The Palm Pilot is 10 Years Old!

I have a black and white Sony Clie that was given to me by my father-in-law. I think I used it for a week and since then it's sat in it's USB dock for the last 2 years. I think if I upgrade to a Treo or some wireless PDA I'd use it more often.

My wife gave me an HP Ipaq for Christmas last year. The wireless internet is cool, especially for wifi hotspots around town, and around the country. I have found that a lot of people have wireless routers in their homes without security enabled. That will allow anyone with a wireless card to get on their internet connection. I use mine more as an MP3 player and calender than anything else.

Even if I just had one that could play MP3s I'd be 90% more likely to use it. Add in E-mail and I'd have it strapped to my hip.

Check out the Ipaq, it has email capability, I check my yahoo account on it, pretty sure you could set up any other account on it, i just don't have another one, other than work. I have a few SD memory cards with MP3s on it, and it works great.

My first PDA was a Compaq C120 HPC that I picked up in 1999. It ran a version of windows called Windows CE. It had a black and white screen but ran a lot af cool and standard apps including pocket word and pocket excel. My favorite game I purchased for it was a version of "Missle Command" and the coolest free app was a dialer that would play phone dial tones throught the speaker to help you speed dial any contact in your address book. Supposedly, you could go to one of the hotel boards at an airport and make free calls where ever you wanted using this dialer, but I never personally tried it. I purchased a 14.4 modem card to go with it but never set it up. It's gathering dust right now so if there are any interested Handheld PC afficianados out there, maybe we can make a deal.

Yeah I have about five of these of different incarnations. I have found them most useful as the I/O for a small programming or data gathering project. All others but the one that is actually my phone are gathering dust. It's just easier to keep track of a sticky note and if you loose it, no big deal. I use those little tiny sticky notes and I stick it to the side of my palm pilot phone. And it's a good day when I can get past the first or second task on the sticky note!

My first PDA, and my only one so far, was/is a Handspring Visor Prism. At the time, about 3 years ago, they were just starting to come down in price and had the best color screen on the market, 160 x 160 pixels of backlit color LCD. I loved the expansion slot, even if it was proprietary. At the time it was the only color Palm OS PDA with expansion. If I had read the handwriting on the wall, I could have guessed the reason the accessories were going clearance, but instead I loaded up. At the cheap prices, they were fun toys, camera, voice recorder, GPS, and even a Visorphone (for free with new T-mobile service!). I still have my T-mobile service, since they replaced my broken Visorphone (it took the shock when I dropped my Visor) with a nice slim Nokia for free even before my time was up.

Anyway, although I charge up my Visor now and then, the novelty has worn off. Funny, I still use my Palm Desktop software for personal calendar and address book, since I use Outlook at the Office, Charter On-line for e-mail, and I do not like Outlook Express!

I would love to get a Handsprin....I mean Palm One Treo 650, but by the time I can afford it, they will have something better out to lust after!