Quick summary of the market for a long-time self-exile?

[Skoobouy]

Hi everyone; the last Pocket PC I owned was an iPaq 1940; since then I've had but a laptop and stopped visiting all the PDA sites I used to frequent.

Now I'm starting to get interested again, though I can't afford one at present. I've browsed all of the old sites, and each one seems to only have partial knowledge of the market; it's hard to piece together a unified picture.

So can someone give me the lowdown on Pocket PCs since early summer last year? Smartphones aside (phones scare me), what are the new models? What models are considered entry-level/midrange/bank-breaker? What are the best gongas, feature-for-dollar? Which ones are the fastest? Is there one device that's running away with the sales? Infamous QC issues? Rankorous debates (like pocketmatrix.com's "Axim X50 vs. Asus 730W")?

Emulation has always been my #1 priority; what's the current speed-demon?

I have done a lot of research today, so I hope people don't think I'm just being lazy by asking. Maybe it's a sign of a waning PDA market that there isn't a one-stop site anymore for this kind of information (no prejudice intended, but even PPCThoughts has lost some strength in this area).

[surur]

Actually the market is larger, which is why you are having difficulty making your choice. In the past Im sure you would have gone straight for the latest Ipaq.

My personal feeling is that the Loox 720 is king of the hill overall, and the Dell x50v is the best value for money. Many people will disagree :)

You can try the PDA chooser at Brighthand, but I believe its a bit outdated.

Surur

[Menneisyys]

My personal feeling is that the Loox 720 is king of the hill overall, and the Dell x50v is the best value for money.

It all depends on where you live... in Europe, where the (non-European product) Dell is considerably more expensive than the (European product) Pocket Loox, the situation is IMHO different.

[Menneisyys]

You can try the PDA chooser at Brighthand, but I believe its a bit outdated.

It's not that outdated, but doesn't have options like "I'd prefer a VGA device only", "battery life is of extreme importance for me" etc. And, when I for example put 100% on 'play games' (and on nothing else, except for the OS, which I also put to 100%), it presented the machines in exactly the same order as without doing it: the 2210 (which is NOT meant for gaming because of its hyper-sensitive D-pad and hard-to-press app buttons), the x30, the 4155, the T|T5 (Palm OS = much fewer games), the T|C (Palm OS = much fewer games), the 5450 (outdated & slow, useless for serious gaming), 4350, x50 (at last a current model!), E-200 (highly outdated), A-716 (at last an Asus model...; but, for gaming, the A620 would have been much better). A recommendation starting with, say, the A620 (not even listed) or the Tapwave Zodiac2 (it's the 12th in the list...) would have been much better.

So, your purchase decisions should be based on reading forums :)