Reliable WM5 PE PDAs

[stsanford]

I have the ETEN M600 and while I love the device for its size and speed, I have to admit it does bog down a good bit and I'm not exagerating when I say that Active Sync 4.2 has to be killed and the PDA has to be soft-reset to get it to sync every other time.

I was speaking with a colleague who has a Treo 750W and he said that he's never had any trouble with it locking up or any active sync issue whatsoever.

Is it my device, or maybe my cradle? Perhaps that is the cause? I see that the HP691x is going to be available state-side soon, would that be a more reliable device? I miss the days of reliability with my old Siemens SX66. That was so reliable, it was never a worry. With the ETEN, I feel like it's a gamble getting it to sync every day.


I should mention that I am a bit of a power user, business use, so I do make good use of the calendar and contacts functions, making notes while out of the office, then I sync them back to the desktop when I return, which is why the sync is so important, if it doesn't syn accurately and easily, I wind up loosing track of appointments either I have made while in the field or through the CRM in the office.
Thanks!

[JesterMania]

How much 3rd party software are you using, and what do you have installed? I don't know if this will help but I think it might be a software issue on your ETEN. When I first bought my PPC, it was full of problems (wouldn't sync, random lockups, massive slowdowns, etc.). The ActiveSync install I had on my computer was clean and after hard-resetting my PPC and running it bare for a week, I found out it was the software I had installed that was causing these issues. Now I choose carefully what software goes into my PPC and have hardly had any problems ever since.

Having said that though, I still think ActiveSync is buggy, but not to the point where you can't get a proper sync though. Another option would be to uninstall ActiveSync, delete the entire ActiveSync directory, and reinstall it, though I don't think that will solve much.

Another idea popped into my head. If you can, try syncing without the cradle. I know on my MP3 player, something is strange with the cradle and I always get transfer errors while uploading MP3s to my device, but using the cable directly to transfer was fine.

[Darius Wey]

I'm going to echo JesterMania's query on the amount of third-party software you have installed.

Also, are you running the latest ROM version (0225), and do you have ActiveSync 4.2 installed? With those combined, the M600 is very stable.

[stsanford]

Darius,
Yes, I'm running 225 and Have AS4.2
My third-party software is pretty std. stuff, no Today plugins except for SPB Backup log.
I have turned off the Network Dashboard, and have only one conduit (STDTime) which is WM5 compatible.

Maybe I will do a hard reset and try again.

Thanks for the feedback,

[Silver5]

Respond to the title, I can tell you that that the HTC Universal, Qtek 9100, and Htc Prophet are all very reliable devices. I have no issues at all when syncing with ActiveSync, usually I am even using BT for tis without a problem, nor any trouble ActiveSyncing with an Exchange server.

I do wonder if many of the ActiveSync problems that people think they have are being caused by software the have added to their computers (security software for example) or to their devices. I just can't imagine having so many complaints against ActiveSync, even though it isn't perfect, since it has always worked pretty well for me.

[stsanford]

Thanks for your reply.
The reason I posted in the first place is that sicne I have upgraded from my Siemens SX66 I have had consistent problems. I NEVER had this type of problem. I have had occasional issues with AS 3.8 that a reboot cleared up, but nothing like 4.x

As a response to the software installed,

I run no today plugins except network browser, and I have turned that off as well. I don't run a firewall on this destop, and I work as a computer consultant, so I don't think that I'm doing anything that abnormally stupid.

I am getting sick of tired of reading and writing things like "It doesn't give me much trouble beyond the typical...." seems like we've become complacent with the low quality of some of the software coming out of Redmond.

Thanks again for your responses, funny my SX66 is an HTC BlueAngel, they do seem to get it right...