10-16-2004, 11:30 PM
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Swami
Join Date: Feb 2004
Posts: 4,303
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Zaurus SL-C300: First PDA With Hard Disk
Sharp has just announced their new Zaurus SL-C3000 PDA. (Hmmm, catchy name. ;-)) It should ship in the Japanese market on the 10th of November and will be the first PDA with a hard drive. The Register has the details:
"The new model is based on a 416MHz Intel XScale PXA270 processor backed by 64MB of SDRAM and 16MB of Flash ROM. Crucially, the unit also features a 4GB hard drive - the first PDA to do so. The Sl-C3000 sports a 3.7in 640 x 480 LCD mounted above a QWERTY keypad with a five-way navigator control. There's written text input too, with Kanji and Western character recognition. Unlike Sony's PDAs, there's no wireless on the Sharp model, only infra-red. There's an SD and a CompactFlash card slot for expansion, so there's scope to add Bluetooth or Wi-Fi later on. There's also the usual USB port for connecting the device to a PC, and an earphones socket."
As you can see, the SL-C3000 has a flip-round display similar to some of the Cli� models. The weight is just under 200 grams, which does seem on the high side You can find more photos of the unit at PC Watch Japan. We've discussed the pros and cons of having hard drives in PDA a fair few times, but now someone has actually gone and produced one, so we should be able to find out how well it works in practice. Personally I still hope to own a Pocket PC with a large hard drive at some point. What about you guys?
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10-16-2004, 11:53 PM
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Theorist
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 301
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It's just nice to see an OEM trying to think outside the box a bit. I'm not really sure that an internal hard drive would be all that much better than a CF slot that the end-user slaps a 5GB Seagate CF MicroDrive into. But hey, at least it's different from what's currently on the market.
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10-16-2004, 11:58 PM
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Contributing Editor
Join Date: Sep 2006
Posts: 524
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It looks like my OmniGo!
Cool! It looks just like my old HP OmniGo 120! I loved that PDA. Back when "Palm Pilot" where the hot item I found the omnigo and was very happy with it.
This looks just like it but with a color screen and probably half the size and weight.
Go Sharp! I loved that OmniGo design!
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10-17-2004, 12:12 AM
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Theorist
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 301
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Re: It looks like my OmniGo!
Quote:
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Originally Posted by vector
Cool! It looks just like my old HP OmniGo 120!
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Whoa! OmniGo, that takes me back! I never noticed the similarity until you pointed that out.
Of course, the other difference would be that the screen actually uses the whole lid. The "square screen" was one of the things I remember about my OmniGo. Thanks for the walk down Memory Lane. :lol:
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10-17-2004, 12:45 AM
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Oracle
Join Date: Aug 2003
Posts: 880
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I like the OmniGo I had... except that I hated the chicklet style keyboard.. and the fact that it was not very reliable... it crashed on me so much that in the end... I had to give it back. And get a Casio E-10...
This unit looks promising... and is moving in a direction... we just need to get rid of the chicklet keyboard and increase the screen size to fill out the bezel... and things are looking good.
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10-17-2004, 01:21 AM
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Moderator
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 6,878
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Is it a microdrive? If so, it would be nice if they used the space for solid state instead. Who will be the first to open one up and check (and replace that microdrive with a 4GB CF card :wink: )?
Steve
__________________
"My eyes are rolling back in my head so far I can see my grey matter bubbling and frothing from reading this thread....bleh." JD
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10-17-2004, 01:32 AM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 157
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Hard drive durability?
Question for the experts out there: Are these mini-hard drives sufficiently durable to be used in a device that is going to be jostled around and potentially dropped? I haven't kept up on this issue in a while, but I remember when the first IBM Micro-drives came out, I heard stories of people that had ruined their HD's by dropping them.
Is this still a problem?
TMann
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10-17-2004, 01:38 AM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 1,041
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Mark Johnson
It's just nice to see an OEM trying to think outside the box a bit. I'm not really sure that an internal hard drive would be all that much better than a CF slot that the end-user slaps a 5GB Seagate CF MicroDrive into. But hey, at least it's different from what's currently on the market.
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I agree. Better to have a CF slot and have a hard drive you can upgrade readily. I love the design though!
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10-17-2004, 01:52 AM
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Sage
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 601
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The 4Gb disk doesn't move me that much, like others I am concerned about durability. However, I'd pay for that form factor running Window Mobile. Too bad there aren't any PPC OEM's brave enough to take a shot at this.
__________________
CTSLICK - ROCK ON
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10-17-2004, 02:19 AM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Jan 2003
Posts: 214
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Yeah that model is slick... I would love to see Windows Mobile able to be ported over on other devices. It would've been sweet to have a Windows Mobile device on a Tungsten T3, or one of the Clie's.
Pocket PC's have been the same boring form factor since their inception. I really admired the Clie TH55 and UX-50, I just had too much invested in Pocket PC software to justify the switch.
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