Handspring Drops to Third Place in Retail Sales

I really think people make to much of this. It is almost impossible to tell the difference between a 12bit image (4096 colors) and 16bit (65,000 colors). It is quite a bit easier to tell the difference between 8-bit (256 colors) and 12 bit. 65000 colors sounds a lot more impressive but believe me (i had a casio e125 ppc with 12 bit-screen and an ipaq w/16-bit) the difference isn't noticable. How many Palm OS apps or games (in the history of the platform) actually show more then 4096 colors on the screen at once?

So in essence, this little company with a half-a**ed attitude is doing almost as well (PDA wise) as a large international conglomerate dedicating it's vast wealth and resources into the effort. That makes Handspring sound pretty impressive to me.

Of course, they may continue their decline but nothing is set in stone my friend. Handspring has PLENTY of time to right themselves...

How long has HS been in the market? 5 years.
For that matter, how long has Palm been in the market? 10 years.

Sony? 2 years.

HS had a whole three years to fully distance themselves from Sony, so I guess some of the "half-a**ed" commentary does fit. Now, if they both entered the market at the same time, then your argument could hold some water.

The Visor fow released in September 1999, about 2.75 years ago.

The Sony S300 was released in the US in August 2000, so about 1.75 years ago.

The Visor hasn't been around that much longer than the CLIE. Handspring had a huge lead over Sony because the original Visor line was very good, while the original Clies were bloody awful.

Sony only starting showing some legs last year when the 710 came out, its first model worth buying.

"PLENTY Of Time??? You do have faith you HS. Why don't you put all the money you have in HS shares? According to you, they will be better to Sony in no time."

I can't emphasize enough the importance of reading if you are going to participate in forum discussions. You might recall I stated "they may continue their decline". I really don't understand how you take that to mean that I think they are going to be better than Sony.

"HS had a whole three years to fully distance themselves from Sony ... Now, if they both entered the market at the same time, then your argument could hold some water."

Irregardless of your false calculations, the only number that really matters is that Sony has been in the game for almost two years and they have just caught up. With Sony's resources, it really shouldn't take that long to catch up with a "half-a**ed" company like some people take HS to be.

"You folks mistakenly assume that everyone seeks the same market dominance that Microsoft has."

If any CEO of a publicly-traded company ever stated that "MS style" market dominance was not wanted by their company, shareholders would laugh the fool out of town...

Dude, what are you talking about? Sony's total sales for last year ($60B) was over 20 (twenty) times that of 3Com, Palm Inc. and Handspring COMBINED (under $3B). Yeah, that sounds real balanced.

HS had to hack PalmOS just like everyone else. HS's people lost their "home field advantage" pretty quickly after leaving Palm.

ssummer

P.S. - Focus on the facts: "http://www.bartleby.com/61/84/I0238400.html"

Oh? I've never used a Handspring specific version of Palm Desktop (other than the one from the install CD) to Hotsync my Visors (a Deluxe then a Prism). In fact, it's the same software. The only differences I've seen is that the non-HS version tries to update the OS, which the Visors don't like. If you just drag the OS update out of your folder, it gives an error but syncs just fine. No reason to wait on a HS specific version, which is probably why they don't bother anymore.

I am sure those are global definition. (but don't tell anybody about next quarter global sale, Palm might now hold up 35%)