Why must every Pocket PC have an Achilles' Heel?

[Skoobouy]

Jornada 540 - slow
Jornada 560 - dust
Cassiopeias - big (& E200 backlight fiasco)
Genio e570/Maestro - short battery life
Toshiba e310 - weak audio
Tpshiba e740 - whole host of problems
All Toshibas - button lag, no upgrades
iPaq:
3600/3700 - dust, buttons
3800 - performance hit from wierd screen issue
3900 - none (?)
1910 - absolutely no expansion beyond memory
1940/30 - "Mellow yellow."
2210 - No record button (wierd. just. wierd.)

All PXA 250 XScale PPCs: the PXA 250 XScale. :|

5550- none (?) but anyway, prohibitively expensive and big.

Viewsonic PPCs - Wierd memory configuration
Dell Axim - Big, upgrade fiasco, problem with memory cards (?)

Is this a conspiracy? Is it really too much to ask to want a PDA with none of this nonsense? Here's hoping we have a brighter future than the past.

[Anthony Caruana]

Some of the early devices in your list were 1st generation attempts by the manufacturers on new model lines. Many of the issues have been resolved by now or were just the nature of the technology at the time. For example

Jornada 540 - slow
Compared to the other devices at the time they weren't that slow. Certainly quicker that the Aero 2130 I had at the time the 540's were out
Jornada 560 - dust
The device no longer is manufactured and the dust issue this device and the early ipaqs suffered from is resolved and has been for some time. Also, the manufacturers either repiared or replaced the devices at the time. Inconveneient but at least they acknowldeged the problem and fixed it.
Cassiopeias - big (& E200 backlight fiasco)
Genio e570/Maestro - short battery life
And for these reasons they are no longer on the market - natural market forces have worked to remove the unwanted products from the market.
Toshiba e310 - weak audio
Tpshiba e740 - whole host of problems
All Toshibas - button lag, no upgrades[/quote]
Again, if these problems are significant buyers will either stop buying them or the manufacturer will fix it.
iPaq:
3600/3700 - dust, buttons
3800 - performance hit from wierd screen issue
3900 - none (?)
Some of these issues (dust) have been dealt with. I had a 3850 and don't know what the issue there was (it didn't affect me AFAIK)
1910 - absolutely no expansion beyond memory
This is by design as the device was pitched at a particular market segment - I don't think this qualifies as a product flaw
1940/30 - "Mellow yellow."
Given, this is a flaw and should have been picked up. However, it is only really evident when the screen is held on certain angles and when compared to other devices. This is not excusing HP for the issue but, I don't beleive that this is a major issue.
2210 - No record button (wierd. just. wierd.)
This is not a big deal, it it pretty easy to reassign that function one of the four buttons on the device (eg the iTask button that many people don't use). The Record button is not used by everyone. I never used it on any of my past PPCs.

All PXA 250 XScale PPCs: the PXA 250 XScale. :|
The PXA250 was a great CPU for its time. That's like criticising the 486 CPU cos the Pentium came out later.

5550- none (?) but anyway, prohibitively expensive and big.
By design as the device was pitched at a particular market (people who wanted a larger screen, the ability to re-use sleeves from previous models, in-built WiFi, etc. The more stuff you add to the device, the bigger it gets!
Viewsonic PPCs - Wierd memory configuration
I don't know about this. Is this the fact that the available memory was misrepresented?
Dell Axim - Big, upgrade fiasco, problem with memory cards (?)[
The Axim has been the most important product released in this market since the first ipaq (IMHO). It moved the price point for a well featured device down significantly. When the first ipasq came out it cost about $1200 AUD. The 2215 retails at $799 AUD and can be had cheaper than that if you shop around (AUDs cos I'm in Australia). So they had some upgrade issues. Who hasn't? Let's remeber that they have offered the cheapest upgrade to WM2003, they were honest in acknoledging an issue, they told customers openly there was a problem and they fixed. That's better than some have done in the past.

Hope this doesn't sound like too much of rant, but I think you're exaggerating this issues here. Many of the big issues you mentioned exisited in older devices and have been fixed in more recent iterations of those devices. The issues in more recent devices have had far less impact.

[Skoobouy]

Of course, bear in mind, my first list is subjective. I'll give it to you that the Jornada 540's were a step up, the iPaq 3800 thing didn't affect most people, and that the Axims and Viewsonics weren't really bad enough to be called "Achilles' heels". (I'm probably murdering the spelling of that.)

However, the dust issue was (just historically speaking) an embarrassment, especially when there was adequate screen technology (Casio HAST screens) that had no problems and looked better in most circumstances. Even now, it's difficult to say that our Transflective screens look much better outdoors than those old HAST active matrix displays. I'm not saying "curse them all to heck!"--just that I think it was a big, avoidable mistake.

Toshiba is irritating because not only do they make mistakes, they repeat them over and over again. e310, e740, e330, e750, e350, e755--none of these machines' buttons will see the print of their owners' thumbs, despite the fact that people complained about it. Now that's just nuts.

Also, I will have to disagree about the PXA 250, and I don't think I'm the only one. It wasn't slow because it was earlier technology--it was slow because it was poorly made. Articles here on PPCThoughts have pointed out that, between the iPaq 3600 PPC 2k's and today's PXA-255 PPC 2k3's, there was a dip in performance, thanks in part to the combination of PPC 2k2 and the PXA 250 XScale. On top of that, you had some Pocket PC makers adding Video chips that either did nothing or hurt performance. :frusty:

And about the 5550, well, I've just always hated the sleeve idea; it's causing problems. "Our iPaq 3600's are so small, we can safely lock customers into this design for years without any serious reprocussions." Ahem, yeah, that's why sleeve-compatible iPaqs are quickly becomming the minority in HP land. Don't get me wrong, I understand people need sleeves. But the sleevable iPaqs are simply too expensive. What justifies those costs? Surely not the dual wireless--the 4155 is going to do that in a smaller package for much cheaper. The biometric scanner? Who asked for one of those, anyway? It seems odd to me that the same company should make some PDAs that are a great value, and others that aren't.

And before I get dragged off of my soap-box, I'm going to ackowledge that Microsoft is partly to blame for lots of problems too. Close button that doesn't close :frusty:, inconsistent alarms :frusty:, and the ever creeping bugaboo of the inadequacy of QVGA, relative to the quickly improving competition. :frusty: :frusty: :frusty:

Anyway, now it's my turn to apologize for ranting. I just think our OEM friends are simply goofy.

[PetiteFlower]

Heh, HP wasn't the slightest bit interested in value until after the Axim came out. Before that, they were perfectly happy making only a few different models with very limited expansion possibilities and charging an arm and a leg for them. Now that they see that there IS a market for lower priced, more customizeable PPCs, they're eating it up. Go Dell! I do think having 6 different models of PPC is a bit of overkill, but it may be what they need to silence most of the "But why don't you have THIS" whining.