corrected in the m125, but it's no consolation. At least you can remap the buttons so if you lose the important ones, all isn't lost.

      I havn't had any real screen problems (other than losing backlighting due to the power button), but it does seem as if my father's m125 is a little inaccurate when it comes to where you're pointing. It could be him just calibrating it differently, but It really seems off.

      To be honest, given the m100's 2MB of memory, small screen and thick body (it could have been smaller if not for the damned faceplates) I might as well have bough the actually upgradeable V, or spent a little more for a Vx. Even today, they've still got it.
    • I had one of the original Palm 1000s (which I later upgraded to be the equivalent of a professional for the extra memory), and then later a Palm 5000 (also upgraded), and now a Palm IIIc.

      I use my Palm extensively, to the point of actually wearing through 3 pieces of tape that I placed over the graffitti area to protect it. (I used it as a notetaking device all the way through university, including math and engineering classes). I had it on 8 hours a day, taking notes.

      My first Palm still works, although I felt its graffitti recognition started to get less accurate (and I wanted new software...) so I sold it to a friend (who still uses it). The case also cracked (this was a well known problem) and the battery cover often came off.

      My second Palm became obsolete when I won the colour one in a contest, so I gave it to my aunt who is a doctor (and she still uses it extensively as well). It was still in pretty good shape, although I had a sticky button problem due to too many games of Pacman. The graffiti recognition on this model was still fine.

      My colour Palm is pretty good, although the battery doesn't last anything like as long as the first two (only about 3.5 hours of continuous use). However, it's also doing a lot more, so I don't mind, and I'll admit that my continuous use these days tends to be games more than just using the memo editor. I'm also out of university, so battery life doesn't matter to me as much anymore... And it's pretty sturdy. It also doesn't seem to have the disintegrating case problem of the other two. On the negative side though, it (and many of the other newer Palms and Handsprings that I've tried out) is a LOT more sluggish in its responses - and that is a very bad thing for graffiti accuracy. I have to be much more precise in my writing, and can't go as fast because it doesn't seem to respond as well as the older models.

      All this to say that I've so far been quite impressed with how well the Palms have lasted under the kind of abuse I've thrown at them. I've dropped them (luckily no screen damage) and left them outside accidentally in the winter - this is a pain, because the display freezes (and is useless until it warms up), without any problems.

      Yes, there were the odd problems (sticky buttons, the graffiti area crapping out and the case cracking are the big ones that cropped up in newsgroup discussions), but I never personally encountered them in such degree that the Palm wasn't useful, and some of the problems were avoidable or fixable. (Eg glue for the case, protecting the graffiti area with tape, not pounding the buttons...) And I did notice that the gentler people are with them, the better they last - one friend had no end of issues with graffiti because he was pressing extremely hard on the screen, and his buttons stuck all the time. He sold it, and the next person had no trouble at all with it, because they had a much lighter touch!

      Actually, I'm pretty impressed with the fact that the Palm 1000 is still living a useful life more than five years later... Given this kind of history, I think it's a little unfair to say that all Palms are "shoddily built".

      I do think that the software is becoming a little less reliable (in particular the general sluggishness of the OS).

      Anyway, my two cents.

    • IIIxe vs m105 (Score:2, Informative)

      by Rob Simpson ( 533360 )
      I agree. Last year, I chose a IIIxe over a m105. They both had the same amount of memory, and the IIIxe was about $50 cheaper. The only benefit of the m105 that I could see was the revolutionary feature of detachable, personalizable faceplates. Woohoo. The m105 also seemed a LOT more flimsy and had a weird shape and a hole in the cover (for the clock or something).

      So much for the folks saying "you get what you pay for".

    • I've gone through a Palm Pro (screen stopped working reliably due to a loose connector being jiggled by stylus insertion), a Palm III (dropped it on the floor, the screen broke), a Handspring Visor (plugged in a camera card one day and the device just died and wouldn't wake up again), a Palm Vx (most of the buttons stopped working and the touchscreen alignment was off), and a Palm V (power button broke, two of the other buttons broke as well). Today I'm going to order a Clie.

      Palm devices have a half life of about 6 months for me, but they're too damn useful to live without, so I keep buying 'em.

      The buttons would probably last longer if I didn't play Galax.

  • We get what we pay for (Score:5, Insightful)

    by JanneM ( 7445 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:45PM (#3623420) Homepage
    Everybody want to get the best possible deal whenever we buy something. This goes not only for electronics, but for all big-ticket items: homes, cars - you name it. When it comes to most stuff, we have at least a vague idea that quality costs, and is worth having. We don't usually get the car with the lowest sticker price; we get the one with the best balance between perceived mechanical reliabilty, guarantees and price - features being equal.

    But with electronics - specifically computers and related devices - we tend to act differently. We have an idea that all machines are about equal in qwuality; they tend to use the same components from the same factories, after all. Instead we have a sheet of performance figures (this much memory, that many MHz and so on), and try to find the seller with the lowest price for what we want to have.

    What we forget is of course that quality still matters. There are a lot of ways to make a functionally identical item more or less reliable and long-lasting. But by focusing on price and ignoring quality issues for so long we have been digging our own graves. If a manufacturer is to compete (and not just become a niche operator or go extinct), he needs to cut corners wherever he can. You get circuit boards manufactured by the cheapest possible technology, soldered together by the lowest bidding contractor that still barely meet very minimal standards, and pack it together with iffy, electrically noisy power supplies and/or the cheapest rechargeable batterypacks money can (or can't ) buy. Then you install it into a case that's made to be cheap and easy to assemble, but that's barely adequate to hold the package together - and totally inadequate to protect the package from the wear and tear that will be the norm for the unit. The thing works when brought out of it's box, but that's about it.

    Consider this: Let's say Palm had two models. they are identical, functionally - feature by feature, they are twins. One, however, is built to last, with a thicker glass substrate, a sturdier case, better solderings, sturdy metal contacts, 'real' key switches and so on. It's still not 'ruggedized' by any means, just a lot better at handling the daily grind. It also costs another $50 or so over the other unit. Which one will be the big seller, and which one will mostly collect dust in the showroom?

    /Janne

  • Hardware HAS gone to hell (Score:5, Interesting)

    by dr_funk ( 7465 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:50PM (#3623435) Homepage
    I am an authorized HP repair tech and they are a prime example of the downturn in product quality. Just the other day I worked on a HP Jaserjet 4SI. This printer and never been serviced and all it needed was the routine maintinance kit (fuser, transfer roller, paper pickup rollers). The amazing thing is was this printer had a mfg. date of 1992!
    Fast forward to the next day. I have a client to whom we sold 4 new HP Netserver LP 1000r (HE wanted them, we only reccomend compaq servers). First 2 we sold him were of a batch where the SCSI cables were so cheap that if you disconnected them, they were hosed (HP Tech told me that). So when I installed the optional NetRAID controller I basically killed the cable (one died in service, we are going to go ahead and replace the other).
    Now onto the 2nd batch we sold them. One of the NICs in one of the servers started dropping packets. Then is slowly degraded until it died completely. HP doesn't send out a new main board, they send the core module (mb & case. Everything but the procs, ram, and HDs). We transfered everything to that unit. Dead. Returned that unit, ordered another. That was dead too. Still haven't got this server fixed and we are back to working on it monday. HP doesn't have a clue of what's wrong, they just want me to order 5 parts on a warranty claim (there goes our proformance metric).
    If you have ever used a DeskJet 600 series you know that HP is making some crap. Likewise if you have ever used a LaserJet 1100.
    HP still makes some good products (plotters, high end LJ), but the difference between now and 10 years ago is painfully obvious. And, I suppose, the difference with other companys is the same.
    Write in and tell your stories.
    • have worked incredibly well since purchasing them. The first is a Jornada 548. Not the perfect PDA I'd say, but it has been rock solid for nearly 2 years now. The other is a Photosmart 1215 printer. This thing is not only fast compared to most inkjets I've owned, but also extremely quiet. Beyond that, it has built-in CF/SM card readers and apparently will print photos right from the memory cards, although I've never tried. It seems to me, that like any other hardware manufacturer, HP has their share of lemons, but also certainly has their share of high quality, reliable products.

    • Re:Hardware HAS gone to hell (Score:5, Informative)

      by matthewmichaelagee ( 555968 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @04:08PM (#3623721) Homepage
      > HP still makes some good products (plotters, high end LJ)

      Qualify that as *high-end* plotters, as well.

      Working at a tiny architectural firm (2-3 people, depending on the workload), we finally bought a low-end HP plotter so that I could control CAD output in-house. It was a very substantial purchase for such a small firm, but critical to moving our productivity out of the nineteen-eighties. We even paid a bit more for the low-end HP compared to other companies' higher-end but less expensive offerings, because my technophobe boss was unwilling to try anything unproven and the HP plotters I'd used in previous offices had been reliable workhorses.

      Well, the other plotters I'd used weren't HP's *low-end* models. It went from adequate to spotty to unreliable to completely dead within a week. HP had on-site technicians in the office for over a month wrestling with the machine before they finally gave up and shipped us a high-end replacement model to compensate for our troubles.

      Of course, that higher-end model wasn't designed to run off of our six-year-old plot server, but it took me about a week to diagnose the undocumented buffer underruns. I ended up bringing in my own laptop to use as our full-time plot server: ten-year IT life cycles can be obnoxious.

      In a two-person office which bills clients hourly, every hour I had to sacrifice to troubleshooting and negotiating my way through HP's support labyrinth was a significant hit on productivity. The month and a half that our full years' IT expenditure sat dead on the floor did not make the boss a happy man. In the end, he swore off HP and CAD for good.

      Oh yeah, and me too. Anyone in northern California need an architect? ;)
    • In my department, two HP 4100 series printers died within a week of purchase.. "fuser error". One 1100 series decided to just up and die for no reason. A third 4100 has developed random roller noises, that are likely a sign of things to come.

      Our main 8550 printer has never worked right, random print speed issues, resolved by using older/incorrect drivers that don't actually use any of the features you would buy an 8550 for. And no matter what driver you happen to pick, if there is paper in the manual feed tray, it will claim paper jam until you pull the paper out, and put it back in....for every single sheet. It will then print from the manual feed tray, regardless of what you choose in the print driver. Turning off manual feed entirely allows it to print from the correct try by default, but anyone wanting to use manual feed then has to turn it back on themselves. This operation, naturally is buried as the last option in the paper handling menu. In other departments, their two year old (4550 series?) printers jam when anything tries to pull from tray three. This is a problem with 6 of the 6 printers that they ordered.

      Is it really that hard to make hardware that actually works correctly any more? Seriously, these printers aren't cheap, and if we have to send back EVERY printer that comes into us for repair at least once, it really can't be saving them all that money. They could at least make them so they break 1 month out of warranty, like everything else. At least then we get something that works for a solid year, rather than random downtime while things get sent back and forth. Spare laser printers aren't exactly one of those things you keep laying around.

      And their driver support just keeps getting worse. HP 3100 combo fax/printer/copier thingy? no XP drivers downloadable from their website, you have to order the CD containing them. All we use is the print functionality, they could at least toss a 3 meg printer driver up, even if they are contractually bound from posting the software that lets you use full functionality. Same for their webcams. I have Photoshop, just give me a small twain compliant driver, and I'll be happy, I don't need Hippy Dippy Bed Bath and Fun Image Manipulation Program to come with it.

      Meanwhile, our printers bought prior to 1997 all are still working, without a peep, and with no service whatsoever, other than toner changes and paper refills. Screw you HP, and screw anyone who looks like you.

      Why do we keep buying their crap? I work for an edu that apparently has a contract with them. Spectacular.
      • Is it really that hard to make hardware that actually works correctly any more?
        We have an HP4MV at work that, when you are manually feeding 11x17 paper, will occassional grab an 8.5x11 sheet from the internal tray. When it discovers the sheet isn't long enough it says "64 ERR" on the display and locks up. So we looked up "64 ERR" in the manual and it says the printer has lost its mind and to power cycle it.

        That's right, rather than fix the show-stopper mechanical flaw, or the show-stopper firmware flaw, HP just documented the hard reset.

        HP engineering quality died long before the Compaq merger.

    • Our first familiy computer, purchased back in 1994, was a Packard Bell. I don't need to elaborate about it breaking down four times during its use, but when we bought it, we slapped down $600 for an HP Laserjet 4L. Every ink printer looked so sloppy compared to the crisp text of the laser printer, so we figured it was a good investment.

      Eight years later, that HP Laserjet 4L is still sitting here next to the family computer. It still prints documents as good as it did out of the box. The only degrade in quality is that there's a small squeak that occurs with the paper rollers inside the printer, but it doesn't affect the functionality at all.

      When I helped out in the computer science department in our high school, I was often paged to fix a "printer disfunction." The printers that we had throughout the highschool were HPs. Most of them were Laserjet model 4's and 5's, and the rest were HP Deskjet 6xx and 7xx. Not once was I asked to ever do anything more for a Laserjet than replace the toner or clear a paper jam. On the other hand, we had to send at least one Deskjet per month to the printer repairmen. Those printers would constantly get out of alignment, smear, not take printer paper, or just in general not respond to anything from the computer.

      But remember, those LaserJet printers, when they were brand new, never sold for less than $500. Unlike much computer hardware on today's market, those printers were worth every penny.
    • well, my perspective is that hp has built a lot of crap recently, but they seem to be doing it because people want *cheap*!

      hp has to compete against lexmark which is selling some of the z-series inkjets (z31? z51?) for under $80! some of the printers sold by lexmark are cheaper than the replacement print cartridges in some places!

      why is there junk (not just hp, not just printers, etc)? because we (americans) tend to think with the wallet instead of our brains.

      it's alway been amusing to listen to someone that purchased a $400 laser printer and complain that it doesn't work as well as such-and-such printer, oh that's a $1200 printer...

      eric
    • One factor which tends to be forgotten when it comes to printing is the duty cycle. Most injets are designed to last a certain number of prints then, quite simply, die (of course, you have to consume the mandatory number of cartridge replacements to compensate for the printers initial loss leading sale).


      Having worked at a company which purchased a lot of the HP injets, I can certainly attest to them being exceptionally reliable... in breaking down after 1 month. The cause though was in part the people using them. HP6xx printers are not really designed to have 100 pages / day run through them, let alone full colour por^H^H^Hholiday photos. Stick with 5 pages a day and it should last you a year before going pop.


      Personally, I still use HP printers, or EPSON. The best in my history books are the EPSON EPL-5200 (fantastic paper path) and HP4P/Plus/M series. These days I'm trying out the HP2200D[uplex]. Surviving well so far.


      Oh, on another note, my wife's HP630c just died (11 months, 15 days old). . . time for the Tektronix Phaser.

  • Have there been quality control problems at their new assembly plant in Mexico (Previously all Palms were made in the United States)?


    FWIW, my trusty PalmIIIx which is several years old sports a "made in malaysia" sticker.
    • Apperently not. I have a nice little anecdote about this. A friend of me, bought his palm III over here in the Netherlands. On the back it says made in Singapore.

      Then, 2 months later, I was on a trip, and bought one at Singapore Airport. That unit was made in the USA!

      I don't know the ideas behind the palm distribution channels, but I'm not thinking much of it.
  • A friend of mine has a Newtwon MessagePad that still works beautifully, despite all the snobbish snearing from people with their fancy new Palms which seem to e made of tissue paper for all the problems they seem to have with them. :)

  • Try Handspring (Score:2, Informative)

    by SkyLord ( 8650 )
    I got my Handspring (The most basic model, 2M memory) for around $100 over a year ago. It's been sturdy and held up well, and is expandable.

    Fry's Electronics even sells refurbs for good prices for the Deluxe's (8M mem) and some of the later models.

    I still use my Handspring, and am waiting to see the direction of the product lines before jumping up to a high priced/performance unit.

    I stayed away from the M series because they just seemed too low end.

  • My experience (Score:3, Informative)

    by auximini ( 225122 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:53PM (#3623448) Homepage
    I received a Palm m105 from a friend who got his free with a Dell computer. I first noticed that the display pad was always out of sync with the stylus. Even more, the calibration utility with the Palm did not work -- it kept going in a constant loop. After posting to a couple forums and trying out some freeware calibration programs, I just decided to call Palm up.

    They were very helpful with the problem and gave me instructions on sending the unit in. Within 2 weeks I had a brand new m105 that works perfectly.

    As most of the forums already say, there definately is a defect problem with the 105's. It sucks, yeah, but because Palm handled my situation smoothly, I'm not too mad about it.
    • Even more, the calibration utility with the Palm did not work -- it kept going in a constant loop.

      That's a firmware problem. Since the Palm OS on the m100 and m105 is in ROM, not EEPROM, the thing is basically fux0red and needs to be sent back.

      The first m100 I got did that. The second one was the keeper.

  • True with just about any product (Score:3)

    by Peyna ( 14792 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @02:55PM (#3623454) Homepage
    I think this is true with just about any product. Electrical devices are probably even more susceciptible to defects/damages during processing. For example: We had an iPaq at my place of employment that worked fine for about a week, and then the screen went dead. It would come on, then fade out and disappear, no matter what we did we couldn't fix it; ended up having to get it replaced under warranty.

    The same is true with other products, such as vehicles. Any given vehicle may actually be repaired or have parts replaced, etc. many times before it leaves the assembly line, and even while it is out in the lot at the factory. The auto industry, or at least the factory where I worked seemed to have a much better way of dealing with this; and defects found after leaving manufacturing were at a minimum.

    Maybe the electronics industry just needs to rehaul some manufacturing processes and defect detection and correction. I've had my share of bad motherboards, monitors, and other parts to deal with it. The cost to them in repairs must be pretty high. Although, it would be nice if they would pick up shipping costs at more places for warranty work. I don't have to pay anything at all except price in gas to get my car to the dealer to get it fixed; why should I pay to ship back a defective product to get it replaced?

  • Older units are rock solid.... (Score:3, Informative)

    by Lumpy ( 12016 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @03:01PM (#3623476) Homepage
    My 1000 series has survived many horrors and still works to this day, even though it has been deligated to my 10 year old daughter as a toy.
    my PalmIIIx also has worked perfectly. accepts drops without a complaint, and never gives me fits or operation errors except when I tried to upgrade it to Palm OS 4.1... I downgraded back to 3.53 after the asenine bloat they stuffed in 4.1 (I never knew you could slow a palm device down to the speed of a Windows CE device... 4.1 does it well...)

    I have noticed that the newer M series looked rather cheaply made... smaller screen (WTF is up with that?) and my next purchase will not be a palm device but a Sony as they seem to be the ones that picked up the ball and are creating the quality palmos based devices...

    Older ones are bullet proof..

  • Low Price? (Score:2, Informative)

    by marshac ( 580242 )
    The cool thing about technology (or uncool, depending on how you look at it) is that the absolute top of the line, most expensive tech toy out there, after a year, isn't. This means that you can hop onto ebay, or your favorite surplus website and look at those formerly spendy Palm V, or iPaqs.....I just got an iPaq 3600 last month for $200. The screen is awesome and the price can't be beat. If you take a step back and look and the differences between the newer units and those from a year (or two) ago, there really hasn't been THAT big of a reason to upgrade.

    The first iPaqs ran at 209Mhz.....guess what the brand new ones run at? Yup, 209Mhz.
  • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • I bought my Palm IIIx so long ago, I don't even remember. I think it was at Thanksgiving three years ago. I believe I paid about US$200. About six months later, I dropped it and it stopped working. With a single phone call, Palm advance shipped me a replacement under warranty in one day. Ah, those were the days.

    Sometime later, when the TRGPro was being discontinued in favor of the new Handera [handera.com], they were on sale at Sam's Club for about US$225 and I bought one. (For those that don't know, the TRGPro is the Palm IIIxe where the TRG folks added a CF slot and better speaker.)

    My employer bought exactly the same model TRG for each of us seven admins. In all the time since, none of my peers have ever had any problems with the TRGs.

    My IIIx is still in use by a girlfriend and she has had no problems. The only problem I have had with my TRG is some small scratches on the screen from the horizontal stiffening members in the flip-down lid. This was from the unit being bumped against things while in my pants pocket.

    Sync has never been a problem - and I sync with NT and 2000 on desktops and laptops at work and with Macs at home. I have also successfully synced with my Red Hat box.

    In short, I haven't had any significant problems. Of course I have older units. My next PDA will likely be the Handera 330 based on the track record I have seen with my TRGs.

  • Casio E-200 (Score:2, Informative)

    by bacontaco ( 126431 )
    The Cassiopeia E-200 line of PocketPCs had a similar problem. It seems the first batch of units produced had a faulty sidelight where it would burn out, usually within 2 weeks. This happened to about 75% of the first batch of units, and I was unlucky enough to get one of those. I exchanged it for a new one and have had no problems with it, but am waiting for it to burn out once the warrantee is up...

    Casio has been very responsive about this issue and issued a new batch of units which do not have this problem. However, it just makes me wonder, do companies beta test their hardware any more? This sidelight burnt out on the defective batch usually within 14 days, under normal usage. Does this mean that they don't even beta test their products this long?

  • Palm and PocketPC (Score:2, Informative)

    by opti6600 ( 582782 )
    I'd say my experience with all PDAs has been bittersweet. I had a Palm Vx and an OmniSky modem, which held up wonderfully, schlepped it to and from school from 6th to 8th grade. I truly hated the OS though, and I still do. Graffiti is wretched, a true pain to learn, because it doesnt adapt to you, you adapt to it. Plus it was monochrome, which isn't fun at all. But it kicked ass over everyone else's PDA at the time, which only showed up in 8th grade, all of which were little Handspring Visors, the low-end ones. In essence, a Palm is a very sturdy thing, but you pay a premium for it (an insane amount compared to PocketPC, in terms of what you get). I now have a CompaqHP iPaq 3650. I've had it since August, got it for my freshman year at my school. Along with a dual-expansion pack and a Toshiba hard drive, I haven't had too many problems. I've dropped it, had other people drop it, and there have been no problems in the way of it falling on the floor, with the exception of a hard drive failure about 3 months ago. The PocketPC OS is much nicer tho. As far as maintenance goes, the Palm takes the cake, it's pretty much indestructible when left alone. A PocketPC however, falls apart no matter what you do to it.

  • Palm Vx (Score:3)

    by rosewood ( 99925 ) <rosewood@ c h a t.ru> on Saturday June 01, 2002 @03:41PM (#3623613) Homepage Journal
    I have and love my Palm Vx and it kills me that its no longer on the market. It is slim and efficient. I love the charge on the cradle and 8megs is more then enough for my palm. It kills me that when I service plan this Vx, I will no longer have a Vx. Oh so sad - teardrop, teardrop.

    Ive gone from Palm IIIe, IIIxe, Vx and none of them have ever given me major fits. My little sister uses the m100 we got for free, my mother and mother in law use the IIIxe, my fiance the Vx, my aunt the m505 and my uncle the m500. We all LOVE all palms and have never had any major hardware problems. My aunt even dunked her Vx in a toilet and it worked okay for a few more weeks, then we service plan'd it.
  • I got mine about a month or two after they came out. I've had it ever since and have had no problems with it at all.
  • I had a 'clear" IIIe, and early m100, both of which I gave away to colleagues and are still working just fine. Can't remember recalibrating them more than a time or two, they sync right up, though I think the IR on the m100 is shot - honestly? most of what I did with it was impress other people by frivolously beaming something to another Palm just to show it can be done.

    I'm now on a Visor Neo - which I'll prolly give to my fiancee now that the Edge is so cheap. (plus, next to my iBook, the Smoke colored Neo looks like it was made by Black -) and the dirt-colored Wintel box).

    As for the 'third time' - um, your implied choices are "maybe more crap" and "DEFINITELY NO PDA"

    Right now you can get a Visor Neo for $147 at any WalMart. Sturdier, far more expandable, a screen that mops the floor with the m1xx series.

    I've decided I need a minimal PDA given the 4-lb iBook - when I was on my 7-lb PB1400 I used the Palms far more than now - and the greyscale 8MB does 80% of what I need to know/do/see walking around. I know the Treo communicators combine two useful things, but I have yet to actually see one being used.

    I figure I'm going to sit on it or drop kick it sooner or later, so I won't sink major bucks into such a thing. Same reason Ihaven't gotten an iPod - there's a detente about heft and size that seems to determine dropability - I've dropped my eMap a lot, but never lost my GPS12 - never booted a CD Player, but my MP3 player is hard to keep ahold of. The iBook has yet to slip loose, but the Palms are always being saved by a quick stab. In the same vein, I've cut myself with every keychain-sized knife or tool I've ever tried to carry, but never so much as a nick from my trusty Victorinox Soldier.

    Go figure.
  • Last December, on a trip to England, my old Palm III was stolen from my jacket pocket. Of course this was pretty stupid on the theif's part, because the jacket was worth easily 3 or 4 times the Palm III's value. This was on the first day of my trip.

    The reason I still had a III was because I couldn't decide on what to replace it with, but now I was forced to choose, so I searched all over the web and decided on the IBM branded Palm Vx, which had been discontinued in the US, but was still available in the UK for a good price. I called IBM and they refused to sell it to me unless I used a credit card with a UK address. So they lost a sale.

    Turns out I would be forced to buy something in a store, and the store prices for Palm type devices are insanely higher than in the US, so I just couldn't bring myself to do it. Then I searched all around and decided I would mail order a particular Handspring or some such, and it would be waiting for me when I got back home. My boss agreed to pay for it, as the Palm III had been bought by work, and I was on a work trip.

    Then a guy I know over there told me he had a M105 that Dell sent him for free with his laptop, it was almost new, in that he had only played with it a bit, and he agreed to sell it to me for the discount price of 20. It has a much better screen than the Palm III, and of course 8MB instead of 2MB, and obviously the price was right, so I was pleased at first.

    Since then the M105 has mostly worked correctly. The case of course feels like crap. The plastic is cheap and the sections pull apart with no effort. The screen has since developed an area in the middle that is a bit too dark or too light, depending on how the contrast is adjusted. Even worse, twice now the unit has completely refused to turn on. I had to remove and reinsert the batteries to get it to come back, and at that point all of the memory was erased.

    Still, for $30 I would recommend one to anybody, but if you have to pay real money, get something else. I would also have to recommend that people avoid the newer M125. If Palm wants to get out of the hardware business and just license there OS to other manufacturers (as has been rumored occasionaly), making junk like this is certainly a good way to start.

    On product just getting worse in general? I have a $2500 (when it was new) Dell laptop that in 1.5 years has had almost every piece replaced at least once, and some of them twice or more. The only original pieces left are the actual LCD part of the screen (the plastic it is encased in has been replaced several times), the floppy drive, and the CD drive. The floppy is rarely used, and the removable CD drive spends most of its time sitting in a drawer.

    I don't abuse the machine. Mostly I carry it between the bedroom, living room, and kitchen in my house. The plastic on the case is so brittle that it cracks at regular intervals. After just getting the external power supply replaced last week, the second time, now I need to call to get the bottom replaced, because it has cracked in the same place it cracked a few months ago.

    Ironically, when entering computer lemon law [google.com] into Google, the sponsored link is www.dell4me.com.

  • Same for Apple (Score:4, Informative)

    by pinkpineapple ( 173261 ) on Saturday June 01, 2002 @04:28PM (#3623787) Homepage
    Is this part of the economic factor? After all, if your system was lasting forever, companies would have some problem justifying their investor that they can sell you stuff only once.

    I bought a PowerPC laptop back in 1995 and I could beat on the keyboard, not use a bag to carry to class, sit on it, almost anything it would take. Last year, I got a TiBook: first week, the return key broke, the next day, I hold the machine, the battery felt off the machine (while working), the screen had 5 bad pixels when I got it and the sticker feet on the bottom left the machine one at a time (without mentioning keys that scratch the screen, heat that burned my laps and locking system that doesn't work anymore.) Overall, a beautiful machine when you see it in an ad. But not built too last.

    A friend of mine has still an HP-41C in perfect working condition (made 20 years ago.)

    PPA, the girl next door.
  • Infant Mortaility Syndrom.

    Happens to everyone. Thermal burn-in can reduce the risk, move you down the curve of the bathtub.

  • ... until the quality increases. Over the past 3 years, I've purchased no less than a half-dozen PDAs (from the base Handspring model to the Sony CLIE I bought my wife for Christmas). Every single one of them, except for the Sony (and give it time, it's less than six months old ...) has had problems. Oh wait a second, I did drop one on the bathroom floor at work and the ensuing screen damage rendered it inoperable.

    But the others (all Handspring here) have all suffered from defects ranging from annoying to unusable no more - on one, the backlight stopped working 4 months after I bought it. Another, a Visor Platinum, refuses to sync - it used to be funny and I could jiggle it a little bit, but now, even after swapping the base USB plastic connector deals out, it still won't sync. A visor deluxe I bought for my wife has a several buttons that don't function properly.

    Admittedly, a few of these were "refurbished" models sold for a discount, but I was led to believe that that meant they got a little more quality testing to make sure the consumer wasn't sold a defective product. Not so in Handspring's case.

    It's just too much money to waste on an item for the dicey reliability factor. And once you start using one, putting all your info into it, having to send it off just isn't viable. Either you buy another or you go back to toting that Franklin day planner again.

  • Is your Palm a worthless piece of junk then?

    I know, send it to China!

    graspee

  • Speaking of poor quality electronics, just an "FYI" for anyone considering getting a Panasonic Gigarange telephone. I have had one, a former roomate had a different model with answering machine, and my uncle had one. ALL have died within a year, mine within 5 months. These are extremely expensive phones with great range and sound quality but a very short lifespan.
    If you get one, be sure to pick it up from a place like Best Buy and get the extended warranty! You have been warned!
    • I've got oa Gigarange, and every since January I can't hardly use the Caller ID functions. I can still make calls, with some loss in sound quality. But when I try to use the handset to look at caller ID, it just says out of range 9/10 times.

      Sux.
  • In defence of palm, I think we should remember how much abuse palms take. I have a Vx that has worked constantly. It sometimes is in my pocket, in my hot car in summer, dropped and and otherwise abused. We take a bit for granted, I think, on how much sh*t we give our little pda's and expect them to work perfectly all the time.

    Ever noticed how computers seem to crash more when you seriously kicking them around (as opposed to just using word)?

    Just a thought....

    -Sean

  • My Palm service experience (Score:3, Informative)

    by jkovach ( 1036 ) <slashdot@jkovach.net> on Saturday June 01, 2002 @08:11PM (#3624461) Homepage
    I have had problems with Palm too....

    One day, while trying to take notes in class, I dropped my Palm IIIxe on the floor and broke the screen. (Whooooops.) Because I had the Palm folding keyboard that worked with the III series but not the newer models with their redesigned cases, I opted to pay Palm $100 to fix my unit rather than to go buy a new one. So I sent my device back, and a week later I get the exchange unit. I then threw some batteries in it and stick it in my backpack, and then when I go to use it two days later it doesn't turn on because the batteries are dead. I figured that the case I had it in was pushing one of the buttons and didn't really think much of it at the time, but after several more sets of dead batteries I did some testing and found that the device would run down batteries in 12 hours while sitting turned off in a drawer. Hard resets and a different brand of battery didn't fix it, so off it went back to Palm for another exchange...

    One week later, the second replacement arrives. In go the batteries, and I even install a fresh copy of the Hotsync software for Windows and sync with that instead of using KPilot to restore my old data. Same problem - 12 hours later, turned off in a drawer, dead batteries. So I call up Palm again and explain my situation, and they say to do another exchange, and when I asked what I could do if the new unit had the same problem they told me I could call corporate headquarters "using the number from the website." Thankfully, the third replacement worked.

    So in the end, in order to have a $100 repair performed on my Palm, I had to pay the $100, plus $5 in tax, $10 three times for return shipping and $8 for a 12 pack of batteries from the rat shack. Total of $142. Plus it took a month and three trips to the post office. Rather inconvienient, and not exactly a ringing endorsement of Palm's quality control...
  • Palm devices (and Handspring, btw) are manufactured by a company called Flextronics, one of the big 4 in outsourced manufacturing. Palm devices are manufactured in Flex Malaysia and in Guadalajara, Mexico. Flextronics sources material and handles end of line manufacturing quality. The only exception to this for Palm was the VIIx was made in a Flex facility in Fremont, I don't know if this applies to the 705.

    In any case, where many people rail about the quality of Company X's products, these days it is highly likely that Company X didn't have anything to do with making the product other than designing it. And in this age of "badge engineering" of electronics, that's not even necessarily true, as someone mentioned with the IBM WorkPad. The objective of outsourcing the manufacturing function is ultimately managing the companies stock price, not pleasing the customer. By offloading headcount and very expensive capital facilities like factories, companies try to make their return on invested capital look better.

    However, someone other than Company X now actually controls the customer's "out of box" experience. If they do this poorly, they eventually will have to eat the cost of returns and perhaps lose Company X's manufacturing business, but the loss of future sales caused by the customer's poor experience falls on Company X. And the contract manufacturer is large and has many other companies to live on, while Company X probably has a relatively small set of products, which now may have acquired a reputation for poor quality. Company X's sales drop and their stock (symbol: PALM) drops below $2...

    Ultimately the consumer is the loser, since as I mentioned, it is possible that a product area has ALL of the branded companies using contract manufacturing, possibly even the SAME manufacturer.

    I believe that using contract manufacturing for consumer systems ultimately is a loser for the companies involved since it is very difficult to avoid large batches of poor quality goods from reaching customers. So if, for example Sony, apart from being innovative with its designs, still does its own manufacturing, I think it will win share down the road, while companies that hit lower price points with inferior product will be eliminated, unless they can figure out how to create "disposable" products and do the heavy marketing needed to establish such a concept.
  • C'mon, who buy palm nowadays? They are overpriced
    and lack features. I give them the credit for
    starting the PDA industry but most people get
    now Sony or Handspring.

  • I have owned my palm for 1 1/2 years and I had no problems with mine at all. Very reliable. 2 megs is fine for a calender and a few apps I have downloaded from the net. Anyway I have seen my father's expensive palm V die and his palm VII freeze up very badly to the point where the batteries had to be taken out while my el-cheapo palm m100 has been fine. So much for the idea that you get what you pay for. My only complaint is the cheap thick plastic used. I have dropped it at least 3 times so far and it has not broken once but its uncomfortable and thick. The outer screen cover came off about the first month since I owned it but other then that I had nothing but good luck.

    The problems many may have could be due to a specific manufactoring plant. This would explain while most have no problems at all but a few do. If the product was poorly designed like then everyone would be having trouble. After the .com crash many companies started looking for ways to reduce costs. Perhaps palm decided to try a cheaper manufactor to build them. At least mine made from the pre-.bomb is fine.

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