Archive for December, 2006
Voxtel, Russian-based PDA manufacturer, had released the first Pocket PC-based PDA that comes with a 4-megapixel camera.
Not bad for a Russian based company. I would had expected this sort of hitech-first would come from a Japanese or American-based manufacturers but Voxtel had beat them this round.
The camera is not a normal CMOS camera module typical in handheld devices, but rather a CCD camera which is better in terms of picture quality.
The features of the PDA are not really something we can brag about but it is sufficient for everyday use of a PDA. The most impressive is it’s size which is really slim for a PDA with built-in camera and it looks gorgeous.
Specifications:
Mode GSM Triband 900 / 1800 / 1900
OS Windows Mobile Pocket PC Edition / OMAP 730, 200 MHz
Dimensions 106 x 55.2 x 15 mm
Battery Type Lithium-Ion 1100 mAh
Battery Life unknown
Weight 120 grams
Display 2.4″ 65k colors, TFT (240 x 320)
External Display -
Expansion Slot Transflash
Built-in Memory 64 MB RAM / 128 MB ROM
Camera 4 Megapixel CCD with autofocus
Connectivity
GPRS, Bluetooth, Java, MMS, SMS, USB, WAP
I scoured the net to find out what is the worst PDA ever, from the netcitizens point of view. And the results were rather interesting. Obviously this is a question of preference. Something that is good for someone could turn out simply the opposite to others.
So here are some of the interesting findings about the worst PDA ever.
Nino
The worst was my Nino(early Windows CE) which was large, clunky and rarely worked without a reset. 2nd worst was my Palm LifeDrive. It was Palm’s version of the Nino - large, clunky and rarely worked without a reset - only it was years after the Nino! [Read more]HP iPAQ rz1715
Witness the fundamentally flawed iPAQ rz1715. HP’s low-end PDA was designed to compete with low-cost products from Dell and Palm, but it lacks any of their redeeming qualities. The glacially slow processor and anemic memory make using it torture, but at least the pain is short lived—because the battery wears out hours before the ones on comparable units do. [Read more]Nokia N770 Internet Tablet
This thing, it surfs Internet. You want to make phone call? You can’t make phone call. You like Ethernet? No Ethernet. You get Wi-Fi. Wi-Fi is nice. No wires! You like slow load times? Yes? It is good for that. You like battery that lasts more than three hours? It does not have one. Nice screen, though. [Read more]Unnamed Korean Product
Worst PDA - Some Korean organizer piece of crapI don’t even really know what this thing was supposed to do, but it was garbage. [Read more]
I think that’s enough for now… if you want more there is always Google ready to dig them all for you… 
Happy PDAing!!
Recently we featured Qtopia Linux flavoured PDA OS offerred by Trolltech. One of Trolltech corporate customers utilizing Trolltech’s Linux technbology is Sharp who has been producing great Linux-based PDAs in the market for quite some time.
Overall
Zaurus is Sharp’s popular Linux-based range of PDA and one of the leading Linux PDA offered by Sharp is Zaurus SL-C3100, which is an update of Zaurus SL-C3000.
Interestingly, Zaurus SL-C3100 is a second hadrdrive-based PDA by Sharp, with 4GB comes as standard. Sounds very familiar to Palm’s LifeDrive 4GB that we featured here before.
The built-in Flash ROM had been upgraded 64MB up to 128MB which is great for running applications software faster. In terms of software upgrade, more Japanese-language are added, a reflection of Sharps strategy for its target Japanese consumer market.
The rest of thew features are the similar as Zaurus SL C3000.
At the time this model was launched, most online stores were sell the SL-C3100 for $900, compared to Palm’s 4GB-equipped LifeDrive sells for about $500, mainly due to its status as imported product from Japan.
Specs
XScale PXA270 CPU at 416MHz
640×480 transreflective touch screen, 3.7″ diagonal, backlit
4 GB internal hard drive (3.6 GB formatted, 2.9 GB available as shipped)
128 MB SDRAM (for running applications)
16 MB Internal Flash (for storage of OS [?])
USB host capability, albeit not well supported
Weight 298g, Size 128×87x24 mm
Compact Flash (CF-II) and Secure Digital (SD) expansion slots
Infra-Red port
3.5mm stereo audio out, plus small built-in speaker
Landscape/Clamshell or portrait style, hot-switchable
Full QWERTY keyboard with bonus Japanese characters
Operating System: Linux kernel 2.4.20 from Lineo
Graphical User Interface (GUI): Qtopia 1.5.4 from Trolltech
Suite of Personal Information Management (PIM) applications
Hancom Mobile Office
Broad compatibility with established Sharp Zaurus software base
If you own a PDA that is based on Symbian, BREW, Windows Mobile 5.0, your PDA can also play Flash movies if you have Flash Lite 2.1 player installed on your PDA. The player is available for download and it is free for developers and consumers.
Developing applications for Flash Player Lite 2.1 should be smooth sailing for most developers who are already familiar with Flash Player 7, the base used for developing the lite version of the popular Flash player.
We hope to see more PDAs manufacturers to start pre-installing the Flash Lite 2.1 players in the future as Adobe is now actively promoting the software among the PDAs application developers.
Read more at [Adobe]