Should I wait for the Pocket Loox 720 to come with WM5?

[Bruno Figueiredo]

I'm thinking of buying the Pocket Loox 720, as I feel it's the one Pocket PC where I get the more bang for my bucks. I don't think I would like a PPC Phone, so I think it's a good choice.

However, rumors say the Loox 720 will have the chance of a WM5 if I buy it now, but it could be paid. And WM5 requires some extra hardware buttons from the PPC, buttons that the Loox doesn't have. So, even when WM5 comes it will be crippled.

So, should I wait for it to come with WM5 (to not pay extra) or get it now and don't upgrade? or get it now and upgrade later?

What do you think of it?

[Kowalski]

i got mixed feelings about WM5. first of all, it seems that most of the improvements will be for phone edition devices. what am i gonna do with the soft buttons, they will consume some of my precious screen space. there will be no wireless sync option which is very very important for me. and for the permanent storage, i have never run outof batteries and had a hard reset. we all know that rom is much more slower than ram, and we will install our applications to the rom or a storage card.
it has great improvements for sure, such as sql server ce built into the rom etc. but upgrading to WM5 wont be a as a progress like upgrading from 2002 to 2003.

as for upgrading the loox, the device hasnt been designed to run WM5 for sure. i mean what will you do with 128 megs of ram after the upgrade. some say 128 megs of ram is a must but after the upgrade there wont be storage ram, only program ram. as for the hardware button issue, you will map two of your buttons as software buttons. i dont like it. hardware buttons are very important for me.

i think loox is a very good device with WM 2003SE. i would buy one if i were you. by the time the update comes, you can decide to upgrade or not

[Bruno Figueiredo]

Hum, I totally forgot about persistent storage. That is a huge improvement IMO. However, it's one more reason to select a device specifically developed for WM5, one with more ROM than RAM...

[Kowalski]

HP did the right move and put 128 megs of rom and 64 megs of ram to 4700. while siemens didnt make their plans for long term. it is obvious that hp is designed for the update. integrated graphics chip is one more sign to this.

as i stated, persistent storage is not an important improvement from my point of view. it would be great if we can install applications to ram someway as we do now. this will surely increase the overall performance.

[Bruno Figueiredo]

Hum, I thought about the 4700 also. But it has a few drawbacks IMO. For one, it has no camera. Yes, I know that the loox 720 camera is flimsy but I think it would be great to be able to take a pic sometimes. Two, there's no rocker switch. I read a lot on my PPC and I think it could be useful. And, correct me if i'm wrong but the 4700 doesn't have dual wireless, does it? And for games, how does the touchpad behaves?

I went for the loox because of my PPC use: reading, referencing and managing data, the occasional game and camera nice-to-have.

Do you people have better suggestions for me?

[Menneisyys]

Hum, I thought about the 4700 also. But it has a few drawbacks IMO. For one, it has no camera. Yes, I know that the loox 720 camera is flimsy but I think it would be great to be able to take a pic sometimes. Two, there's no rocker switch. I read a lot on my PPC and I think it could be useful. And, correct me if i'm wrong but the 4700 doesn't have dual wireless, does it? And for games, how does the touchpad behaves?

I went for the loox because of my PPC use: reading, referencing and managing data, the occasional game and camera nice-to-have.

Do you people have better suggestions for me?

The hx4700 is dual wireless. The touchpad is pretty bad for action games - opinions differ on this.

For reading books, the iPAQ may be better (even if it doesn't have a jog dial) because:

- it has a bigger screen
- the minimal brighness level is lower than that of the PL720. It should be pointed out, however, that the PL720 isn't that bad in total darness either - much better than, say, the e800 or, if you have used it, a Palm Zire 71 without a third-party screen backlight hack.

On the other hand, I wouldn't be afraid of the meager flash ROM size. You can install most apps on memory cards.

[Kowalski]

as Menneisyys stated, a 4" screen will be much more practical than rocker switch for e book reading. i wouldnt consider the camera because for me embedded camera is just a waste of space.

[surur]

Actually I have found the camera very useful. Its no good for "on the wall" pictures, but to record something to show some-one else who wasn't there (e.g. my daughters flute recital or a piece of furniture) it worked very well just two days ago. It would have been brilliant if the quality was better, but having the camera is definitely a plus, and I use it quite often.

Regarding the large ROM, thats nothing a SD card cant substitute for, whereas adding another 64MB RAM can be quite costly.

Lastly, the jog dial is invaluable for e.g changing volume or flipping pages/scrolling down a web page etc. Its little touches such as these which cant be added to a PDA which makes the Loox special. Either your device has it, or it hasnt. There's no SD jog dial.

Surur