[ale] Palm Response Summary (OT)

[Danny Cox]

Responses:

hirsch at zapmedia.com writes:
If you aren't getting a rechargable battery, I can't think of a good
reason for getting a palm instead of a handspring.  The visor is
pretty nice--maybe not quite as elegant as a palm III, but it does
come in cool colors.  And last I looked, it was a lot cheaper.

	While true Handspring sez on their web page that they "do not support 
	Unix or Linux".  That, and their 8MB model is also $249.  I'll stick 
	to Palm.

me at FultonGreen.com writes:
I use a Palm III, which is about a year-and-a-half old. I haven't done any
sync'ing w/it to Linux, but those who have say it works pretty well (the
recent security-related ALE postings notwithstanding). Supposedly there's a
way to shoehorn Linux into it, but if that winds up being your prime focus,
I'd recommend you check out www.handhelds.org for the Compaq handheld for
which Linux (and X!) is being actively ported.

	No, I want to use it as-is, not run Linux on it.  I'll still check out
	www.handhelds.org though.

rstickel at mindspring.com writes:
Having recently bought a IIIxe, I wish I had gotten a Visor instead.  They
are nearly identical, but whereas the IIIxe has a serial port, the Visor has
an expansion slot.  I was envious to see a friend plug his Visor into a
phone line and check his email without any external stuff.

The batteries are not much of a problem unless you're really concerned about
landfills.  I've been running for over a month on the two AAAs that came with
the IIIe and have about 30% charge left.

Of course, if you are primarily interested in email, it's hard to beat the RIM
Blackberry.

	Thanks for the info.  See by objections to the Handspring above.

>From dhurst at kennesaw.edu Thu Sep 21 06:57:48 2000

My boss has the Palm 5X and it is sweet!  I got it to hotsync with it's
software running inside Win95 OSVR2 inside VMWare inside Linux thru the
external serial port on my laptop running SuSE6.4.  I think for real
world use the extra memory is important.  They are hard to find though.

	Sounds good.  I just couldn't see paying the extra $$ for the 
rechargeable batteries.  I wanted the functionality, not the style.  The only
difference I could tell between the IIIxe and the V (with 8MB) was the
rechargeable batteries, and an extra $150.

	Well, I Took The Plunge, and bought a Palm IIIxe last Friday night,
and so have a few days to report on my experience so far.  It's been great!
I bought two cradles, so I could sync at home and at work.  I found "jpilot"
on freshmeat, and it works great!  I find that typing into jpilot and syncing
with the Palm to be a painless way to enter in data.  After entering all the
appointments, phone/address/names, todos, and the like, I still have hardly
scratched the surface of the 8MB ram.

	I'll probably end up getting one for my wife also.  She tends to tote
a day-timer with her everywhere, and I think a Palm (or equivalent) will be
much nicer for her.  I did see a sync program in the Solutions Guide that
would handle husband/wife type syncs.

	The coolest app I've seen so far is the DeLorme GPS receiver and
software that'll plug into the Palm, and display driving directions.  My only
problem is the $200 price tag.  That's almost as much as the Palm itself!

	The geekiest app is, of course, the one on Slashdot either Monday or
Tuesday, where the Palm controlled a small robot.  I might just have to build
one of 'em.

	Oh, well.  'Nuff said.  Thanks for the responses!

Danny

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