Still, the reason the SD slot is on the side on the i and not on the top is the antenna, which likely takes up that whole area and then some under its whitish, translucent hat. Universal On the bottom and back is the now-standard Universal connector. I'm pleased to see that I can use the m cradle I already have on my desk with this new device. With all the new Palm OS licensees, my desk is quite a mess of cradles and cables.
Now, at least for the three major Palm OS devices, I need only the one cradle, and it appears that most of the Universal connector peripherals will work with the i The included book-style cover is much like the covers on the Palm V and m, except that it doesn't slide into a stylus-like slot.
Instead it uses a flexible plastic strip that slides into a mating groove on the side. I'm really not sure why Palm still insists on this type of cover. Because it's so flexible, it hangs perpetually off square with the face of the device itself, looking like a shabby afterthought. True, it folds around the back of the device nicely, but I still find myself removing it until I have to take the unit somewhere.
Unlike the Palm V model, this cover seems to want to escape. The strip's hard plastic top doesn't really lock in place, so it keeps popping up as if it wants to be removed. It does require some force to actually remove it, so it's not a problem except of fit and nuisance.
Screen The screen is now the same size as the mseries, about three sixteenths of an inch smaller than the Palm VII, measured diagonally. The pixels appear to be slightly better in contrast to the m I have, though it has the same gray or yellowish inverted backlight that really doesn't work that well in low light.
In near darkness, however, it's okay. I'm told this is the same screen that is in the m, so the difference in contrast is probably due to varying sources.
It is an excellent screen with a light background and very black pixels. The Graffiti area and the icons that surround it are roughly the same as the m, with a clock icon in the upper left corner, and contrast control icon in the upper right, and the calculator icon is now a star, which can be programmed to do whatever you like. This isn't really new, since this has been customizable since at least Palm OS v2.
The battery is a Lithium polymer rechargeable that Palm claims will last up to one week under normal use without a recharge. Alarms include tone, red flashing light, and vibrate. The vibrate feature is more vigorous than I've felt in previous models, producing a deeper tone and shaking the plastic quite a bit more.
Since I've judged past PDA vibrate features as being too weak to be noticed in a jacket pocket, this is a good change. I should also note that the LED in the antenna flashes various colors and at different frequencies to communicate different messages.
A slow flashing green light indicates that the radio is on and has good wireless signal. A slow red light means the radio is on, but there is no signal. A fast red light means there is some kind of notification waiting for your attention on the device, and no light means the radio is off.
Wireless Though earlier I mentioned that the front of the unit has the standard four buttons, I meant their location, not necessarily their purpose. Like Handspring with their Treo, Palm has elected to move the wireless features to the fore, placing access to the MyPalm portal where the To Do button used to be, and the email launcher where the Memo Pad and Note Pad button used to be. Datebook and Address, being properly deemed of highest importance, are still in the same location.
These buttons can still be remapped to do whatever you want, of course. From here, you can use a pull down menu to choose from six basic categories. The first two are Home, which is the default screen, giving you one tap access to almost all of the menu items; and Personalize, where you can choose your default email app, select MyPalm Update, Personalize your MyPage, visit the Palm Store, or download WCAs. Essentially, these are small programs that let you perform a specific request, such as retrieving movie show times using Moviefone in a specific area code, listing recent news headlines via CNN, ABC News, USA Today, and the PR Newswire , or a number of other quick bursts of information.
PQAs are basically just Web forms that grab specific information. For example, testing as I write this, it took 18 seconds between tapping the News link to displaying a page with four PQAs listed. I tap the new Top stories link, wait 14 seconds, and a page of headlines is displayed.
I tap a headline, wait another 25 seconds, and am finally given the text of a 2K article. Several times, the i lost contact with the server when viewing Web pages, resulting in partial pages.
Amazingly, there is no Refresh command to reload the contents of the page, so you have to go back to the previous page, tap the link for the article you want, and hope it loads on the second try.
Net service in my testing. Email — Far more useful is the included MultiMail application, which you can use to access your Palm. Net plan , retrieve only unread mail, or ignore attachments. Impronto DK. As evidence, they point to the new Treo 90, which has a color screen and a few other enhancements "but no wireless phone, nor any means of connecting to the Internet.
Handspring, Inc. Treo 90 expands the Treo family of handhelds to now include organizers as well as communicators. Based on the design of the Treo communicators, Treo 90 comes with 16 MB of memory, Secure Digital and MultiMediaCard expansion capabilities, and a long-lasting rechargeable battery. The Palm i wireless handheld from Palm, Inc. The status LED at the top of the antenna swoop serves several purposes.
If you are out range, there will be a slow red heartbeat. The LED will blink a fast red heartbeat when you either have a new email, or a date book, clock or notepad alarm has been activated. It will also glows green continuously when charging in the cradle. I really wish you could customize the blinks. The green heartbeat blinks drive me nuts. If I have the i laying on my desk within eyesight, the blinks will distract me from my work. I think it would be nicer if the LED would glow a steady green while within radio range and maybe just turn off when out of range.
For new unread emails I think the LED should glow a steady red and blink green for alarms. One nice thing to know is the fact that you can set the radio to be on always or to just be on for a certain time span during the day. The left side of the i has an accessory slot for screen covers. A leather flip cover is included which slides into this slot. The right side has the stylus silo. The silo is cut out like the silos on the Palm V and m series.
The right side is also where the SD expansion card slot is. The bottom of the PDA has the universal connector which allows you to sync in m series cradles, use the same cables, some keyboards. The display on the i is my biggest complaint about this model. This PDA would be soooooooooooooooo much better if they had gone with a color screen. I would have even been happy not Snoopy dance happy, but happy all the same if they had even gone with the mediocre m color display. Ok, enough with the complaining… The display is your typical newer Palm mono display.
It has much better contrast than my Palm VIIx. It is crisp, clear and viewable in most lighting conditions. If you are in very dim light, you can hold down the power button to toggle the backlight. Unfortunately, the horrible reverse backlight is used which is really only beneficial in very very dim otherwise know as dark lighting. The actual screen is hard, slick and easy to write on with a stylus. That said, it does depress ever so slightly when you press the stylus tip on it. You have to hold it at an angle to see this though.
I also found that the digitizer was sensitive and recognized all the Graffiti letters that I tried. You also might notice that the silkscreen area looks a little different on the i The calculator soft button has been replaced by a star. This star is your favorite button. Not a favorite website, but a favorite application. You can set this button to launch any application installed on your PDA.
If you need a little extra oomph to make the alarms and notices stand out, the i also has a vibrate feature built-in which is noticeably stronger than the vibrate on my m Attaching and removing the i from the cradle seems easier than doing the same with the m Battery life is as excellent as with all Palm devices. I sure wish my Pocket PC did this well!
Of course, the biggest feature of this device is the wireless feature.
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