iPaq 1935 3rd day review

[Skoobouy]

Well, all I have to say is: it's about darn time. Living in Belgium, I've had to wait for this little puppy for six weeks--what was originally supposed to be two weeks. Well, now it's here, smuggled past cutsoms by the Rector and sitting in my palm. YAY! I am no longer utterly gadgetless.

Now if only the rector hadn't tossed out that $50 rebate thing. >_<

The iPaq 1935 is a heck of a machine, coming up from a Jornada 567 that I sold last May. Here are my initial impressions:

-I am really loving the screen here. It's behavior is typical for the series--slight yellowing when tilted away--but the screen looks so gorgeous straight-on (and most of the rest of the time, too) that I say it's a non-issue. Now I know why some of the major reviewers, like C-Net and PCMag, plus "Personal Computer World" from the UK, don't even mention it: it really doesn't affect anything.

Also, insteresting discovery: tilting the iPaq with the lower-left corner facing you produces the most extreme results. It turns orange, almost red!

-Speed is great. I haven't tried anything more intense than Pocket Nester, but that runs perfectly (even tough games like Castlevania III and Mario 3). Supposedly, there's a mysterious SNES emulator for Pocket PC, called SNES9xj4u, which runs excellently even on the 1930's 203MHz processor. But it's all but disappeared from the Web.

-I bought the Palm Wireless Keyboard. Works perfectly, especially with Nyditot Virtual Display, and loads of fun. I like to use Landscape 480x320, a profile I named "virtual Tungsten," which is a good way to get more text on the screen. Quite readable.

-Very happy that I get Westek's ClearView suite as a bonus.

-Sandisk Wifi card installed fine, and I can get AvantGo channels, but no Web yet. Somebody said a hard-reset worked, so I'm tempted.

-Looks good in my bubble-wrap case. :)

-Totally better than the Tungsten E. Smaller, non-finger-printing, Wifi capable, soft-graffiti/landscape, emulation, Themes (!).

-WM2k3 is great. I like blue dots better than red dots for tap-and-hold. :)I still don't understand why they think PDAs need DLLs. Oh yeah, and Internet config menus still suck.

That's all for now. :)

[animlmed]

I love my h1935. It's a great little machine. Fast, great screen. i've been playing games on mine all night. There is nothing about this machine I don't like! Worth the price! ( And what a deal, if I may ad.:) )

[Skoobouy]

Oh man oh man oh man!! I'm posting this via iPaq + WiFi! Weeeeeeeee!

[Janak Parekh]

-Looks good in my bubble-wrap case. :)
Waitasecond, do you mean that you're using the packaging it came in as a case? :lol:

Congrats on the purchase.

--janak

[Skoobouy]

It's nice having scaled another mountain on my path to Pocket PC glory. :) I am now browsing the Web in the refectory of my college, using PIEPlus and an NVD virtual resolution of 480x320, which is the same as those high-res Palms. True, it's not exactly VGA compliant, but I find this works much better than 480x360. I'm also writing this with the Palm Wireless Keyboard.

Nothing has ever come close to being so pleasant, except naybe my old Jornada 720, and that was a giant, with cramped keys. Now if only Pocket PCs weren't so geeky. I've already made the other folks in the college jealous. :)

[delfuhd]

-WM2k3 is great. I like blue dots better than red dots for tap-and-hold. :)

As a matter of fact, one thing I've noticed is that the dots for "tap and hold" change as your Today theme changes! It's very nifty indeed

[Skoobouy]

Well, I've gotten to play even more with the thing. I don't think I'll ever get tired of it. This is the first time I've been able to use Pocket Outlook for real e-mail. I sent a quick recorded "I love you" to mom--yes, this feature alone could be a Blackberry killer, if only one could be connected all the time without dialing-in, and if the client itself had any formatting features whatsoever. Setting up my couple of e-mail accounts was relatively painless, but...

-Has anybody ever gotten that "automatic configure" feature to work? Because I had my Outlook configured perfectly, but so far as I can tell, this feature does nothing at all.

-There is no option to manually set it to "leave the messages on the server." Is this the default?

-Is there any way I can filter mail from my two POP3 accounts into seperate folders?

Seems like Microsoft should realize that "pocket version" =/= lacking essential features that everyone uses. :roll:

---------------------------------------

I also have a quick question about uBook: the full-screen option doesn't seem to work very well. Whenever I tap the main function symbol, either the title bar or the menu bar appear, or both, obscuring the once beautiful Gutenburg e-text.

But so far, I'm still having a blast, and making people jealous all over the place. Weeee. :)

[Dave Potter]

I bought the Palm Wireless Keyboard. Works perfectly...

Could you clarify this statement??

Do you mean a 'Universal' IR Keyboard that works with both Pocket PC and Palm PDAs - or - do you literally mean a Palm branded IR Keyboard?

The reason I ask - I didn't know that you could use an Palm branded IR Keyboards on a Pocket PC, if this in the fact case.

[Skoobouy]

Yep, the Palm Wireless Keyboard works with any Palm or Pocket PC with the latest dirvers from ThinkOutside.

[Palmguy]

How long have you been in Belgium? I had thought that you were in the States within the last couple of years when we were all still at PDABuzz...

Congrats on the new iPAQ, the 1900/4100 devices are pretty much the ultimate form factor. I do miss the size of my 4150 with this new blue VGA beast I have. Is the case on the 1935 metal? I seem to remember playing with one and it felt more metallic than the 4150...how's the range on the SD Wifi?

[Skoobouy]

I've been studying in Belgium since last September.

The case feels metal, but it's really not easy to tell one way or the other. SD WiFi range is a little dissapointing, but that's because it has to go through a number of walls to get very far in our large building. It can't quite reach the refectory or the lounge or the chapel sacristy--all places where it'd be most convient. It's not nearly as strong as my buddy's WiFi USB dongle. But it's still the coolest thing in the world. :)

[Skoobouy]

Well, it's been about ten days now, and I have more to say--although that may have more to do with caffeine than iPaq experience.

Quick correction--I'm positive the chassis is plastic. However, the stylus is metal and has a pleasant cold feel after five minutes in an air-conditioned room.

I've had to hard reset the device twice, first because I had problems with removing some programs and messing too much with the registry. (Registry is not updated by 'Remove Programs'?--stupid, stupid, stupid!). The second time was because of mysterious and unexplainable behavior with TextMaker. Now everything's nice and smooth.

I have to repeat myself again : PIEPlus is the most important program ever written for Pocket PC, EVER! More than WISBar, more than TextMaker, maybe Pocket Backup rivals it, but PIEPlus simply _makes_ the machine. Seriuosly, nothing comes close. No zooming, no NVD Virtual Display teeny-text, no annual service fees, just pure, no-compromise Web browsing. Every single site I go to is readable and navigable in full.

My SanDisk card deleted everything, including several pages of course notes. ARGH. I still use it, with weekly backups to the PC. ActiveSync needs a 'Synchronize Storage Card' option..

Whatever company designed the chassis for this and the 4100 series deserves a Nobel Peace Prize. :)

I'm more convinced than ever that the 1930 completely beats out the Tungsten E for value. The formfactor is simply better, the screen is bigger (and with PIEPlus, high res be darned!).

However, I know PPC like the back of my hand. I'm discovering that WM2k3 is simply opaque to non-computer people, and that is a problem that needs to be fixed. Thing is, it isn't difficult. All WM2k3 needs is:

-A registry that keeps itself clean.
-Memory management that keeps the device just as clean after a month as it is right after a soft reset.
-Preloaded Transcriber profiles that are easy to pick from for easy training.
-Either/both (a) a more simple directory structure or (b) an idiot-proof tutorial about File Explorer.
-A CLOSE BUTTON THAT CLOSES ARGH ARGH ARGH!!! :cry:

[PetiteFlower]

Get Pocket Plus from SPB Software. Makes the close button really close. It's the single most valuable app I have on my PPC, without it the non-closing close button really drives me nuts! It has a lot of other nice features too, and it's not expensive.

[Skoobouy]

Thanks PetiteFlower; I already use WisBar Advance. I'm fine, but I'm just thinking of the average new PDA owner who wouldn't think to fix the problem with a 3rd party app--heck who probably wouldn't even knoiw all of his/her programs were still running in the background, slowing his/her device to a crawl.

3rd party apps are great; forcing customer to search for them to make the thing work right is stupid, stupid, stupid.

[Dave Potter]

3rd party apps are great; forcing customer to search for them to make the thing work right is stupid, stupid, stupid.

I completely agree. But, we are talking about Miscrosoft. If they were to put too much functionality in the OS - they'd likely be slapped with some sort of government anti-trust law suit.

Damned if they do - damned if they don't.

[Skoobouy]

Who would sue them for fixing the close button? What market would they be monopolozing? The "Working Close Button" market? :roll:

[dh]

Who would sue them for fixing the close button? What market would they be monopolozing? The "Working Close Button" market? :roll:
The entire Working Close Button industry would be devestated if Microsoft were to include that feature in the operating system. The only hope for these companies would be to merge with AOL-TimeWarner, with who knows what consequences.

I believe that several States, the Federal Government and the EU are already preparing Anti-Trust cases against MS in order to prevent this gross misuse of monopoly power. It looks as though Microsoft will be forced to provide an OS with no features at all. Mr. Bill Fence (a Microsoft spokesperson) was recently quoted as saying that a feature free operating system is already in development and will be called Windows Mobile 2004. Fence said that since customers prefer third party solutions anyway, why not let third party developers provide everything. It seems that the new Feature Free WM2004 takes up no ROM space at all, having a footprint of 0MB, yet another advantage. Fence also mentioned that a license fee of $250.00 must be paid to Microsoft for use of the FAT file system. This license fee must be paid by everyone on the planet over the age of eighteen.

By the way, Battery Pack does a very nice job of looking after the Close Button. I'd hate to see OmegaOne go the way of Netscape. I bet those nasty AOL people would soon put a stop to the free upgrades.

[Dave Potter]

No one would sue them for fixing the close button? 'Fixing' the close button would weaken the market postion of third party vendors who offer this functionality. It's these disgruntled third party vendors who have built a business out of fixing a MS weakness who cry foul and then try to sue (Boo hoo - MS is monopolizing the Software industry!)

Also - keep in mind that MS wants to encourage third party vendors to write apps (and fixes) for their operating systems. The more the better. At least in theory, every vendor focussed on writing apps for MS platforms is one less writing for competitive platforms (like Palm). The more apps and the more vendors writing for MS platforms, the greater the perception that MS is king. If the OS were too perfect, none (or much less) of this would occur.

Walk into any software store and what do you see - shelf after shelf of MS platform based software. See much Macintosh stuff anymore? Of course not. Is it because Windows is better? (I'm not gonna open that can of worms). It's all about perception. The availability of more apps creates the perception that MS is better and that it offers more options and flexibility - whether its actually true or not

My personal theory is that they intentionally include weaknesses in the Pocket PC OS to specifically attact third party vendor solutions. It's all part of a master plan - one that has worked very successfully before (Windows vs. Mac OS). Say what you like about Bill Gates - but he is smart.