Questions on PDA Data Transmission Choices

[Annette]

I am currently the Operations Coordinator for a small Marine Surveyor and we want to upgrade our field operations. Currently, I have laptops on all my field surveyors with which they prepare and print their reports at their appointed jobsite. Then they either fax or physically bring me the report. My questions are thus:

1. Would it be more feasible to switch to PDAs and transmit the data back to the office via internet or satellite? and

2. What are the current choices on data transmission for PDAs?

Any help that anyone can render would be most appreciative

Annette

[Sven Johannsen]

If they have access to a fax, then they certainly have access to a phone line. With that you could have them just dial in to your network and transfer the files. You could also have an Internet service and they could log in to it with a local number for them and transfer/e-mail the files.

If I can assume you are looking at a more direct method of transfer, and the surveyors aren't normally at a fixed phone (and the fax was when they got back to the hotel or something), you could consider using the data capability of many of todays cell phone networks. This is GSM/GPRS, and most of the major provides have it available. It involves using the phone as wireless modem over the Cell network. This could be done with either the laptops you have or PDA's. The speed is not great, but it is capable of transferring files and such.

The wireless capabilities, WiFi and BT are really short range solutions more for eliminating wires in an office or campus environment, not a field solution.

There are PDAs that have the phone/data capability built in. These are called PocketPC Phone Editions and the look like a regular PPC but have the phone bits built in. They are convinient in that they are one device, but the transmission method is the same as if you bought a data capable phone and hooked a PDA or a loptop to it for connectivity.