The Palm Tungsten|w

	The Palm Tungsten\|w Prev 1 2

	It’s A Cell Phone The Tungsten\|w cell phone surprised me in a couple of ways. For one, at this writing it is limited to just a single service provider – AT&T. Since that is who I use anyway, that wasn’t a major issue. But in terms of usage it seems to actually work better than my Motorola T720. Reception was better in the same areas. I don’t know if this is due to a better antenna or what, but it was better. The integrated phone application is pretty easy to use. It has a large keyboard that works well with your fingers, so you don’t have to use a stylus to dial. It also integrates into the Palm Address Book, so you can quickly look up an entry and dial with a simple touch of the screen. However, note that a stylus works better than your finger here when selecting a person from the list. I do have two negative comments here. For one, you can only use the phone through the earpiece. In other words, you can’t hold the phone to your head and talk. Now a headset is how I almost always use my cell phone anyway, but there are times when I do want to use it phone to head. And if you lose or break your headset, you can’t use the phone for calls. The other problem isn’t really a Palm issue, it’s was problem with the Act software. I couldn’t dial a client from within Act, I had to actually copy the number down and then go to the phone application and type it in. However, checking in at the ACT site I discovered a hotfix that you can download to fix the problem. You will need to register on the site in order to download it, but otherwise it was pretty easy to add the patch. You can get it by clicking here. I give the Cell Phone aspects a B+. [an error occurred while processing this directive] Yes, It Does EMAIL! Now we’re getting into what is one of the key features, email. As mentioned, you must be using AT&T for your voice and data, and there are several voice+data package rates ranging from $30 to $100 a month. Also, if you will be in Canada or traveling in other international areas you will need to let them know. I needed to visit Nova Scotia and for an extra $2.95 a month the access was fine. Does it work? Yes, it really does a good job as an email client. I had a couple small bumps in getting everything running smoothly, but they were easily rectified. The included VersaMail application didn’t work seamlessly with AT&T, but I was able to use AT&T’s Office Online service (https://www.startofficeonline.com). This is a simple web interface that allows you to send and receive email using your corporate email server or other mail provider. It works great, although it does not allow you to send or receive any attachments. It is free if you are using one of the more extensive phone and data packages, but it’s only a couple dollars a month otherwise. Web surfing is a bit more problematic. It does work, but it formats sites into a single column instead of trying to display them as designed. The graphics come through fine, the links work, but the page can look jumbled. And it does not seem to like sites that use frames. Of course, if you are accessing sites that are WAP friendly this isn’t an issue at all. I think the browser should give you an option of how it displays the page; that would allow more flexibility and compatibility with sites. I give the cellular email a solid A. Other Features Other noteworthy aspects are the screen and keyboard. The display is sharp, text is very readable and the colors are vibrant. The keyboard is remarkably easy to use - I was surprised by how quickly I took to it. That said, I wouldn’t want to write a long document on it, but for memos and email it is more than good enough. The Dragonball CPU is reasonably fast, but in the next version it would be better to use the fastest processor available. I think the Intel processor used in the new Tungsten\|c is faster than this one. The added speed certainly would benefit users of larger databases and spreadsheets. Likewise the 16MB of SDRAM is adequate, but jumping to 64MB or 128MB SDRAM should be the default in the next version. Final Thoughts All in all I can say this is one of the most useful purchases I’ve made in a long time. It really does allow me to take the most needed aspects of my office – phone, email and client database – everywhere I go. And I don’t have to lug a heavy notebook around just to get my email. I give the Tungsten\|w a strong buy rating. Source: DMO Prev 1 2