H3650 Pros and Cons:
The Power Is In Your Hands!
By David Em, Byte.com
Jun 21, 2000 (8:32 PM)
URL: byte.com
The first time I held a Windows CE device was in the Las Vegas Hilton at last year's Comdex/Fall 1999. It was the first meeting of the Byte.com Comdex Best of Show Awards jury, and all the jurors had brought along samples of interesting contenders they'd seen earlier in the day. My contribution was a Hewlett-Packard Jornada 430se with the brightest screen I'd ever seen on a handheld, very high-quality audio playback, and some PIM software.
Almost all the other jurors were unimpressed by my offering. As soon as they heard it was a WinCE device, their eyes instantly glazed over. Most held to the belief that trying to put a real computer in the palm of your hand was pointless, anyway. Plus, despite its elegant styling, it was as fat and heavy as a pig compared to a Palm Pilot.
After a few days of playing with the Jornada, I concluded they were right about the WinCE part. WinCE 2.1 was a real mess, confusing, labyrinthine, and illogical. I hated it. But I didn't much care that the Jornada weighed more than a Palm, and was bulkier than a Palm, because in my head, I didn't classify it as the same kind of device. The Palm Pilot is a superb organizer, and increasingly, a multifaceted communications device, but it's not much in the way of a creative tool, at least so far. Devices like the Jornada 430, it seemed to me, were technologically amazing skeletons whose software skins were simply not up to the same standard of quality.
So, it's been with great interest that I've kept my ear to the ground about the next generation of these machines, the so-called Pocket PCs, and at last here they are. There's no doubt that they've come a long way. However, the final results are a mixed bag. Here is a First Look at the prime contenders.
The Big ThreeThe current 800-pound gorillas in the Pocket PC realm are Hewlett Packard, Compaq, and Casio. All have brand new products that run under Windows CE 3.0, and except for the OS, it's remarkable how different the three machines are. All three use different physical designs, different processors, and different screen technologies. In fact, they are different enough that I can't honestly say any one of them clearly beats the pants off the other two, although in certain specific areas, there are definite design and technology wins -- and losses.
In terms of the OS, the WinCE 3.0 software is certainly superior to grisly old V. 2.1, but it's still not as fluid as I'd like. Perhaps the most outrageous OS issue is that none of the previous generation of WinCE 2.1 devices can be upgraded to version 3. If I'd paid 500 bucks plus tax for one of these systems a few weeks ago, today I'd be a mighty unhappy camper. Of the new devices, only the Compaq uses flash ROM, so it's the only one whose OS is theoretically upgradeable. For more on the upgrade issue, take a look at John Ruley's discussion of upgrades and rebates in his WinCE Column.
The Pocket PCs come with a basic suite of Microsoft Programs that include Pocket Word, Pocket Excel, and Pocket Internet Explorer, and all are welcome additions to the CE software library. I was surprised at how well the handwriting recognition succeeded in interpreting my scrawls in Pocket Word. The information-management tools such as the Calendar and Task Manager have also been improved. Other WinCE applications are starting to appear from companies like BSQUARE, and there is already a good bit of shareware out there. Microsoft Outlook 2000 is included in the package, and I had pretty good luck synching up the data in my PC with it, using ActiveSync 3.1, which finally has USB support, and is more streamlined than version 3. The newest contestant in the Pocket PC sweepstakes is Compaq's iPAQ H3600, and from a technological point of view, it's the leader of the pack. iPAQ units are currently pretty scarce, although they should be appearing in greater numbers by PC Expo later this month. The H3600 runs on Intel's 206-MHz StrongARM processor, and it's the most responsive unit I've seen so far. Unfortunately, several shareware software products I tested don't support the StrongARM, so don't assume that simply because you've bought a Windows CE device, that all CE software will run on it.
The iPAQ also leads the way in battery technology, with a lithium-polymer battery that yields an estimated 12 hours of juice, which is roughly a third better than HP's Jornada 540 series, and twice as much Casio's Cassiopeia E-115. It comes standard with 32-Mbytes of RAM, and 16-Mbytes of ROM.
Another big win for the iPAQ is its 12-bit color reflective TFT screen, which is the only one of the three that's clearly visible outdoors. Reflective-screen technology has come a long way over the past year. Expect to see it showing up increasingly in digital cameras and tablet computers, as well as handhelds. The iPAQ's screen uses a bright backlight in normal viewing conditions that shuts off when a light sensor determines that it's in bright sunlight. There are no contrast controls, however, so the image is a little washed out, despite its brightness and readability under all lighting conditions.
Another innovation is the concept of optional, interchangeable, slip-on Expansion jackets that accommodate Flash Cards and PC cards. I have mixed feelings about this setup. On the one hand, making all the varied PC card functionality available to a handheld device is clearly a good thing. But in the case of Flash Card technology, I think it's enough established that CF's are a de facto standard, and they should be integrated into this class of machine.
The weakest aspect of the iPAQ is its ergonomic design. It's not what I'd call elegant. It looks sort of like an embryonic Robbie the Robot. While I appreciated being able to see the screen in broad daylight, I found the sun reflecting off its shiny silver surface very distracting. I never found a comfortable way to hold it, partially because its edges are too smoothly rounded. The Expansion jackets might minimize that, but they're not in production, so I've yet to see one. Another problem is the pen, which is stored in a hole that uses a click-switch to pop it out, and that looks like it's just waiting to break. The shape of the pen also requires that it go in its hole exactly right, or it will get stuck, something I managed to do several times.
The iPAQ H3600 sells for $499. The Flash Card and PC card Expansion jackets are $39 and $139, respectively. The Jornada 548 and the Cassiopeia E-115 come with built-in Flash Card slots, but their asking price is $599, so the iPAQ is priced very competitively, and its technology is first rate.Hewlett-Packard's 32-Mbyte Jornada 548 sports an excellent body design that is much simplified over its predecessor, the 430se. Gone are the numerous side-mounted buttons and the boxy shape. The dark gray 545 (the 548's 16-Mbyte sibling) fits my hand very comfortably and would be my first choice if I had to hold one of these devices for any length of time. The design of the 540 series has some serious, but easily correctable, flaws. This is a shame given the system's superior ergonomic strengths. The main problem is the protective screen cover. It flips up and makes the unit look like a handheld starship transponder, which is OK if you like that sort of thing, but I found it clumsy. Fortunately, the cover is easily removable, and I found the 545 much easier to handle without it. Unfortunately, the stylus is designed to slip into the inside of the cover; so once the cover is gone, so is your pointing device.
The stylus itself is the worst I've ever seen, a real triumph of form over function. It's so small and flat it would probably only be comfortable in the hand of a very young child. The way it's set up, it's just a question of time of which will get broken or lost first: the cover or the stylus. The best bet might be to get a leather cover to protect the screen, and get a different pen. I've been using a sharpened stick of bamboo. I kind of miss the screen cover on the now-obsolete Jornada 430. It folded all the way back behind the unit, which ingeniously turned it into a stand that I found very useful when I used it on a desktop, which was a significant amount of the time.
Another serious flaw is the choice to support only Type 1 compact Flash cards, meaning that Type 2 devices like IBM's Microdrives, which store hundreds of megabytes (and that HP had a special bundle deal for with the 430), won't work in it. HP suggests that this affects very few products that are typically used with this class of machine, but I was not able to fit a Xircom CompactCard 56K modem in the 545 that had worked perfectly well in the 430, either. Given that the Xircom modems, Ethernet cards, and wireless cards cost serious money on top of the 430's $500 cost, HP may have trouble convincing some customers to stick with the program. Top-flight products like Xircom's and IBM's should not be rendered useless simply because users decide to upgrade their machines.
The Jornada 540 series uses Hitachi's capable 133-MHz SH7709A RISC processor, and a backlit CSTN screen that features 12-bit color (not 16-bit, as their promotional materials claim) at a resolution of 320 x 240. The screen is a little smaller than the Compaq and the Casio, but it is quite readable, and the ClearType text is very sharp. Its docking base is more solid than the 430's, and its worldwide power adapter ranges from 100-240v. The Jornada comes with a good software bundle that includes Sierra Imaging's Image Expert CE 2.1 application for viewing and voice-annotating color images and photographs. Despite its problems, the 545 is the device I physically feel most comfortable with. For more on the 545, check out John Ruley's WinCE Column review.Unlike the evolution of the Jornada, Casio's 32-Mbyte Cassiopeia E-115 resembles it forebear, the E-100, very closely. It is physically the biggest device in the group, and the boxiest. It has a little plastic cover that needs to be removed to get to the Compact Flash compartment, yet another candidate for the Lost and Found department. I haven't worked with the E-115 yet, so I can't say much about it, but it does have some features worth noting in addition to its sound, imaging, video, and PIM capabilities.
First and foremost is its screen. While it can't be viewed in bright sunlight like the iPAQ, and its text isn't as sharp as the Jornada's, its screen displays the truest and most saturated color of the three, so if you're particular about color rendition, there's no contest. Of course, you pay a stiff price in power consumption for quality color, with significantly less battery life than the competition. Speaking of batteries, the Cassiopeia is the only unit that gives you easy access to the main and backup batteries. Replacing the batteries on the others looks like it involves some surgery. And the E-115 accepts all Compact Flash cards, so it's the most versatile in that regard.
Are They Worth It?Does all the horsepower, memory, and color add up to more than a heavier Palm on steroids? When I was a student, I carried a pocket-sized book of drawing paper with me everywhere I went, and that's how I learned to draw. A couple of days ago, I downloaded Conduit Technologies' Pocket Artist onto the Jornada 545 (it wouldn't load on the Compaq). Pocket Artist is sort of a Pocket Photoshop, and I find I'm doing the same kind of thing with it that I used to do with the drawing books when I was a kid. So that's kind of exciting.
In the past couple of months, I've also used a Pocket PC to show pictures of a filming location to a video crew, and to put together a presentation of digital photographs of the family Volvo, which was totaled by a parking valet, for my insurance agent. That was useful; if I was a real estate agent or an insurance adjuster, I imagine this kind of device could be pretty handy.
But yesterday, I saw the most convincing evidence yet that these kinds of tools will become a bigger part of our lives. I was sitting in a park with my five-year old son and some of his friends. They'd all brought their Nintendo GameBoys, which resemble Pocket PCs very closely, to play Pokemon. The GameBoys were networked together, and the kids were absorbed playing games and music, and exchanging data back and forth. I've no doubt that after next Christmas, most of these activities will be conducted wirelessly. I can already see them beaming data back and forth to each other from one end of the playground to the other, from the slides to the swings to the thing that spins around till you get sick.
It doesn't really matter who gets it right first with some variation on BlueTooth. It could be Microsoft, Palm, Apple, or even Nintendo. But I'm sure that creating and transmitting high-quality media with handheld devices like these will lead us to compute in ways we haven't before, just like our kids are already doing. After all, we grown-ups deserve to have a little fun, too. |
