09-21-2004, 09:00 PM
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Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 15,171
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Bitstream Releases ThunderHawk 2.0
We've reported on ThunderHawk before, and users have been very impressed with the technology, but had one major complaint: it was very slow at scrolling. Well, Bitstream has released ThunderHawk 2.0 today. I've been trying the prerelease version, and I can safely say they have completely fixed the scrolling problem -- it's very fast, yet maintains all of the features of ThunderHawk 1.0. They've also added a bunch of other smaller features, including cut-and-paste support and improved text entry.
It's a free upgrade for existing ThunderHawk users (in fact, you can download the .CAB straight to your Pocket PC now), or you can sign up for a free trial to give it a shot. And as the picture above suggests, it works very well on my Samsung i700 using the 1xRTT connection -- in fact, I was logged into the "desktop" view of Pocket PC Thoughts last night on the train ride home using the TH2 preview. :mrgreen:
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09-21-2004, 09:19 PM
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Theorist
Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 276
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Whenever I get tired of waiting for Netfront or Multi-IE to load up on my PPC I immediatly switch to Thunderhawk and wonder why I paid money for the other two. As good as they are, nothing on a PPC can compare to T-Hawk and now with the scrolling issue resolved it's even better.
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09-21-2004, 09:26 PM
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Thinker
Join Date: Oct 2003
Posts: 434
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I believe it's displaying quad-pixelled on a VGA screen. Still better than Netfront or PIE (which is a disgrace in VGA) but not crisp and sharp.
2.0 is lightning fast though.
__________________
James Kendrick* ...using mobile devices since they weighed 30 lbs
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09-21-2004, 09:27 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Sep 2003
Posts: 233
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:rock on dude!:
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09-21-2004, 09:31 PM
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Pupil
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 48
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Amazing, is all I can say. The scrolling issue has been my single problem with Thunderhawk ever since I started subscribing to it a year ago.
Hooray!
-Kyle
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09-21-2004, 09:37 PM
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Pupil
Join Date: Aug 2002
Posts: 32
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Version 2.0 is much nicer. Thank goodness they resolved the scrolling issue! Now what I want is the ability for the TH browser to utilize cookies that are stored on my PPC. The advantage is that I would not have to log into sites like Brighthand forums all the time to easily see what new messages are available in the forums.
I'm also in the market for a VGA device (probably the Dell Axim X50 at this point). I'm wondering what Bitstream's plans are for TH on a VGA device. I guess they've had almost a year to think about it since the Toshiba e805 has been out nearly that long. And it doesn't look like they've made a version that supports 640x480, but instead support the 320x240 and use quad-pixels as with QVGA applications.
BTW, for people considering alternate ways to view forum sites like Brighthand, take a look at Skweezer. That product is $15/year and it loads up Brighthand forums much faster than PIE. The formatting is not the prettiest, but it definatly reduces the wait time. And as a bonus, it supports cookies on your PPC, so you can remain logged in to a site unlike with TH.
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09-21-2004, 09:42 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 98
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How do you do the cut & paste function ?
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09-21-2004, 10:03 PM
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Pupil
Join Date: Jul 2002
Posts: 12
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The piece of software looks great but I wonder how many people actually subscribe to this piece of software since it's subscription-based.
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09-21-2004, 10:12 PM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 241
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getting there
Thungerhawk definately cant be beat for usability of the web on a ppc, however it still has some serious flaws. If I hit a pls to stream radio it doesnt know how to handle the link. I am unable to download anything. These (and other) features are very important for me to use this on a regular basis, and should not be very difficult to include, if it is not renderable in the browser, it should be handled differently differently by thunderhawk, or even passed to PIE rather than ignored outright.
Another nice thing would be the option to change from landscape to portrait. I love the landscape while on the move, but at my desk it might be nice to have a portrait view. Since this is just rendered content coming from the remote server, it should not be difficult to implement something like this.
In addition, Thunderhawk claims to pick up lost connections easily, however twice now since i started using it about 30 minutes ago it has lost connection and the only way to get it back was to exit thunderhawk, reconnect and then restart thunderhawk. It went to the connection lost page and I could find no way to go back to the page I was on. I also tested how well it recovers from poweroff. It does not, rather than reconnecting through bluetooth, it fails to connect and i have to restart thunderhawk to get it to work.
I may be wrong, but that is what I am waiting for before I will spend 5$ a month for this software. With PIE Plus and the PIE options added through SBP Pocket Plus, browser functionality and usability is approaching that of a desktop. If Thunderhawk would release thier font for use in PIE I would happily pay 30 bucks for it.
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09-21-2004, 10:29 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 78
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Secure Internet Access Required?
Question - Does Thunderhawk require a secure (https) access to the internet? My T-Mobile digital account doesn't include this access??
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Linear Mode
