Popular Palm Hand-Held Computer Disappears from Market:
Sep. 14 (San Jose Mercury News/KRTBN)--More than just popularity has made the Palm V handheld computer tough to find on store shelves.
Palm Inc. confirmed Wednesday that it stopped making the popular Palm V at the beginning of the month, leaving the more expensive Palm Vx as the only option for consumers who want the brushed-metal look of the most popular handheld. The Palm V retails for $329; the Vx for $399.
The move comes as handheld computer makers are preparing for what promises to be a hot holiday season, complete with new products. Handspring Inc.'s next offering -- a handheld that doubles as a cell phone -- is due before December. Sony Corp.'s Clie, based on the Palm operating system, should arrive in stores within the next two weeks. And Hewlett-Packard Co. is ramping up production of its Jornada.
Palm, the leader in the handheld computer market, said 2MB of DRAM memory is no longer enough for many of the mobile professionals who buy the Palm V line. There are about 8,000 programs available for download into Palm-compatible products, and the 8MB Palm Vx will be better able to accommodate them.
The Vx has more DRAM, a type of memory generally used to store extra programs and other information users enter into the device. Palm's products also use flash memory to run the operating system and some other software that comes pre-loaded.
"As people have become more comfortable with that device and realized that there are more things they can do, they do start to add more things to it," said Mike McGuire, analyst at Gartner Group. "Would that blow out a 2MB load? It's conceivable."
Leading up to the holiday rush, consumers are buying four times as many handheld computers as last year, according to market research firm PC Data. Though it is hard to get specific numbers, some in the industry estimate that about 55,000 devices are sold every month.
Tapping into the enthusiasm, Palm's m100, a curvaceous $150 device designed to replace the Palm III, became the second-best selling handheld behind the Palm Vx soon after its debut in October 1999.
In the overall market, though, the quiet disappearance of the Palm V -- which was first introduced in February 1999 -- suggests a move toward packing in more capabilities. More than 100,000 developers have signed up to make Palm-compatible hardware and software, promising to add to the more than 8,000 Palm-based programs already on the market.
That added horsepower, combined with plans to add more capabilities like MP3 players and Internet connectivity to the devices, has some in the industry concerned that Palm developers could drift away from their original mantra of simplicity, creating beefier software just because the devices can handle it.
"You've got to avoid the kitchen-sink syndrome," McGuire said. "If you start just throwing stuff out there because you can, you've got to be careful that you don't diminish the core appeal of the device."
It's still unclear how much complexity consumers are willing to tolerate in a handheld computer. Devices running Microsoft Corp.'s PocketPC operating system have rich color screens, the ability to access HTML Web pages and handle documents, but they haven't yet made a significant dent in Palm's market dominance.
To a degree, that could be because PocketPC devices haven't had the chance. HP, Compaq Computer Corp. and Casio Computer Co. -- the main PocketPC manufacturers -- underestimated consumer demand when the devices came out earlier this year, and shortages in flash memory and color screens have prevented them from quickly boosting production. As a result, it's unclear exactly how well the products would do against Palm if they were widely available.
Industry-watchers might soon get a better idea. HP insiders say they have ramped up production of the Jornada PocketPC handheld for the holiday season, and they expect that the company could sell as many devices during November and December as they have in all the months since the product began selling in April.
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