Happy with your h4150? How'bout the h2215?

[Orbsplateau]

Happy with your h4150?

It’s one of the models I’m considering to purchase (along with the H2215 and the standard X50). I was almost sure about getting the X50 but I’ve heard a lot of good things about the 4150 ... so feel free to complain about it.

I own a h1910 at the moment. I’m happy with the form factor, style and weight. Love the screen.
BUT I’m NOT really happy with it and want to make sure I don’t encounter the same problems with the 4150:

Slow CPU:
granted, the 1910 is much slower than the 4150, but the 4150 is also a lot slower than some of the newer Dells. Any of you guys had problems with slowdowns / freezes?

Poor build quality / reliability:
This is my 3rd h1910 in 18 months. Each unit has lasted no more than 5-6 months before dying or developping a serious problem. On 2 of those occasions, the screen was the problem. My friend has gone through 2 h1940's so far. The unit just seems fragile. HP replaced my units right away... but still. My Cassiopeia lasted me 2 years before I sold it. Never had a problem.

Poor battery life:
I needed a second battery to make it through some days. I’ve heard that the extended battery makes the 4150 heavier and defeats the point of having a light unit.

The record button:
I often record memos. Unfortunately, I have the press the button and hold it REALLY hard or else it stops recording halfway. Had the same problem on all 3 units...

No CF support:
It would be great to be able to use the same memory type for my digital camera and PDA. CF cards are still faster/cheaper than SD cards.


I use my device for:
+ voice recorder in class (Resco audio turns off the screen and turns device to recorder - it helped that the 1910's microphone is at the very top of the unit)
+ reading the news (avantgo)
+ calculator (scientific / graphing / Excel)
+ alarm + organizer + scheduler
+ photo album & short movie player (taken by digital camera)
+ MP3 player (pocketmind music player is AMAZING. much better than Media player)
+ Memo recorder (I often record phone numbers by voice and write them down later)
+ reading long articles (WORD docs... the 1910's display settings helped)

I use my device both indoors and outdoors

I like the idea of having bluetooth to improve connectivity with other devices.
I also like the idea of Wifi... but don’t see myself using it much.

any advice or comments would be greatly appreciated.

[PDANEWBIE]

Heres some thoughts on the 2215

If you need a record button scratch 2215 off your list it doesn't have one.

My 2215 I am overal okay with but it has had its issues (see some of my prior posts) some have been software related some have been worse and have had to have service.

With the 2215 I am not seeing significant speed problems except I wish apps opened quicker I don't know if that it CPU related or just my wishful thinking that an app load quickly.

Battery life I can't complain about even with the regular battery I had a great amount of time I could use it. With the Mugen I think my average battery life is something like 8 to 9 hours. Though I have a problem with the extended battery making cases a more difficult thing.

IMHO the 2215 has alot of outdoor glare. Almost to the poin of unuseable. I think the one thing I will need to base on my next purchase is use in the future will be outdoor visability. But I hear the newer models these days are much better for outdoor use.

My Opinion 2215 has nice weight to it (light), good small form factor (except the handles that can be a pain to replace), and a long battery life.

As far as bluetooth and WiFi while I don't use it much I will never buy a device that doesn't have them both built in again. I now have another CF card I have to carry around with me that I have to put in my PPC if I ever want to web surf and god forbid if I left it at home!

[Orbsplateau]

thank you for taking the time to shed some light on the 2215.

I've read nearly all the reviews on the 2215, and they're not all "good".

I had heard for example, that the display is not as good as the h19xx or the h41xx. But I didn't know its outdoor usage was limited.

As for the record button, I guess the workaround would be mapping the record function to another button (that's possible, right?)

I'm not as worried about not having wifi, since I've never had it and I really haven't missed it. It would be nice once in a while, but my cell phone is blue-tooth capable... so if I really wanted to, I could access the net that way - and that would work from anyway, not just from work (I don't have wireless setup at home).

The main advantage of the 2215 over the 4150 seems to be the CF slot, a more solid feel and the consumer grade IR.

A lot of the "usual" problems/fixes with the 2215 are addressed here:
http://www.pc-counselor.com/h221x.htm

[Sven Johannsen]

Keep in mind that the 2215 is also half again as thick as the 4155. So if you were considering the 2215, you shouldn't discount the 4155 with extended battery. Those are then comparable. You could go the route of a CF to SD converter for your camera, but the ones that work..the SD is totally enclosed...aren't cheap. Also note that if you put a picture laden SD from your camera into your PPC, what are going to do with the pics. You can view them, but won't have enough RAM to copy a significant number off the card for storage. A dual slot device is the only reasonable thing to have if you are looking to off-load your camera. That could be the X50 as well as the 2215.

The X50 is significantly bigger than either the HP models. I have an X50v and am not impressed by it's performance over my 2215 and 4155, until I go to video playback. That could be due to the graphics processor and VGA screen in my unit, or the aggressive processor management to conserve power for the underwhelming battery. It's by no means bad, just doesn't seem 50% faster as the processor speeed might lead you to expect. Haven't had the opportunity to play much with a non-VGA X50, so those may be different.

At this point though it is hard to justify paying more for year old technology with WM2003, over the latest WM2003SE box. Dell's pricing is compelling, and they are getting it with their hardware these days. Updates seem to be forthcoming, and their support, when it comes to replacement, is pretty good.

Incidentally, you should be able to just click the record button and have the recorder keep going until you click again. The timing is real touchy, but I have had it work, though I rarely use the record function. Not sure if this is just an SE option, but it is in the book on my X50, and it works.

[Orbsplateau]

That anteater pic is hilarious!


It is true that the 2215 and 4150 are a year old and have an older OS. The X50 is one of the newest PPC out there.

X50 seems to have the better battery life.

According to the benchmarks, the X50 is faster too... but I've read conflicting comments about the X50v specifically.
In some ways, the X50 520Mhz seems faster to some users.


I've realized that if the X50 had the h1940/h4150's form factor and weight, then it would be the perfect PDA for me.

That's pretty much the main reason I'm consdering the lighter/smaller HPs.

[Menneisyys]

It would be great to be able to use the same memory type for my digital camera and PDA. CF cards are still faster/cheaper than SD cards.

In a hi-end digicam, they are. In a PDA, not any more. You won't really encounter any speed advantage when using a CF card in a PDA than over using an SD card. Actually, recent PDA's (including the 2210!) access the SD card even slightly faster than the CF card.

+ voice recorder in class (Resco audio turns off the screen and turns device to recorder - it helped that the 1910's microphone is at the very top of the unit)

If I were you, I'd switch to NoteM. It has by far better sound quality when you use MP3 encoding and 44 kHz sampling fequency (if you want to make decent, hi-quality recordings). Also, it has less battery consumption than Resco. If you really need voice activation, you can also consider VITO's sound recorder program, which too has vastly superior sound quality to Resco in hi-quality mode. See http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=36508 for more info on this.

(Of course, if you don't want to record hi-quality stuff, Resco is OK.)


+ photo album & short movie player (taken by digital camera)

The 4150 has a definitely better, more saturated screen than the 2210 if you wnt to use it for a photo album. It's nowehere as good as the 1910 screen, however.

I use my device both indoors and outdoors

Both the 2210 and the 4150 can be used outdoors without REALLY major problems (washed out screens).

[Menneisyys]

but I've read conflicting comments about the X50v specifically.
In some ways, the X50 520Mhz seems faster to some users.

VGA devices are inherently slower at displaying op. system menus as QVGA devices because they have to move/display/scroll 4 times more pixels at a time. In raw processing power (e.g., decoding JPG's), however, the 624 MHz VGA devices ARE significantly faster than 520 QVGA devices. And, always prefer PXA270/272 devices (X30/X50) over PXA255 (2210) devices - the new, 270/2 processors ARE faster.

An example: an 520 MHz PXA272 VGA device can find a given word in a Mobipocket document in 6:20, while a 400 MHz PXA255 QVGA device (the 2210) only in 9:52. See for example http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=36376 on this:

"Incidentally, exactly the same test, under the same conditions, ran for 9:52 on an iPAQ 2210. Astonishing result if you take into account that the 2210 is a snappy, fast device and there's only 120 MHz difference between the two machines. The difference in the clock speed is only 33%, while in the raw CPU+I/O power, 56%! The difference is not that visible in real life, though, especially when browsing with File Explorer. Then, the PL720 (or, for that matter, any VGA machine) seems to be much slower than any decent WM2003 XScale PXA-255 QVGA device."

[Menneisyys]

IMHO the 2215 has alot of outdoor glare. Almost to the poin of unuseable. I think the one thing I will need to base on my next purchase is use in the future will be outdoor visability. But I hear the newer models these days are much better for outdoor use.

All non-reflective (transflective / transmissive) devices are like that. Noone has produced a transflective / transmissive screen as yet that would have the same visibility as a simple reflective screen. The outdoor visibility of the 2210's screen is not much worse than those of the PDA's produced in 2003. It's mostly the even more washed-out colors that are apparent with the 2210 screen. See for example http://menneisyys.freeweb.hu/sunlight/2210vs5450vsA620vs3630.jpg and http://menneisyys.freeweb.hu/sunlight/2210vs5450vsA620vsZire71.jpg . The first image also has the reflective 3630 - you can see how better screen it has.

Please also take into account that I've forgotten to clean the 2210 screen before the shot; this also contributes to its being hardly visible.

Newer-generation PDA's can be/are indeed better in this respect. I haven't compared the outdoor visibility of the 2210 screen to the x50(v), though; only to that of the hx4700 and the PL720. The latter two VGA devices have definitely much better outdoor visibility than the 2210. They still aren't as good as the 3630, though.

[Orbsplateau]

Menneisyys.

wow, thank you for all your valuable insight, especially the performance optimization technics since that will come in handy regardless of which PDA I purchase.

By the way, I totally aggree on the Resco Recorder comment. Very CPU intensive and power hungry. My battery never lasted the entire day when I used this program.

The recording quality was "OK" but I over-came this by using an additional software on my computer to re-process the recordings in order to reduce noise and background hum. Still... this wasted a lot of time.

[Orbsplateau]

summary

So far here's what I've gathered from readers comments. From what I

the 4150's display is better than the 2210's (though perhaps not by much) and the 19xx had the best display among the 3 models.

the people who like the 2210 like its versatility (dual slots, Consumer grade IR) and its range of features.
They hated the rubber grip "situation" and aren't too happy about not being able to upgrade the OS. Actually, there are a number of other "minor" complaints as well.

the 4150 fans seem to love the formfactor (probably the devices's best feature?) and the fact that it has both WIFI and Bluetooth in a small package.
Not much to complain about it.... except that it doesn't have the latest OS and it's relatively expensive given that it's an older model.
Battery life was an issue for a few users.


thank you guys for all the valuable comments you've provided. I still haven't made up my mind completely, but if I buy an HP, it will be the 4150.