10-01-2003, 06:00 PM
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Contributing Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 8,228
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Palm Tungsten T3 Reviews
http://www.brighthand.com/article/Hands_On_The_Palm_Tungsten_T3
For those of you interested in the latest from the competition, Brighthand has reviewed the newest family member of the Palm Tungsten T line, the T3. There are a few things of interest.
� It has a 320X480 screen, capable of portrait and landscape. Very nice.
� 5.1 (open)/4.3 (closed) in. tall, 3.0 in. wide and .66 in. thick, 5.5 ounces. This comes in slightly larger than the 2215 in almost all dimensions which is 4.54 x 3.00 x 0.61 in, 5.1oz. Very pocketable.
� Palm (not PalmSource) redid the PIM apps to work better with Outlook and now has a Pocket PC-like Today screen. Contacts supports multiple addresses as well. It wasn't mentioned in the review, but I would think this is going to be a problem for fans of the Palm Desktop product, especially if you have multiple devices. I'm sure Palm will now tout these new features heavily though. "You don't need it until we have it."
� Native support for .XLS and .DOC files. And yes, now that native support exists on the device, it too strips out much information, just like the Pocket Excel and Pocket Word we've all come to know and love.
� This quote was odd. "I've found that I get about three hours of use out of each charge. That's enough for one day's use for me, but I have to remember to recharge it every night." In this article from 2001 the battery life of the original iPAQ 3600 is criticized, which on a bad day had 6 hours of life. Other articles and threads contain similar criticisms of the battery lives of various Pocket PCs over the years compared to Palm counterparts. Correct me if I am wrong, but I don't think the diminutive Audiovox Maestro had under 4 hours of battery life. I guess bad battery life is in the eye of the beholder, and then it depends on which device they 'beholding. :wink:
� It is $400, which pits it directly against the 2215. On the face of it, the 2215 has much better battery life, a CF slot (great for that WiFi card without giving up your SD storage) and is slightly smaller. The T3 though has a much larger screen with landscape support. Pocket PC OEMs had better get on the ball on this screen issue.
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10-01-2003, 06:23 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 335
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Screen is most interesting aspect...
I have my doubts as to the usefulness of the slider, especially as it's hiding screen area. I would prefer smaller buttons and D-pad below the screen...
However, 480x320 blows the PocketPC out of the water! Hopefully the new Toshiba will be able to use it's 640x480 resolution screen and get back the advantage.
Palm has also integrated on-the-fly Portrait/Landscape switching, and most developers will be supporting it in the very near future.
Unless Microsoft steps up the screen support I feel my next machine may be a OS6 Palm!!!!
It now looks like the gamble Microsoft's PocketPC team made to take the easy way out and not support larger screen resolutions and different orientations will be proven to be very short sighted.
My 2c
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10-01-2003, 06:24 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 1,466
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The T3 looks like a great product, but I'm none too fond of the slider. I hated it on the TT and T2. Other than that, my other gripe was the lack of a flip cover, but PalmOne seems to have listened to customer complaints because they did include a nice leather (or simulated) flip cover. Gotta love that.
Still, I think I'm going to hold out for the Zodiac. T3 is a kick ass handheld, but I don't think it's the one for me. For that matter, neither is the Zodiac...but there is no such thing as perfection. Just pick what you like.
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10-01-2003, 06:26 PM
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Sage
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 740
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I just bought a Tungsten|T in order to finish a series on PDA software for Computer Power User Magazine.
The |T1 is a great PDA. I was very surprised at what Palm presented with this unit. Its really the first PalmOS device that I have every REALLY used.
The |T3 looks tempting. It uses what appears to be OS6 (based on Landscape support), and unless some PPC OEM's get it together and include native Landscape support for Pocket PC, this could be a big advantage for Palm. It also appears to use a virtual silk screen area (like the Sony NR series). While I don't like Graffiti or Graffiti2, and prefer to use Calligrapher or Transcriber, the extra screen realestate that the virtual silk screen provides when in use by other programs is a huge plus.
I wonder how HP, Dell, etc. will, if at all, respond to this new device.
Kind Regards,
Christopher Spera
__________________
Kind Regards,
Christopher Spera
Gear Diary Review Team
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10-01-2003, 06:30 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 418
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Ed, I might be wrong, but I thought 3 hours with the T3 was for intensive multimedia use. That's not much less than what I get on my HP2210 if I use it that way and the iPAQ 3600 commonly got under 2 hours when used that way (but at least the 2210 has a swappable battery).
I gotta be honest... the T3 is pretty tempting. But the Zodiac looks even cooler ($400, 128MB, 480x320 dual SD slots, dual batteries, or $300 for a version with less memory). I might go back to PalmOS... I really wish Microsoft had built WinCE/PPC to work on a handheld from the ground up instead of basing its design on NT. PPC's sluggishness and tempermental nature is starting to get old (not to mention ActiveSync's quirks). Damn crappy Win32 API. Then again PalmOS isn't perfect either, and on the PPC-front, the iPAQ 4000 looks mighty tasty.
No matter whatever platform fits your needs, it's a good time to be a handheld enthusiast.
__________________
HP 48s, 200lx, USR Pilot 1k, Palm 3, V, M100, Handspring Visor, Sony N610c, T615c, T655c, HP iPAQ 1910, 2215, Palm T3, HP hx4705, Dell X50v, HP rx1955, Apple iPhone, 3G, 3GS, 4, Samsung Galaxy Nexus
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10-01-2003, 06:35 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 1,466
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Agreed on all points, Chris. The ball is in Microsoft's court now. Their next moves will decide Pocket PC's future. One thing is for certain, they cannot keep this platform locked into the current status quo. PalmOS's higher screen resolution will continue to nip at Microsoft's heels. And as more PalmOS devices become increasingly advanced, it may steer more "power users" away from PPC. Hard to believe that just two years ago PPC was the platform of choice for those seeking the most powerful hardware. Now that choice is not so easy to make. Microsoft is a sleeping giant. They had better wake up a take a good hard look at what the other camp is doing.
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10-01-2003, 06:40 PM
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Pupil
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 28
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Re: Palm Tungsten T3 Reviews
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Originally Posted by Ed Hansberry
� Native support for .XLS and .DOC files. And yes, now that native support exists on the device, it too strips out much information, just like the Pocket Excel and Pocket Word we've all come to know and love.
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Actually, this is not the whole truth. Documents to Go 6 gives you a choice, which I think is fantastic.
If you use the DTG hotsync conduit to transfer an MS Office document to your Palm, it is converted to the proprietary DTG file format, but the formatting of the original document is preserved even after you edit it and sync it back.
However, if you've received a native MS Office format document via email on your Palm, or just have one saved on your flash memory card, you can still open it and edit it on the Palm -- you'll just lose some of the formatting.
Matt
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10-01-2003, 06:42 PM
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Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 15,171
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Deslock
Ed, I might be wrong, but I thought 3 hours with the T3 was for intensive multimedia use. That's not much less than what I get on my HP2210 if I use it that way and the iPAQ 3600 commonly got under 2 hours when used that way (but at least the 2210 has a swappable battery).
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Ed Hardy said, in that thread, that this was "typical use":
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This isn't a torture test where I keep the device on until the battery is dead. I'm using the T3 normally and tracking the amount of time it takes to empty the battery with Jeroen Witteman's BatteryGraph.
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All the modern Pocket PCs I use definitely have better battery life than this.
--janak
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10-01-2003, 06:42 PM
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Pontificator
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 1,466
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10-01-2003, 06:42 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 153
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3 hrs battery life, non replaceable 900mAh battery,
built in office that doesn't retain all format, a fake today's page.
Hey! Is it me or Palm is trying to make iPAQ3700?
This is so funny.
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Linear Mode
