Comments on: Rumor: Tungsten T4 Speculation

This is one case where I would like to see these rumors be true. Dual bluetooth and WiFi would be EXCELLENT...my T615 is getting a bit long in the tooth... not to mention how tired I am of the memory s____s.

$399 for the T4 (if it has all that) is too little, too late, for too much, especially if it doen't have wifi (get a Zodiac2)
"

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Doesn't the 64MB of RAM get "downsized" somewhat? As PPCs and their apps utilize more use of resources and RAM? Also, Lacking dual wireless isn't good for the market who's shooting for it, but the T3 will still have x2 the resolution screen over the curr line of Axims

[signature0]the secret to enjoying your job is to have a hobby that's even worse[/signature0]
[signature1]My PDAs: Visor --> Visor Neo (blue) --> Zire 71.... so ends the "marathon", for now[/signature1]

And it's stupid Palm1 to make this model as it described in rumors. They need a real THING, something more, then Cobalt, Dual Wireless and Normal (not VGA) screen. Or it must be some ~$300 to make it market-sucsessful.
Actually, i'm really in love with PalmOS, especially because of Size of the devices, and their better (then PPC) screen, but as it seems to me, upcoming Asus 730 is quite small, and still has a VGA-display and USB-host (which Cobalt even cannot offer as it stand in SDK).

BUT I HATE BUILT-IN CAMERAS!!!! i hope, Palm1 won't be adding one in T4 (or whatever, exept Zires7x)

____________________
Future Online!
Sorry for my bad english :(

Or are you expecting customers to say "poor Palm, let's buy their more expensive devices"?

I guess Palm will have to offer something compelling. If it's not hardware, it will have to be some other thing. (and, personally, I just won't be fooled again with Palm OS 5 or anything similar. And I'm still uneasy about Cobalt's capabilities...)

That may be true where you live, but in general, there are very, very few places where you can legally get free 802.11a/b/g access in the US. It is limited to small, selected areas of very few towns and cities, plus a some coffee shops, bookstores and restaurants. I suspect places you claim you can get "free" access are either individuals/companies that have unintentionally not secured their wireless networks or are violating terms of service with their providers. Personally, I have NEVER been able to get free access anywhere that I have needed it, and that is not for a lack of trying.

Except for very few coffee shops, bookstores, restaurants and other Internet cafe type places that charge a small amount, non-free WiFi access is generally far, far more expensive and limited to very specific locations per provider, compared to using mobile phones for access.

As we start to get Bluetooth phones from major carriers Verizon and Sprint, Bluetooth will quickly become a much more viable option for the average consumer. Built-in Bluetooth is a must have for my next PDA purchase. Of course, I'd prefer having both WiFi and Bluetooth built-in.

There is no way I'm using external SD/CF cards for wireless again. When you're using a mobile device, you want something quick and convenient. Fumbling around with a SD/CF card is neither quick nor convenient. If Palm releases a T4 that is like the T3, but with built-in Bluetooth and WiFi plus OS 6, that would be great for me.

If a had a dog as ugly, I would put it up for adoption! Seriously, as much ranting as I'm sure will go on in this thread, the Dell is slower, is a serious downgrade in screen, is a downgrade in relative RAM, and has looks that say cheapo-geek. I had an iPaq 2215 until two weeks ago, and even though I did not care for the looks, it was still much better than anything Dell.

--Do the words high res screen mean anything to you?
--How about crashes only a few times/year

I'm interested on that; would you please point us to some info, or at least explain that design flaw?

That and the terminate and stay resident PocketPC apps (yes! TSRs are alive and well!)

TSRs, as you may know, were (DOS-era) programs that terminated and were no longer accesible to the user, though they remained in memory; they awaited for some kind of signal (usually an interrupt from the clock or the keyboard) to perform some function (like doing something to the screen, the keyboard, or displaying a calculator).

Now, you just made me think that this sounds exactly like the way PocketTunes (as an example) works on PalmOS when playing in the background. I think that even PalmOS's hacks could qualify as TSRs.

So yes, TSRs are alive and well - on the Palm OS.

Now, are they used on PocketPCs? Or are you referring to their multitasking ability - with their included non-closeability? It's not the same thing, you know. (it's funny that they need a third-party app to actually close apps - but comparing that to TSRs is quite misguided).

If you are talking about TSRs proper, please point out to some info, or explain a bit more. I'm also interested on that.

LOL I gather that is why I wrote that the advantages of the palm are high res screen and that is does not crash.

My needs are rather simple (I work in a hospital where there is a computer in every room so I have no need for wireless) and for me the palm operating system is vastly superior. Is does what I need, and is easy to use. I have no need to ever switch to "the darkside".

Scott

Mostly I use to check email and browse the web around the house and Sync with my Mac using Markspace (which I would use anyway with forthcoming palms).

Also it doubles as a GPS with better programs for tracking and geocaching than I could ever find on Palm.

I do find I have to reset more often than with the T|T but it is still infrequent and the benefits outweigh the minor inconvenience. Its mostly specific programs. Mainly iSilo with a specific button combination and if I attempt a BT connection with a BT GPS with GPS off.

Battery time is excellent and browsing the web in landscape mode and WiFi is much better than the T|T ever was.

Cheers!

They also didn't waste several years on developing their own kernel.

The equivalent of Cobalt could have been out several years ago with almost no development effort on the part of Palm if they had picked up one of the OSS kernels (BSD, Linux) and built a handheld on top of it.

Instead, Palm lost market share, wasted millions, and is coming out with an unproven and proprietary product.

Nobody is doing this to Palm--they are committing suicide.

Price: X30 clear winner.
Size: T3 clear winner.
Slider: Like it? T3 winner. Don't? X30 winner.
Battery: T3 (X30 3 hours before low batt, T3=4)
SDIO: Don't know how you checked this, but remember the T3 had to be slowed down...
Speed: Tie. Sorry, T3 has a much more responsive OS.
Wireless: X30 winner.

You forgot;
Screen: T3 winner
Stylus: Tie (T3 is said to be best, but I kinda like the X30 stylus)
Looks: Hello? (grin)

The other side of this, of course, is that the T3's OS is doing much less (because / thanks to being less capable) than the X30's. The same happened on the Mac OS pre-OS X: of course it was much more responsive to the user than Windows, because it was not preemptively multitasking - in fact, it stopped doing anything else if you clicked the mouse button! (you could drop your dial-up connection just by keeping the mouse button pressed for 1 minute)

That "lesser capability" can be academic for some people - but can also be deal breaking for others (those that are asking for multitasking).

Perfectly understandable. After all, I preferred Mac OS to Windows all the time. (of course now it's easy ;), but back then it could be painful)

However, seems to me that we're just choosing the lesser evil. It's not that Palm OS is good, but that M$ does it so bad...

Actually, the X30 is the same width and thickness, while being a half inch shorter than an extended TT3.

Battery: T3 (X30 3 hours before low batt, T3=4)

Wrong. Bluetooth on, WiFi off, screen at 50%, the X30 will do 7 hours. Beat that with your TT3. Even with WiFi on and screen at max, the X30 does 4 hours.

SDIO: Don't know how you checked this, but remember the T3 had to be slowed down...

For one thing, I'm talking about SDIO in general. Palm has problems with that, and a lot of the existing SDIO peripherals don't work on Palm. For another, the X30 has a full 4-bit SDIO slot, which is the fastest that's available. And, as you pointed out, the TT3 got slowed down.

Speed: Tie. Sorry, T3 has a much more responsive OS.

Besides what Winter said, I'll add that the processor in the X30 is the equivalent of overclocking the TT3 to 750 MHz thanks to clock speed and efficiency improvements. As to whether or not the OS feels 'snappy,' it does on the X30--though when you're opening a large file or playing video the extra processor speed is even more important.

Looks: Hello? (grin)

To each their own.

However, having said that I must say that I recently had a chance to play around with an iPaq 4355 for a few weeks. And all of those Palm people who love to tell stories about the instability of the PPC platform...well, I must say that I didn't see any of that. The iPaq was DIFFERENT than my Clie's for sure. But it ran smoothly and did everything I asked of it without any problems. YMMV.

So with that experience in mind, I have to admit that DNorton had a point in that the some of the iPaq's and Dell's seem to have better specs (at least on paper.) I have been waiting in vain for a Palm version of the iPaq 4155: Wi-Fi and BT in a small pocketable size. Judging from the "rumors" I may never see one! Even with two SD card slots, it will be a hassle having to place a Wi-Fi card in everytime I want to hook up to my home network. (Incidentally, I was FINALLY able to get my Wi-Fi/BT Palm by ordering a European TH55. But it cost me much more than a comparable iPaq.)

So we'll see what happens. I'm hopeful that Palm will continue to produce products that will maintain their marketshare, but I must admit that I'm a little nervous.

TMann

For battery life, I used the numbers for reviews on the major sites. I've had the Jornada and h2215, and used the h4355 and most of the other iPaqs, as well as a few of the Toshibas, but have not had any hands-on with the X30. I believe you about being able to get more than expected battery life, as I was able to stretch 6 hours out of a T3, but that was with the screen dim and BT off (no fun). However, you are the first to claim 7 hours for the X30.

Regarding the SDIO, the reason the T3 required a ROM update was because the write to card function were too fast for the SD card. The card would actually get hot from the T3 ramming data down its throat, and the chip controller would fry after sustained operations. Seeing as the T3 maxed the envelope for SD cards, I don't know how that could be surpassed.

About the speed, you are not paying attention to the math. If two devices are running the same app and same OS and the same clock speed, but differnt processors, then CPU "efficiency" would play a key role. CPU efficiency is defined as a CPU being able to perform more processing tasks per clock cycle. This was glaringly obvious with the old Apple 6502b address enhanced processors. Whereas the old 8080 chips of the day would do one cycle for address refresh, one cycle for IO, one cycle for screen refresh, etc, but the 6502b would perform most of these tasks in a single cycle.

However, I have heard no such advantage for the X30 *or* the T3, as they both run Intel XScale processors. I have not heard of any dramatic difference between the two other than clock speed. If someone has that info, please post here an I will humbly stand corrected.

With all that out of the way, I know from personal experience that a Palm OS device and a Windows Mobile running the same processor speed do not respond equaly. Windows Mobile carries more weight, and therefore takes more processing power. With all things being equal except OS, the Palm will simply be faster... The Windows Mobile device will need to have a faster clock cycle to equal the performance.

This next comment will probably draw fire from the Palm side, but I have to balance things out by saying that a leaner OS is a decisive advantage, but only until that leaner OS begins to hamper ability. I'm probably defined as a power user (over 100 third part apps installed, 6 to 8 hours runtime per day, sometimes having 3 differnt handhelds) and have not hit that ceiling yet, but I will not be so dense as to pretend that ceiling does not exist.

As far as looks, you are right; to each his own. But if I had a Dell I'd get a paper bag and...

;)

That sounds strange. Are you sure about that? Can you point to some info? (I don't know the specifics of this case, but I had expected that one of the sides of the transfer was simply not respecting the times required by the standard...)

Seeing as the T3 maxed the envelope for SD cards, I don't know how that could be surpassed.

As AyDb pointed out, the X30 uses a 4-bit SDIO bus. Is the T3 doing the same? (a number of PDAs use a 1-bit bus)

and have not hit that ceiling yet,

That's tricky! How do you define what the ceiling is? Of course you can do lots of things with a Palm OS device. More than with a paper agenda. If that's your ceiling, you'll be OK.

But *I* would like to use my T3 like a 400 MHz, 64 MB (+256 MB), 320x480 computer. I want flexibility to do whatever I feel like, to run whatever software is runnable by such a hardware. I'd like to do at least what I could do with my 120 MHz, 16 MB computer.
But I simply can't do that with Palm OS. So, to me, the Palm OS ceiling is pretty low.

The TC and T3 both use 4-bit. The T3 was out of spec, exceeding the SDIO speed specifications.

"How do you define what the ceiling is?"

That is up to the individual needs. The ceiling is found when you want do something that your PDA cannot.

"Of course you can do lots of things with a Palm OS device. More than with a paper agenda. If that's your ceiling, you'll be OK."

Cute, but my list includes surfing the web, wireless email *anywhere*, multiple relational database management and creation, 45 reference libraires, direct router and switch configuration, CAD, full wordprocessing, music, ebooks on a screen where you can't see the pixels, image management with instant rotation and zoom from 5% to 1600%, GPS mapping routing and tracking, fullscreen 480x320 movies in stereo, and hi-res+ multiplayer network games with the the MP3 tracklist of my choice playing. That's some of what I do everyday and I can do it anytime 24x7.

"But *I* would like to use my T3 like a 400 MHz, 64 MB (+256 MB), 320x480 computer. I want flexibility to do whatever I feel like, to run whatever software is runnable by such a hardware."

Same here.

"But I simply can't do that with Palm OS."

Oh, we're talking about Quake again, right?

"So, to me, the Palm OS ceiling is pretty low."

Ok, I hate to do this, but for the list I gave earlier, the POS ceiling was higher than the WM ceiling. I tried to make it work, tried for weeks to justify keeping that iPaq.

1. "What the &$## did you do to my document!!" was what I met with after doing a revision on an email document using PocketWord. The doc was screwed. I got the same with Pocket Excel. After flawlessly doing similar revisions for almost a year on a Palm, I was both shocked and pissed.

2. Diminished web browsing experience, less viewable area.

3. Where is PocketAccess?

4. What do you mean I CAN'T access the Cisco console port anymore?

5. "Hold on, it's almost done flipping the image."

6. Looking at gridlines on the screen.

7. Being embarrased when accidently trying to put it into my shirt pocket where it does not fit.

8. Doing five or six taps or presses to do what takes me one or two taps on a Palm. Quick! What's your battery level?

The ceiling is in different places depending on your use, but for me, I got enough PPC knots on the head to box the iPaq. It's not the hardware... the X30 has impressive specs and features. The stumbling block is Windows.

The TC and T3 both use 4-bit.

The T3 seems to sport a MMC interface, NOT A SD ONE. The PXA255 processor found on the T3 only supports a MMC interface.
http://developer.intel.com/design/pca/prodbref/252780.htm

Confirmed by BrightHand and Tom's Hardware:
http://www.tomsnetworking.com/Sections-print-article82.php
http://www.brighthand.com/article/SDIO_Everywhere (not about the 255, but applies as well)

So, unless you can provide any proof that the T3 uses an external SD controller, as the iPaq H2210 does, we should assume that the T3 is using a 1-bit wide MMC bus for the SD slot.

Meanwhile, the Dell X30, as Tom's Hardware article says, uses a PXA27x processor, which sports a 4-bit wide SD bus proper.

So, going back to the subject: X30 wins hans down on the SD expandability camp - at least on the hardware side.

Now, on the software side, I've found that a number of people are complaining about extremely low speeds with their SD cards on the T3:
http://www.bargainpda.com/discussion/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=5434
(my T3 is SLOW writing to the SD card - but not as slow as those people are saying. I supposed it was just another problem with Hotsync; now I'll have to re-check)

The T3 was out of spec, exceeding the SDIO speed specifications.

This follows what you said previously: Seeing as the T3 maxed the envelope for SD cards,

"Out of spec" is not the same as "the chip controller would fry", is it? That's why I asked for more info.
And anyway I can't see how failing to meet the standard that they're supposedly embracing could be regarded as a feature.
(If I wanted that, I'd get something from M$ :P )

You could still say that the T3 was faster than, say, the T/T; but that was just because the T/T was slow (reported about 400 KB/sec, while the SD standard allows for >10MB/s - and the MMC standard allows for >2MB/s)

And you can see that the T3 problems with SD were not because of being the fastest on the block, since a number of other devices suffered similar problems:
http://wwss1pro.compaq.com/support/reference_library/viewdocument.asp?source=MH020123_CW03.xml&dt=3
http://sdprob.aximsite.com/news.htm

Cute, but my list includes surfing the web, wireless email *anywhere*,...

My 120 MHz, 16 MB computer (ok, expanded to 48 MB) did that with the full Mozilla 1.2 suite (web browser, mail, news - even composer, for Dog's sake). So now that I have a 400 MHz processor with 64 + 256 MB, why should I settle for a reduced browser?

...blahblahblah... , and hi-res+ multiplayer network games
...and then...
Oh, we're talking about Quake again, right?

So you like multiplayer network games? then why do you joke about Quake? You're beginning to sound disgusting :P.

I also find disgusting your selective memory. I asked for Quake, yes; it's available for PocketPCs, so why it hasn't been ported to Palm OS? But I also said some other things, like: give me GCC and/or Python and let's forget about Quake.
Or give me a goddamned good enough JVM, not the one available for Palm - which was meant to be used on 16 bit, <400KB devices.
And a VNC server for the Palm.
And let me use those 64+256 MB in the T3 in whatever fscking way I feel like. Why should I need third party apps or hardware to put there a folder structure with HTMLs and JPGs?
I could take Apache (already ported to PocketPC) + 5 MB of HTMLs and images on a WiFi PocketPC and use it as a web server for some quick demo of whatever project I'm working on. Tell me how to do that on a Palm OS PDA. PLEASE.
And then, there's that continuing issue about SDIO drivers... though the BrightHand article already mentioned sounds kinda alarming.

Quick! What's your battery level?

I thought you had already accepted that the X30, with WiFi and screen at max, lasted for 4 hours, while the T3 withOUT Bluetooth and with screen at min lasted for 6. So what do you mean now?

Finally, I'll state this again: I'm not getting a PocketPC. I hate Windows in all its encarnations. I've read that, as a honest-to-Bill Windows, PocketPCs can have problems with DLLs, and just for starters I wouldn't stand that (again). The very moment it complained about some DLL gone astray , I *know* that I would turn it off, wait patiently to arrive home, and then lovingly put a 10 inch nail thru its dark evil heart with a single hit.

BUT, I am NOT happy about Palm OS. At all. To me it's just the lesser evil. And I regret (bitterly sometimes) not having waited for some other option (Zaurus, which was quite hard to find here anyway, or some iPaq+Linux).
That's why I say that the next Palm OS version will have to change a number of things - for me to buy in at least.

From the second link: "the main factors in the low speed were software and hardware issues in the H2210's SDIO interface."

Although the 2210 uses the PXA255, it is well known that this specific model has IO problems for both SD and CF slots. The model we tested had half the speed of other devices. A Sprint cellular NIC I tested worked fine on laptops, but was a crawl on this handheld. Sprint's engineers confirmed the card interface was the issue. Also, it is interesting to note that the info on Tom's Networking link, in which they state "there is some conflicting info", contradicts data from Intel on the first link. I wish I had saved the link from the info confirming 4 bit for the TC and T3, but I didn't. My loss, I'll have to try and find it again.

From the third link we get "the default implementation is a 1-bit bus speed, called SD Narrow, which is far below the 4-bit bus speed, called SD Wide, normally offered on handhelds with SDIO". Default implementation being a key term. The T3 does not use the original version of the this chip, it uses the PXA255 core revision 4. Not sure which chip version most PPC's use, few of which even supported SDIO until very recently.

Regarding the out of spec and chip frying comments, yes they are related. If a chip or interface is pushed beyone it clock cycle capabilities, it is common to have errors or component failures. I have to agree that I wish the T3 write operations were faster. But, I must add that even in a card reader which has nothing to do with any handheld, SD write speeds are slow. A 400MB transfer taking 14 minutes? I'm looking forward to faster cards, period.

The comment about Quake was not about the game itself being good or bad... it is fun and popular. It was more abut it being used as a mantra. You know, "my handheld is better because I can play Quake", or "it's not worth my time if it can't play Quake" or "my car is better than yours because we can play Quake in the back seat". And on and on it goes ad nauseum. I personnaly had a situation where some guy, unprovoked, walked up and challenged me to load a 13MB word document on my old TT. Fine. He sent it to me in email and I loaded it. He tried to load it on his iPaq for half an hour and failed. Rather than draw attention to the failure, my subdued response was that perhaps there was something wrong with ActiveSync and he should reboot his desktop and try later. His response was that it did not matter because he could play Quake if he wanted. What kind of logic is that?

It's nice to be able to use a handheld as a web server. I have no such need but I'm sure it's invaluable to others. If that's what you need, then go for it. Myself? I'd love to do wireless site surveys, but I can't unless I go for an older iPaq with the expansion sleeve. What confuses me is that WM can do some things very well, but can't keep from screwing every important spreadsheet I own. Oh well.

Battery. You missed the context; I was talking about ease of use and navigation, not battery life. Four taps to see what's left in WM, no taps in POS.

Remember my post was a response to the perceived "T3 is dirt in every possible aspect" attitude the thread was taking. It was not my intention to be slamming WM, so don't take it personally. I support both platforms at work, and friends who don't like Palms are my friends because PDA's are not important enough to get in the way of things like that.

I have to conclude pretty much the same way you did. Only a fool would think POS was anywhere near perfect. Likewise, Windows Mobile is not perfect. Each has limitations, and like you, I took the lesser of two evils. Hopefully, Cobalt will come closer to what we really want.

Don't just look into the first page. "SD/MMC support" is quite inconclusive: a 1-bit bus would be compatible with both. And so SD are only mentioned on the intial blurb; go into the PDFs, and you'll see there's ONLY mention of MMC.

An interesting excerpt:
"A MultiMediaCard (MMC) or secure digital (SD) memory card can be used in socket J25. It
communicates via dedicated I/O pins with the MMC controller, using either the MMC or Serial
Peripheral Interface (SPI) protocol."
Interesting tidbits: "MMC controller", and no mention of SD protocol(s).

And I've found no mention at all about SDIO on the PDFs.

As a comparison, look at the PXA27x page. "4-bit SD I/O" is mentioned even on the initial page.
http://www.intel.com/design/pca/prodbref/253820.htm

And the PDFs specify (everywhere!) 4-bit SDIO.

From the second link: "the main factors in the low speed were software and hardware issues in the H2210's SDIO interface."
Although the 2210 uses the PXA255, it is well known that this specific model has IO problems for both SD and CF slots.

That second link already warned: So it would appear that the H2210's hardware is willing but the firmware is weak...

What remains to be seen is if the T3's hardware is "willing". (and then we would still have the firmware issue...)

I wish I had saved the link from the info confirming 4 bit for the TC and T3, but I didn't. My loss, I'll have to try and find it again.

Yes, please.

Default implementation being a key term.

Indeed it is! I still have no reason to think that they didn't follow the default implementation.

The T3 does not use the original version of the this chip, it uses the PXA255 core revision 4.

Does that revision include 4-bit SD capability? The latest specs update I've found (september 2003) still makes no mention about SD, only MMC. In fact it talks about a number of MMC controller bugs, perhaps that would explain some of the infamous T3 SD issues.

Regarding the out of spec and chip frying comments, yes they are related.

They COULD be related. But being "out of spec" suffices to explain a number of things, no need to "fry" anything.
First off, I still have found no hint about SD cards being "fryed" - apart from you. (anyway I guess we should start saying "burnt", or "make them too hot" - though I would like to first know what the typical operating specs are for SD cards)
Second, you implied that the T3 was so fast with SD cards that it "fried" them - as if that could count as a feature, anyway.
And third, the errata PDFs on Intel's site talk about a number of data corruption happening with their MMC controller; they even talk about compatibility with different SD card brands. Now, thinking that SDs can behave as MMCs, but include copy protection measures, to me it starts to look like the corrupted data could have caused the SD controller on the wasted cards to "simply" freak out.
In fact one of Intel's proposed solutions is to slow down the data stream (by breaking it on smaller pieces). Sounds familiar??

But, I must add that even in a card reader which has nothing to do with any handheld, SD write speeds are slow. A 400MB transfer taking 14 minutes? I'm looking forward to faster cards, period.

That would be >450KB/s. That's more than what I get with the T3 (less than 300 KB/s, last time I checked).
But anyway, if you're getting that speed with a card reader, then you should get a better one. USB(1) should allow for more than 600KB/s, and as already said the MMC standard allows >2MB/s. (SD, >10MB/s). USB2 and Firewire should saturate that.
And certainly there are cards that go near those speeds.
http://www.digit-life.com/articles2/readers-p10-pny-sandisk/

The comment about Quake was not about the game itself being good or bad... it is fun and popular.

My comment was not about it being fun or popular, but about Quake being available (pronounced "PORTABLE") to PocketPCs.
Like the rest of the software I listed. Why should I be paying for some custom half-assed program when there are better, open source, and FREE working alternatives out there?

It was more abut it being used as a mantra. You know, "my handheld is better because I can play Quake", or "it's not worth my time if it can't play Quake" or "my car is better than yours because we can play Quake in the back seat".

In this case, it's more like "my car is better than yours because it *has* back seats, so we can play Quake or whatever we feel like there".

I personnaly had a situation where some guy, unprovoked, walked up and challenged me to load a 13MB word document on my old TT. Fine. He sent it to me in email and I loaded it. He tried to load it on his iPaq for half an hour and failed. Rather than draw attention to the failure, my subdued response was that perhaps there was something wrong with ActiveSync and he should reboot his desktop and try later. His response was that it did not matter because he could play Quake if he wanted. What kind of logic is that?

Well, I'm sorry, but I certainly don't know which kind of logic is that. Should I? Perhaps you should just go ask him. :P
(or perhaps you should just laugh him off :P)

It's nice to be able to use a handheld as a web server.

Hey, I thought we both wanted to treat our T3 as a 400 MHz, 64+256 MB computer, didn't we?
The point is: pocketPCs can do (almost?) whatever you can do with a comparable computer. Meanwhile, Palm OS is a stumbling block.

Remember my post was a response to the perceived "T3 is dirt in every possible aspect" attitude the thread was taking. It was not my intention to be slamming WM, so don't take it personally.

I have some experience on platform wars (remember, I have a Mac :P), so I have learnt not to take these things personally.
Furthermore, I'll repeat: I'm NOT defending PocketPCs, and never have; I'm just pointing out obvious (to me) handicaps in the Palm OS.

What I don't like is that we started talking about technical info and, when asked to elaborate, you not only stopped being informative but went disgustingly sarcastic. I have had some experience with 2 people like that on these forums, and I don't want a third one.

Dell only sells direct. Palm sells through channels. The T3 came out at $400, but about two weeks later you could find it for $360 or so, less if you had discount coupons. (A friend of mine got one for ~$315 three weeks after it came out with a $50 discount coupon.)

I agree.

Will the T4 be their *last* PDA?

"PalmOne's China sales agents stop selling palm PDAs"

http://tinyurl.com/2lh9u

And then there's *this* to contend with:

http://www.pdafrance.com/articles/ebookprint.php?id=373
(tinyurl went down!)

And then there's this too:

http://www.geekzone.co.nz/content.asp?contentid=2965

The decision is due to the three agents' declining profits, because other importers of Palm PDAs are offering the products at lower prices.

Aside from the headache I got from reading French (I do not like to use Babblefish unless I have to) the price of 599 euros would be a dealkiller. At current exchange rates that is about $492.00. At that price point, a PDA just is not worth it.

Life is a great adventure or nothing.

that is a really nice looking PDA however. With that hardware and palm OS, that thing would be amazing.

The Federation for the Responsible Use of Acronyms

I got the exchange rate from a German friend. Perhaps I should buy some euros from him. Seriously, that makes it even more of a deal killer.

Life is a great adventure or nothing.

And you're setting an example of that? Ahem.

Now, will you let me go to do something productive? ;)

Such speculation has been a staple of PIC since I've been reading it--and many other similar sites within the technical community. You have SpyMac devoted solely to upcoming Macs & Apple products.

In what is admittedly a slow news week (pre-July 4th) it's good timing for Ryan to let us speculate & postulate which of the two (if either) set of specs on the T4 are correct. Brighthand's had several forum threads on this same topic for months now and no one there has complained.

Someone considerng jumping ship to PPC might be swayed to stick with Palm for another go-round due to the possible inclusion of the UC on the T4, for example. Just like Mike Cane's annual set of predictions, spculation as to the next wave of Palm hardware is an aspect of PIC that's here to stay and a topic that many users (myself included) are quite fond of taking stabs at, if for no other reason than to see how good we are at trying to nail down the direction the industry is heading.

You're surrounded, pal!

http://makeashorterlink.com/?N2FF13FA8

Give me a T4 with the lesser of the rumored specs (64mb ram, no wi-fi, dual SDIO, UC), better button layout, a good software bundle, a stable initial version of OS6 and a price around $350. I'll be fairly content as would most of the current Tungsten users. I still am sticking to my guns that a dual Wi-Fi/BT Tungsten is far better served up in the T|C formfactor. 320*320 screen gobbles less power and a new T|C in the same or similar formfactor could really pack in some battery power, especially when combined with OS & CPU tweaks for power management.

Cheers.

I'm still stuck on a Vx because I want landscape & Wi-Fi. If the T4 has just got bluetooth again, then it's off to PPC for me.

And WiFi isn't a selling point for me.

Jon Acheson

"All opinions posted are my own, and not those of my employers, who are appalled."