What could I do with a PDA?

[kewlerthanu182]

I'm thinking of buying a pda but i'm not really sure if it's worth the money. All i know of that i could do with a PDA is word processing, organizational stuff (like calenders, address book type things), games, and multimedia stuff. Is there any thing else that a PDA could do? (not including really hight end PDA's)

O and BTW i'm thinking of getting the Treo 90, is that a good investment?

[WeezerFanJeffrey]

Pocket PC's have so many features, we cant list them all here. BUt do understand that they are not laptop computers, nor desktops. They are able to sync with these computers, but they are not as powerful.

Some things you can do:

-Read e-books
-Program stuff
-Read news on the go
-Some have internet access cabilities
-Use it as a calculator
-Play games
-Listen to MP3s
-Play DivX and other video types

..and more

[kewlerthanu182]

so do u think it would be worth an investment?

o and one more thing. I'm really having problems deciding which would be better for me, a PPC or a palm (specifically the Trungten E and Dell Axim X5). at first the palm was looking better but i just read sumthing on pdabuyersguide.com that said ppc's are better for multimedia which i like. But i also want to have organizational stuff. So does ne one have a suggestion?

[WeezerFanJeffrey]

All this below summarized: still get the pocket pc. It has equal (if not better) organization software, is more compatible with your Windows software, and has all the extra power you need for gaming, music, and videos. To put this in perspective, the cheapest Axim has 300mhz of speed, while the Tungsten E has only 126 mhz. Oww.

And read below all of this because then I talk about the Axim.

Now this is why...

Pocket PC is infinitely more powerful than Palm OS, in my opinion. When buying my PDA, I gave it my deepest consideration. I shopped around for nearly 5 months. I walked into Best Buy in the first week I had decided to buy one, and looked at the PDAs. I started with the Palm. Impressive. They were cheaper than the ppcs. Most had plastic covers, and good screens. They had a good selection of software, too. Then I looked at the ppcs. WHOAH! Great screens on most, awesome multimedia capabilities, less software available, but great quality software. The pocket pcs offered what I liked in the cheaper units. SDIO slots, Mp3 capabilities, a lot had wireless internet. I chose the Toshiba E355, its my Christmas present for myself.

One reason PPC is more powerful is this...multitasking. Currently the Palm OS cannot run two apps at once. PPC can. Listen to music and read the news, at the same time. Plus Palm is geared a lot towards the business person, where Pocket PC has better feautures for the people like me. I use my PPC for school and organization, but I like to program on it, play games, read news & e-mail, and a lot of other stuff that is not related to business.

Neither OS is without its downfalls. PPC has seemed to be almost neglected my Microsoft lately. MS has gone towards their tablet pc OS. Pocket PC seems to be still in its infancy to me, although it is infinitely better than Palm OS.

Palm (to me) is a tool for the person who can use a computer, but knows nothing about them. Pocket PC is for the true power users that use their PPC as a lifeline to their computer when they are away from it. Although PPC is equally good (if not better) than Palm's organizing software, the main selling point of the PPC product is what it CAN DO. Hey, if you wanted to get organized cheaply I could recommend you to a nearby Wal-Mart where they sell those $5 organizer things with the calculator and the addresses and memos...Palm is just a nicely packaged version of that.

I have never owned a Palm though (just tried it), and I think everyone in this board is biased towards a Pocket PC. The opinion you might want is that of a person who has been on both sides of the fence. From what I have heard though, people who had Palms and tried a Pocket PC never went back.

And now about the Axim

Note: I dont own an Axim, I am just giving my opinion based on the opinion of reviewers, probably about 4 of them.

The Dell Axim was one of my options when I was shopping for a ppc. I saw the wonderfully low price in one of the Dell ads and decided to reasearch it. The lower end X5 had about 32 meg RAM, I believe it was, and a 300 mhz processor. Nice. I saw the screen, and everything looked great. Reading some of the reviews I got an overall mediocre response, however. The d-pad seemed to be cheap, as was the jogger button. I didnt particularly like the design either. Dont get me wrong, though, this is still a good unit, just something about it turned me off.

And now about the Toshiba e355

I instead bought a Toshiba e355. Great price at Amazon ($165 & free shipping). I bought it and when it got home I was very impressed. It does not have the extensive software package like other PPC's, but its hardware was the seller. 300 mhz XSCALE processor, the same as the Axim. The d-pad was working (thats good), and didnt have any creaks. The screen was awesome. The casing was even better, like some kind of aircraft grade metal. Had an SD (IO? I am not totally sure) slot and a voice recorder, and ran on PPC 2003.

I have heard bad remarks about Toshiba customer survice, even some people go as far as saying Toshiba may pull out of the market. Hey, no one company is going to be perfect!

That is my opinion from about 5 months of in depth research into the PPC world. I am only a freshman in high school, so 165 dollars is a HUGE investment for me. It was well made. I would definitely suggest a PPC.

[kewlerthanu182]

thanks for the nice post there. Your sitution seems alot like mine. I honestly want a pda more for fun stuff, i'm still and school and don't have a job (not old enuff yet). Now i'm more leaning towards the ppc, but what to get is a problem now. i now have around $250 to spend even though it would be good not to spend it all. So far the only ppc i kno i can afford is the dell axim X5. Are there any other ppc i can get for that cheap that are better than the axim?

[WeezerFanJeffrey]

Ill reply again, since you may not see that edit I tagged on to the end of that last post. The Toshiba e355 is my recommendation. I wasnt really attracted by the X5, and the two units are very comparable. I bought the e355 for $165 at Amazon with free shipping, that leaves me with about 100 to spend on memory and games/other software.

Your situation sounds almost exactly like mine. I wanted a PDA at first for its mp3 capabilities. I figured I would spend 100 bucks on an Mp3 player, why not move up to a PDA? I can use mine for keeping track of schoolwork, to watching videos, to reading books (although I dont read very often, unless it is for school). I didnt have wi-fi or bluetooth, so the Toshiba was for me. I can always expand it if I need to.

Toshiba. Unless there are any die-hard Axim fans that have something to say?

[kewlerthanu182]

ok after reading a few reviews on toshibas, i ran into something.

What's the difference between the 330 and the 335. From wut i read it just said the 335 came with a picture editor type thing and the 330 yet on cnet.com the 330 got a 7.3 and the 335 got a 6.8. Can ne one explain this?

If they r different which do you think would be better

[WeezerFanJeffrey]

Toshiba uses different model numbers (adds a 5 on to the end or what not) to signal whether the device is sold in stores or the internet (I think, something about where or how the product are sold). The e335 and e330 are identical, however the e335 comes with ArcSoft Photobase to edit pictures.

The ranks are probably user voted, thus explaining the difference. Or it was reviwed by two different people with different opinions.

The Toshiba e355 is $159 at Computers4Sure with free shipping.

http://www.computers4sure.com/product.asp?productid=1697031&affid=874&adid=874

[PetiteFlower]

Keep in mind that this is a PPC site so there are not going to be many people here telling you Palm is better(one or 2 but they are just trolls :p)

This is also a site populated by people who LOVE their PPCs and so you're not going to find anyone here who will tell you it's NOT a good investment, because we find ours infinitely useful.

So you're not going to get an unbiased opinion here on either count.

I've heard very bad things about Toshiba's customer service so I would probably steer you away from them for right now. I LOVE my X5 now and I'm currently deciding between an X3i and an Ipaq 4150 for my next purchase. Go for the Axim, it will make you happy, it's a great PPC for a first time user(which I was also).

[shawnc]

I never knew what a troll is (though I assume it is not a compliment) but I disagree with the notion that we can not give an unbiased assessment of Palm vs PPC. I have many issues with my PPC and would have no problem sharing them. I think both platforms have their strenghts and weaknesses, though right now I think the PPC is slightly better. I certainly hope that doesn't make me a (heaven forbid) troll :wink: .

Just to expand a little on what WeezerFanJeffery said, I love my Axim and if you can deal with the fact that it is slightly bigger than some others, I think it is a great machine. Price and dual slots make it a tremendous value. My biggest issue with the PPC is the occassional Activesync issues (and these are relatively minor) and the lack of true Excel/Word functionality. But those are issues with PPC, not the Axim.

[dh]

I have an X5 and it's been great. If you want to carry a lot of stuff with you, like music, movies and eBooks, having both CF and SD cards is the only way to go. CF cards are a much better buy than SD cards right now.

Having said that, I've just ordered a Toshiba e355 for my daughter for Christmas. She's ten and has been using my old Palm Vx for a while and is looking to get something with more features. I'll get her a 256MB SD card so she can listen to her Britney CDs and have some games as well.

The e355 is the lowest cost WM2003 device around right now, you can find it for less than $170.00, a bit less still for refurbished ones.

For my own use, I will not buy a single slot PPC (that will change if there are ever SD cards as large and low cost as CF) so I don't have many options right now. I'm planning on keeping the Axim until I see what new models the next few months bring. I consider myself a pretty heavy PPC user, I use mine for e-mail by T-Mobile Hot Spot when traveling and I have an Infrared keyboard to use as a laptop replacement. The Axim still does everything I need so I'm under no pressure to change.

I've had good support from Dell as well. If you have a problem they send you a replacement right away and those Indian guys are always polite. It will be interesting to see how Toshiba support works out. Hopefully we won't need it too often.

[kewlerthanu182]

thanks so much for all the replies, it's really helping.

So far i detirmed if i get a ppc i'm getting a Dell axim (i don't kno to go for the X3 or X5) or the Toshiba e335.

The only thing thats holding me back from getting a PDA is i'm not sure what i'm going to do with it. All i can think of that i would use it for is games, the mp3, watching movies, a little organizational stuff, and maybe a little word stuff. Do you guys think that that will be good enuff to make it worth the $200+, or is there other features that i haven't thought about?

[PetiteFlower]

You mean the 5 things you listed aren't enough? Jeez, what do you want, for it to wash your car for you too?