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Old 05-13-2005, 04:09 PM   #1
derekweb
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Switching from PalmOne T|T3 to HP iPaq hx2755

This is a very nice description by one of our readers about the process of going from Palm to PPC. I like the word he chose... "traumatic!" Very true. You can find the three Tanker Bob articles he references here. And I've written my own 2-part article on the experience during my own switch to PPC here. [BobR]

This is just a short primer for something I'll be finishing later tonight. However, I just recently switched from a PalmOne device to an iPaq.

My goals were simple, though probably numerous:
1 - Clear screen, as I use it for a mobile photo album and movies
2 - HAS to be able to deal with To Dos and Calendaring, ... and do so EASILY!
3 - Financial tracking is a MUST
4 - eBooks. Gotta be able to do eBooks! Not negociable.
5 - Games. Not the crap-sex stuff either that used to polute PocketGear.
6 - Battery Life
7 - Memory (ROM / RAM) has to be considerable. I do a lot. :-)
8 - What are the extra's.

I went with the HP, despite the slightly smaller pixel resolution than the Dell x50v because I could simply BUY IT LOCALLY. Dell, I like your online store, but I NEED to see it, feel it, hold it, in my grubby paws before I'll ever drop out $500 or more for something. Because if it breaks, I can now take my handheld back to the purchase point (on warranty) and get help. I like that. Especially since I'm not especially big (yet) on Windows Mobile PPC.

I didn't feel like waiting for the PalmOne LifeDrive that is soon to debut, because at the time, there was NO INDICATION except for a rough time frame (summer, 2005 sound familiar anyone?) of when this was going to be available. My T3 was going out FAST, ... I couldn't use Graffiti anymore because the screen was going. As a result, I couldn't wait. Not an option.

Now. For the transition itself. If I were to use a single word to describe it, I would use "Traumatic". And for me, it would be extremely descriptive. I will give kudo's however, that there was someone else (I *think* TankerBob) who did 3 primers on his own switch. I used his guides as a starting point for my own dang near religiously. I had his second guide printed out, I needed the data that much.

It's not easy, doing the switch. He has it right, though. The BEST way to convert over is to do so COLD TURKEY.

Software.
--------------------
Essential Software:
Financial -
- Microsoft Money
- Pocket Quicken 2.03 (I hope they update this one soon, like they did for PalmOS)
----> Both were on the plate for consideration due to their overall robustness. I eventually decided on PocketQuicken (though it's quirkier on the install, and it REALLY preferrs that you sync with Desktop Quicken) due to familiarity on the Palm side. Plus I like to be able to categorize by Bank Accounts, Loans, Assets, etc where MMoney does not do that.

Time Management
- Ultra something.
- Pocket Informant.
---> You can tell here what I went with. PI has a TON of customizations that you can do for it. So many that I'm still going through and struggling with some of them. A lot of them are just common sense, though so the basics are pretty easy to figure out. Which is a good thing, all things considered.

Web Browsing
- One of the things that I wanted NOW was WiFi capability, as well as BlueTooth. The iPaq does this nicely. But Pocket Explorer does not. So you will WANT to down load NetFront3. Yes you have to pay for it, but it's WORTH it. It's SSL capable (meaning that if you can secure your Wi Fi, you can use it to access your bank account online), and it's speedy. It can do tabs, and you can save images from a webpage to your card. In short, it's a desktop browser on your handheld. It has tons more features that frankly, make it really worth the small amount of cash that I paid for the license.

Entertainment
- I added BetaPlayer to the mix. WONDERFUL application. I love it. And it's free. I don't remember the EXACT phrasing, but you don't have to pay anything to use it. It plays a ton of different formats (... now if only they can add MOV to that list it'd be excellent and truly above all others!)

Maintenance
- Way more important here on PPC than on PalmOne handhelds. For this, I use MemMaid. Nice little ditty that keeps your temp files and otehr things cleaned out. Quite necessary on PPC, unfortunately. Pocket Mechanic is the other utility I use. Both are wonderful, and while not exactly required for use of a PPC, they definitely enhance your experience wth your handheld.

Overall ease of use
- Get something like WISBAR, or WisBar Advance 2x. In short, since Windows does not give you the option to Minimize vs Close the application, you're stuck with PPC minimizing to the background. Free up some memory and have WisBar set it to CLOSE instead. Nice feature, and they add a bunch more too! I just switched from WisBar to WisBar Advanced (still evaluating it) but so far, I'm *really* impressed.

Oddball Add Ins that make life easier:
- Kasuei's Hitchhiker. Still in beta, but still, VERY NICELY DONE so far.
- MohairSofa Calendar+ Today Plug In. Allows your Today Screen to show more than just your next appointment, and up to several days worth, in fact.
- Resco Explorer. So definite nice add ins, and I like the split screen approach to File Exploring.
- Macromedia Flash Player. Won't play desktop flash stuff ... at least not without a major conversion, but maybe down the road? Still, it allows others to do some nice programming. See DashBoard, or FlashDance for examples.

This is the short list, and frankly, they've made it a LOT easier on me for my surviving my transition from one platform to the other. I hope that if you read this and are thinking about converting, that this will somehow help you out too. And find TankerBobs' stuff too. They're priceless on this stuff for providing tips and information.

Last edited by BobR; 05-13-2005 at 04:44 PM. Reason: Post to Front Page
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Old 05-13-2005, 10:47 PM   #2
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Quote:
Originally Posted by derekweb
4 - eBooks. Gotta be able to do eBooks! Not negociable.
Welcome to the club

Quote:
Dell, I like your online store, but I NEED to see it, feel it, hold it, in my grubby paws before I'll ever drop out $500 or more for something.
Same here. But Dell gave me no choice and I took the risk. Glad now I did

Quote:
So you will WANT to down load NetFront3. Yes you have to pay for it, but it's WORTH it. It's SSL capable (meaning that if you can secure your Wi Fi, you can use it to access your bank account online), and it's speedy. It can do tabs, and you can save images from a webpage to your card. In short, it's a desktop browser on your handheld. It has tons more features that frankly, make it really worth the small amount of cash that I paid for the license.
Did you buy NetFront 3.1? The new 3.2 is just approaching, with the Japanese version already available for purchase.

Quote:
- I added BetaPlayer to the mix. WONDERFUL application. I love it. And it's free.
After every new hard-reset (yah, I had a couple of these), BetaPlayer is always among the first three apps I reinstall.

Quote:
Maintenance
- Way more important here on PPC than on PalmOne handhelds. For this, I use MemMaid. Nice little ditty that keeps your temp files and otehr things cleaned out. Quite necessary on PPC, unfortunately. Pocket Mechanic is the other utility I use. Both are wonderful, and while not exactly required for use of a PPC, they definitely enhance your experience wth your handheld.
Did you try SKTOOLS? It does everything MemMaid does and a lot more.

Quote:
Resco Explorer. So definite nice add ins, and I like the split screen approach to File Exploring.
Another one of my three must-have apps
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Old 05-14-2005, 01:22 AM   #3
cbarnett
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Ah, another joins us on the dark side.... Feel the power....

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Old 05-16-2005, 11:27 AM   #4
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Actually, Craig. What I'm feeling are the resets. /sigh/ Every time it seems (although it is actually much less than this, but still, ...) it seems like I'm doing a soft reset because the OS has stopped responding, or the today screen filters (the default ones, like my name fer crying out loud) are going wacky (showing boxes and crap characters). On average, I'm soft-resetting about 2 to 3 times a day. But then, I tend to really use my handheld. But coming from PalmOS land, I really expect stability while I'm out and about on the move.

However. That all said. /deep breath/ For backups, I absolutely LOVE the built in ROM accessable File Store that IPaq did. It survives even a Hard Reset, allowing you to have a SAFE backup of everything. I have a LOT more confidence now if I'm out and about and I lose power. Though I've even taken some steps to ensure that that won't happen either (9 volt emergency recharger! WOOT!)

To the one above, I'll give the software you listed a try. I'm always looking for better software. To answer your questions, too. Yes, I did register this latest (I think it WAS v3.1 of NetFront). When they release v3.2, you can bet that I'll be there handheld ready for an upgrade. :-)

To be honest, my expectations may seem pretty high. I've foudn that all adjusting aside, (which is STILL quite a pain, ... I apparently don't like change all that much, even despite my co-workers telling me I'm a change-agent). The hardware itself is pretty good. I'm relatively pleased hardware wise and capability wise. It's really the software that is the hardest to deal with, get used to, etc.

Windows Mobile simply isn't as stable. Although. To be fair, I have a friend who just bought the T|5 from PalmOne. He's not much more stable at the moment than I am. LOL ... His issues, straight out of the box mind you, were one factor I decided to look at ALL of the handhelds available. The other reason: The HX iPaq hx2755 was HERE. Not vaporware. So far, while the designs for the PalmOne MM Life Drive are NICE, ... show me the hardware. If you can't produce it for me (yet) in PERSON, then it don't exist! Which means it's not there for consideration. /shrug/ I waited about 6 months to upgrade, ... was expecting good things for the T|5. Was disappointed. Expected good things about the Life Drive. It isn't here yet.

You can see the process of how I came over to PPC land.

Still. Rambling aside. There are some nice things to say about multi-tasking. I just wish that MS had included most of the WisbarAdvanced functions built IN to the dog gone OS.

Why is it that MS only does the OS half baked?
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Old 05-16-2005, 11:38 AM   #5
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Battery Life on the hx2755

By now, I've had a decent amount of time to evaluate the Battery Life under my own personal usage conditions. It would probably be appropriate for me to share those thoughts (since I don't have hard numbers, please bear with my point of view on this).

Usage:
I use my handheld for everything. EVERYTHING. Pictures, music, eBooks, Astronomy charts (yes, for some reason watching the night sky go round is relaxing.), Word Processing, Spreadsheets, ... like I said, everything.

I have to recharge the handheld around every other day.

Caveat. When I have security engaged, for some reason the handheld continuously pops on. Time interval is somewhere between 30min to 1 hour. The device WILL auto shut off, but after my standard default of 3 min. As such, it's chewing power. Because of that, when Security is engaged, I've found that it's BEST to have the device charged at LEAST once a day, and better even to just keep it plugged in when it's not in your pocket.

While listening to music.
On thing about BetaPlayer (or MS Media Player 9) ... the screen does not shut off. However, WinOS Mobile does include an option under SETTINGS to really really dim your screen. Wonderful setting, truth be told. Saves a LOT on battery juice. I've gone for several hours (at least 3, but I didn't time it unfortunately, but I went all afternoon between lunch and going home) listening to music via headphones.

Speaking of headphones, vs built-in speaker. Headphones in general (maybe this is commonly known by everyone else, but I've recently seen the clues) seem to draw less power consumption than does the internal built in speaker. As such, when possible, you should use headphones.

There are other things you can do to help optimize your battery life. Wi Fi as everyone knows eats it like a starving cow. So does Blue tooth, but not QUITE as badly. Screen brightness also affects it, as everyone knows.

Those are the biggies for Battery consumption. And that is also the short of it, regarding my observations on Battery Life. I'll write more later on other parts of the handheld.
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Old 05-16-2005, 11:44 AM   #6
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Quote:
Originally Posted by derekweb
While listening to music.
On thing about BetaPlayer (or MS Media Player 9) ... the screen does not shut off. However, WinOS Mobile does include an option under SETTINGS to really really dim your screen. Wonderful setting, truth be told. Saves a LOT on battery juice.
I use BetaPlayer for watching movies; but for listening to music such as MP3s, I only use GSPlayer. GSPlayer also allows you to completely shut off your display
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Old 05-16-2005, 02:30 PM   #7
Bob Russell
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Quote:
Originally Posted by derekweb
I absolutely LOVE the built in ROM accessable File Store that IPaq did. It survives even a Hard Reset, allowing you to have a SAFE backup of everything. I have a LOT more confidence now if I'm out and about and I lose power.
Don't get too comfortable. Out of the blue this weekend, I just lost the contents of my internal Flash Rom in my Toshiba e405 PPC! And it's not the first time. Not to mention that my SD card has gone useless multiple times, with the data all gone. I've had fairly recent backups each time, but my confidence is shot, and recovery is no fun.
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Old 05-16-2005, 02:47 PM   #8
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Don't get too comfortable. Out of the blue this weekend, I just lost the contents of my internal Flash Rom in my Toshiba e405 PPC! And it's not the first time. Not to mention that my SD card has gone useless multiple times, with the data all gone. I've had fairly recent backups each time, but my confidence is shot, and recovery is no fun.
With both backup options being as they are for you, how do you *guarantee* that you have a valid backup? If you can't trust the internal store, and can't trust your backup card,... then the thought that comes to mind is "screw it".
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Old 05-16-2005, 03:30 PM   #9
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That's about the conclusion I'm coming to! What I do is run Sprite backup scheduled nightly, and it includes the internal flash. Then I copy to my PC every day or two.

It's not a comfortable feeling having to worry about all that. Don't know how many pdas are completely stable, though.
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Old 05-16-2005, 03:39 PM   #10
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Well I don't trust my PDA anymore since the last unwanted hard-reset. EVEN Dell suggests that when you perform a flash upgrade, to also backup your data in your storage memory, even though it is usually untouched.
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