iPAQ *&* Smartphone: Use both?

[hamishmacdonald]

My mobile service provider was charging me a lot for lacklustre service, so today I switched to another company. For the same amount of money, I'll be getting 4MB of GPRS, and a new Smartphone. (I know, I know: in America you can get unlimited GPRS on T-Mobile for about 2/3 of what I'm paying, but I'm trying not to think about that.)

So here's my dilemma: I do most of my work on the iPAQ. I need that big screen, and I need all my peripherals. But now I've got a Smartphone thrown into the mix, and I know I'm going to be tempted to take advantage of its features.

If you use both a Pocket PC and a Smartphone, how do you use them?

[Jason Dunn]

100% of the time, when I leave my house, I take my Smartphone with me. This is typically for short trips.

80% of the time, when I leave my house, I take both my Smartphone and my Pocket PC with me. This is typically for times when I'll be away from the house for a while. My Pocket PC has better games, is better for email and Web access (I use the Smartphone as a Bluetooth GPRS modem), and contains FlexWallet, which has all my passwords.

[OSUKid7]

I don't have a real "smartphone," but my percentages are about the same as Jason's. I always take my cellphone (Ericcson T610) with me, and almost always bring my Pocket PC.

[Fishie]

Almost never leave my house witouth my smartphone.

[Kowalski]

I don't have a real "smartphone," but my percentages are about the same as Jason's. I always take my cellphone (Ericcson T610) with me, and almost always bring my Pocket PC.
the same here. also note that sometimes taking notes to the cell phone is easier than taking notes to the ppc as:
-walking
-traveling on a bus or subway (you can use only one hand)
-you dont want other people to make attention (crowded places, "oh what is that small thing?")
so as you go home , you can sync both your mobile phone and your ppc, and bingo!

[hamishmacdonald]

Oh, that's an excellent point about the voice-notes, 'cause I do tend to use them to capture ideas. I feel silly talking to the Pocket PC in public.

I think my usage will be much the same as what you guys have described. I may switch to using the mobile for my music, since it'll be easier to fish out of my pocket than taking my iPAQ out of its case. And I used my T610 as a modem, too/ With GPRS this phone will still serve that purpose.

The one thing I can't quite figure is alarms. I suppose I can just make my iPAQ my work-machine, which is more or less what it is now, and use the Smartphone for calls, alerts, and such. But that means keeping it synchronised, which means both the Smartphone and the iPAQ will be turning themselves on and making noise. How do you manage this?

[OSUKid7]

so as you go home , you can sync both your mobile phone and your ppc, and bingo!yeah...wish I could. I'm still having problems getting Bluetooth to work correctly. I'll prolly post a help thread soon. :|

[hamishmacdonald]

Dang! I didn't realise that "mini SD" wasn't just a way of saying "Boy, SD cards are really small", but actually refers to a whole different kind of SD. That's a bit misleading -- not intentionally, just prone to causing users to make mistakes, like, say, if I were to have bought a 1GB SD card last night.

:cry:

So the Smartphone is definitely not going to be used for listening to music.

[Jason Dunn]

The one thing I can't quite figure is alarms. I suppose I can just make my iPAQ my work-machine, which is more or less what it is now, and use the Smartphone for calls, alerts, and such. But that means keeping it synchronised, which means both the Smartphone and the iPAQ will be turning themselves on and making noise. How do you manage this?

This is the ugly part of the scenario - both will make noise, and there's no way to avoid this. <sigh> :?

[OSUKid7]

The one thing I can't quite figure is alarms. I suppose I can just make my iPAQ my work-machine, which is more or less what it is now, and use the Smartphone for calls, alerts, and such. But that means keeping it synchronised, which means both the Smartphone and the iPAQ will be turning themselves on and making noise. How do you manage this?

This is the ugly part of the scenario - both will make noise, and there's no way to avoid this. <sigh> :?Why not just uncheck the Notifications checkbox in the Sounds & Notifications setting? Is there something like that on Smartphones as well?

[hamishmacdonald]

Actually, now that I've been using the thing for a while, I see that it is what they say -- a really smart phone -- but it's nowhere near the kind of Pocket PC functionality I'm used to. No contest here: I'm going to keep using my Pocket PC exactly the way I have been.

[Jason Dunn]

Actually, now that I've been using the thing for a while, I see that it is what they say -- a really smart phone -- but it's nowhere near the kind of Pocket PC functionality I'm used to. No contest here: I'm going to keep using my Pocket PC exactly the way I have been.

What kind of phone was it? I get the sense it's a "small s smartphone", not a Windows Mobile Smartphone? Would that be correct?

[hamishmacdonald]

It's the Orange SPV, so it's a proper Smartphone smart phone. It's neat. Wish we had the iPAQ 6315 here, though. I've wrestled with the convergence thing for a long time, wanting my devices to be separate, but now I think it'd be really handy.

My Bluetooth SMS apps (iPAQ > phone) don't work with this. Dang. I'm going to finally have to commit to learning to use my thumbs quickly like everyone else.

[Jeff Rutledge]

I'm pretty much the same as everyone else here. I always take my Blackberry 7280 with me (phone and email) and almost always take my iPAQ 2215.

If the next Blackberry does in fact have Bluetooth (as is rumoured), it may end up being the perfect solution (for me...work email must be Blackberry email).

[maximus]

When motorola mpx220 is out, I will drop everything and just go solo with it.

Just kidding. :mrgreen:

I will still carry the mpx220+V600+dell axim+minolta dimage Xt+wallet wherever I go.

I might drop the dimage Xt though, since the mpx220 has megapixel camera.