Questions, advice please

[Milandra]

Hello, i'm new to the forum so i'm not quite sure how it works. Recently i've been getting interested in palms and pocket pcs, simply because it seemed like a better deal buying one and buying english - japanaese dictionary and kanji , english, french dictionary and a becherelle for them then buying an electronic dictionary. By the same token I thought it would be a good oppurtunity to replace my mp3 player.

Now I don't know what to go with. I've managed to narrow down my interest of certain PDAs, but I still dont know enough about them to make a good guess at what i'de need and what would bring me the most. My first criteria was to be able to purchase it for under 200 USD. I managed to narrow down my interests to 3 units.

The one that caught my attention the most was the Zaurus 5500. I liked the tiny keyboard on it, and it seemed full of options. On top of that i've always wanted to try out Linux, but i'm too much into pc games to forgo windows. My only pickle here is the compatibility issues of the Linux OS. Not wanting to steer away from my initial goal, it would have to be able to be just as efficient as the other models as a multi-lingual dictionary. Do the pocket pc programs or palm programs work on this? I've found the software for sell on either of those two things.

My second choice was the palm zire 72. It's currently on sale right now for a place that I have a nice big gift certificate for, although i've heard horror stories about it breaking a lot.

My final choice would be the Dell X30. It quite frankly sounds perfect for my needs, and it looks pretty good, yet seems to have less than the other 2.

Well thanks for reading this far, any advice/comments would be greatly appreciated :)

[surur]

Sorry to not be able to answer your question directly, but this is the second time Ive seen this type of cross-platform question being asked at pocketpcthoughts. I wonder if there is not a place for de-focussing a bit from the WM platform and adding coverage and members from The Competition. There certainly seems to be a demand.

Surur

[Sven Johannsen]

I want to make a couple of comments that you may want to consider. I wouldn't gravitate to a PPC because you like PC games. While there are some ports to the small platform for some popular ones, PC games do not run on a PPC.

In the same vein, programs for any of the mentioned platforms, will not run on the other two. When there are multiple platforms listed for an application, that means the developer produced them for multiple platforms. Just like MS Office, you can buy a Mac version, and a Windows version. One doesn't run on the other platform (emulators aside).

You are looking at it from a very intelligent point of view. Look at the software that most does what you need to do, and get the platform that supports it.

I agree with Surur that it would be nice to find a cross-platform fountain of information. Brighthand covers all, but they are split into camps and often you get beat up for mentioning the other platform, rather than useful advice about the pros and cons from someone that uses them all. I'm not sure Jason is ready to turn this into PDAThoughts.

[Milandra]

Thanks for the responses : D

It took me a while to understand the first message. I'm aware that this isnt going to be a gamestation. I got a glimpse of the games that it could play, and it seemed to only 1 up cell phone games. I tried looking for linux OS dictionaries as well, and it looks possible, but it looks like i'de have to dance around to get it to work. I went on the FAQ for the zaurus and there was responses that were "No, but yes!".

I think maybe the zaurus might be a little too intimidating, my already being new to these small devices. I'm leaning towards dell's x30. The software I want is available for both palm and pocket ms, yet the negetive feedback on the zire 72 is lots of broken devices yet the dell x30 negetive feedback is poor customer service.

[Sven Johannsen]

You always get the horror stories in equip and customer service. I've had good luck with my dealings with Dell. They don't seem reluctant to replace units that need it, and they do it quickly most of the time.

If you are considering a Dell, have you thought about an X50? It may be a little more than what you were thinking of spending, but with Dell announcing that they will be providing WM5 updates for the X50, it has a bit more life left than the X30. Do you want or need WiFi. It adds to the device cost, eats battery, and isn't very useful unless you have a WiFi network, are around a lot of free WiFi, or want to pay for a hotspot subscription. It can also easily be added to the X50 with either a CF or SD card, without affecting your memory potential. The X30 only has the SD slot so adding WiFi to a non-WiFi unit would require you to pull the memeory card you likely will get used to having.

I've had them both, and while I liked the X30, the X50 is just much nicer ergonomically, IMHO of course.

[Milandra]

Thankyou for the informative posts Sven, but I think i'll just go with the X30 for my first palm. If I come out of this paying much more than an electronic dictionary I think i'll be beating myself up, and i've also found a nice deal on an X30. Yesterday I didn't know what WiFi was, but I really don't think i'm going to really "need" it for this, and I have no idea where i'de go about finding that kind of thing around here. I think it will be a good oppurtunity to try things out though.

[MoChA]

Salam to all

i have a question i have i-mate version 2003

how i can download msn messenger , and realplayer ??

[Darius Wey]

Salam to all

i have a question i have i-mate version 2003

how i can download msn messenger , and realplayer ??

Welcome to Pocket PC Thoughts. :)

MSN Messenger should already be installed on your Pocket PC. Check the Programs menu. As for RealPlayer for Pocket PC, it can be downloaded from here (http://www.realnetworks.com/industries/mobile/operators/products/player/ppc/) (the latest release is v1.1).

[MoChA]

thanks alot


yes , i know there is msn but it is not working when im trying to sign in an error msg occur that i have the old version ! i should download the new one 8O where i go to do this ?

[Nurhisham Hussein]

Here you go:

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsmobile/downloads/msnmessenger/default.mspx

[Darius Wey]

yes , i know there is msn but it is not working when im trying to sign in an error msg occur that i have the old version ! i should download the new one 8O where i go to do this ?

Most of the Windows Mobile 2003 devices and some of the Windows Mobile 2003 SE devices don't have the MSN patch installed (as linked above). Bear in mind that everytime you hard reset your device, you will need to install the patch again. :)