I had specific wants for a PDA; it should be simple & easy to use, have long battery life and be fairly sturdily constructed. I didn’t want to pay above 7-8000NT.
I didn’t need ability to play mp3s, or colour display.
Obviously for simplicity and battery life I was looking at a Palm OS machine. The choice seemed to be between Handspring Visor, Sony Clie and Palm machines. Although the price of the no-longer produced Handspring Visor standalone PDAs was attractive (I think that Nova in Taichung and Taipei still sell them if you’re interested), the screen looks a bit fragile, and the expansion options were limited to the now obsolete Visor proprietary format (although there are some nice plug-in modules such as cameras for that format).
I bought a Palm m125 because it seemed sturdily built and because the power was supplied by two AA batteries as opposed to the internal rechargable battery most PDAs have. I preferred this because good batteries such as Duracells should always last longer than an internal rechargable, and because it’s more flexible - I don’t need another power adaptor if I visit another country.
The battery thing has brought its own issues, though. The PDA retains everything in memory for about 1 minute, so you have enough time to change batteries. Pimlico software didn’t seem to agree with it, though. I was using first their free utility ‘weekview’, which enhances the built-in datebook application, and then I bought their standalone application ‘Datebook5’. Whenever I replaced batteries I would get critical error messages and would often have to do a hard reset and reload everthing from my desktop computer onto the PDA. I have stopped using the Pimlico application and now do not have this problem.
roc makes a good point. You have to actually remember to use the thing. Quite a few regular posters here use the ‘Supermemo’ program, me included. I don’t always remember to switch on the PDA and do my tests every day, though, so its effectiveness is compromised. I try to use the PDA as the primary address/phone book list and then sync other stuff (desktop pc, cellphone) from that. I don’t always remember to do this, though, and it gets confusing when I put a new phone number into my cellphone or enter a new e-mail address into my desktop and forget to put them into the PDA.
I bought a hard case made by Proporta in Britain. It’s very good; made from ABS plastic, has an optional belt clip and the PDA stays in the case all the time, you just flip open the lid and take the stylus out of the back of the case.
Proporta is a good company. I dropped the PDA in the case shortly after getting them. The PDA was fine, but the little window in the front slipped out of place. I got on the phone to Proporta and they apologised, saying they had had a batch where the window was a bit less secure, but that their production was back to normal. Not only did they send me a new case and some freebies, completely free of charge, but because I was in a hurry they also let me keep the old one and explained to me how I could fix it with a little bit of superglue. How’s that for service?
So I didn’t have to take the PDA out of the case every time I hotsynced, I bought an infrared reciever that plugs into the serial port of my desktop. It’s really meant for synchronising cellphones to the desktop, but works fine with the PDA. Now the only time I take the PDA out of the case is to change the batteries about once a month.
)!!! I’ll just describe my setup and try to answer your questions as I go along.