PDA (Was:RE: [SunRescue] we're all just spoiled (was: re: IPC))

[jwbirdsa at picarefy.picarefy.comjwbirdsa]

   The first law of PDA buying seems to be: know the capacity of thy
machine, and do not stress it beyond that.

   I have an old Cassiopeia E-10, WinCE 2.0, ~40MHz MIPS CPU, 4M RAM,
enhanced with a 32M Compact Flash card. It's basically as small and
pathetic a palm-sized WinCE unit was was ever made. For me, it's
essentially an intelligent pad of paper -- it keeps lists of tasks,
addresses, and miscellaneous stuff, including several megabytes of
thumbnail scans of things. I have a couple game programs loaded and an HTML
viewer, and that's about it. It does OK on speed and is highly reliable --
I've never hard-booted the thing, and it only requires a soft boot two or
three times a year.

   My housemate, on the other hand, has a Visor. He has a couple modules
for it, and a folding keyboard, and he's all the time trying out new
software on it. When he's beaming software and data to and from other
Palms, I envy him, but I don't envy his frequent hard and soft resets and
the way it's a triumph when the thing actually syncs properly.

   I'm dreading the day my E-10 eventually dies. If I had to replace it
today, I'd face a choice between spending $$$ for a WinCE machine which is
mostly composed of features I don't need, or getting a Palm which is still
missing critical features for what I want (320x240 screen, the ability to
grok standard mass storage like Compact Flash).

   So, what do you want to do with it? How hefty of a unit do you need to
support that? Should you be considering a new machine at all, or would you
be better off getting a dirt-cheap used unit? (Actually, that suggests a
solution to my own problem: I should buy some E-10's and store them as
spares. Doh!)

   --James B.