MobileTechReview.com PDA and Handheld Computer FAQ: What is a PDA?

What is a PDA?

What does PDA stand for? Personal Digital Assistant. A PDA is a computer that fits in the palm of your hand. Its main purpose is to carry your PIM (person information manager) applications and data: address book, calendar, notes and tasks. PDAs have been around for quite a few years now, and they can do much more than PIM functions these days. In fact you can use them to access the Internet for web browsing and email, work with MS Office documents, add on a GPS for navigation, play games, and some even double as phones (these are called smartphones) and have integrated digital cameras. There are two major breeds: Palm OS and Pocket PCs running the Windows Mobile OS. Palm OS PDAs are made by Palm and Sony. Handspring had been a big player but they were bought out by Palm and only the Palm name survives. Sony left the US handheld market in mid-2004 so their models won't be on retailers shelves by the end of 2005. Pocket PCs are made by many companies, including HP, Toshiba, Dell, ASUS and ViewSonic. There are also a few Linux PDAs on the market, and these are mostly imports from Japan. The most popular is the Sharp Zaurus line of PDAs which come in clamshell (notebook-like) and traditional slate PDA designs.

All PDAs have touch screen LCDs which respond both to the stylus and your finger, and have color displays these days. All have a stylus which you can use to navigate the screen and enter information using handwriting recognition (HWR). Several now have built-in thumb keyboards in addition, which have become popular. Unlike PCs, most don't have hard drives because those used to be too large, too slow and consume too much power. But hard drive technology has improved leaps and bound. These days, iPods and other personal media players have tiny MicroDrive hard drives and the Palm LifeDrive Mobile Manager and Sharp Zaurus SL-C3000 PDAs have 4 gig hard drives! Other than those with hard drives, PDAs instead they have RAM and ROM memory, a portion of which is used to store programs and data. Palm OS PDAs generally come with 32 or more megs of RAM, while Pocket PCs have 64 to 128 megs. The ROM area is non-volatile, which means it isn't erased even if you wipe out the PDA via a hard reset. ROM is where the operating system and basic programs that come with the unit are installed. If you install add-in commercial and shareware programs, they'll go in RAM, though some allow you to store programs and data in ROM as well. PDAs have a CPU, aka processor, just as your PC does, and speeds range from 200 MHz to 624 MHz these days. Generally Pocket PCs have faster processors and more memory because the Pocket PC operating system (OS) requires more horsepower than does Palm OS.

Some History

PDAs have been around since the mid 1990's. The first popular ones were the Apple Newton and the original Palm Pilot. Apple discontinued the Newton line in 1998, and the Palm Pilot held the majority of the market share. The now mostly discontinued Psion PDAs were also popular in those days. As the Palm Pilot caught on in popularity, Microsoft decided they wanted a part of this market, and introduced the first Windows CE PDAs. These were available in mini-laptop clamshell designs, resembling shrunk-down notebook computers and were referred to as HPCs (handheld PCs). They first hit the US market in 1997, and didn't sell very well because they were less portable and more complicated than the Palm OS PDAs. The Psion also had a mini-clamshell design, but it still had reasonable popularity because it had a reliable and user-friendly OS along with a great keyboard. In 1998 and 1999 the first Windows CE PPCs (palm PCs) hit the market, and these were a bit more popular since they were more portable than HPCs. Palm still ruled the marketplace, and in 2000, Microsoft released a new OS: Pocket PC. They changed the name to rid themselves of the negative association they felt WinCE had with consumers. Pocket PCs did indeed have a better user interface, requiring fewer screen taps to get to frequently needed information, and their mark share started to grow. However, they still had price tags that were higher than Palm PDAs, and that didn't help. Pocket PC 2002 PDAs came out in (you guessed it!) 2002, and these featured further improvements in the user interface (UI), better support for networking connections and powerful hardware that was great for games. With the introduction of these devices, Pocket PC started to make some serious inroads into the PDA market, was still largely dominated by Palm OS. They still cost more than Palms, but offered color screens, MP3 playback and a variety of network options, which most Palms didn't. Nowadays, you can get color Palm OS PDAs with MP3 players, movie playback and networking capabilities. Palm OS 5 is the latest version of Palm OS. The current version of the Pocket PC OS is called Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition and the next generation running Windows Mobile 5 should be out in the Fall of 2005.

Cost

Budget Pocket PCs with plenty of features sell for around $300 to $350. What is the difference between $300 and $600 models? The more expensive models have more expansion slots and possibilities, faster processors, more memory, and built-in wireless networking in the form of Bluetooth and/or WiFi. Palm OS PDAs range in price from about $149 for the entry level palmOne Zire 31 to $500 for top of the line LifeDrive with its 4 gig hard drive, large screens, MP3 playback, WiFi Bluetooth and more.

Expansion Slots

Most all current PDAs have expansion slots that can access storage/memory cards and IO cards such as modem and networking cards. Pocket PCs usually have SD slots and sometimes CF slots. Palm brand PDAs including the Treo 650 have SD slots. Sony Cliés have Memory Stick slots and the NX series and NZ90 also had a CF slot that accepts Sony's WiFi network card and storage cards with a 3rd party driver that sells for $28. You can buy storage cards and Palm's SD WiFi card for select Palm brand models. For Pocket PCs you can get memory, Bluetooth, WiFi and even SD GPS cards. The CF slots on Pocket PCs accepts storage cards, CF digital camera modules, CF modems, wired Ethernet Cards, Bluetooth cards and WiFi cards. For the Clié, you can get Memory Stick storage cards, a digicam Memory Stick and overseas, a Bluetooth Memory Stick.

Mac Compatibility

Pocket PCs do not sync with Macs. They support only Windows. There are two 3rd party application called PocketMac Pro and MissingSync for Pocket PC that will allow you to sync to the Mac, but you may still have trouble installing 3rd party applications since these are usually supplied in .exe format.

All Palm OS PDAs (Palm, Sony and Handspring) can sync with the Mac using Palm Desktop software. For some reason, Sony doesn't include the Mac version of Palm Desktop or drivers. You'll need to get a copy of MissingSync to sync with the Mac (it works great and can interface with iTunes and iPhoto in OS X). If you have a Palm or Clié with Bluetooth, you'll be able to sync via Bluetooth. For more information, see our Mac FAQ.

Syncing

Since the Pocket PC OS is made by Microsoft, Pocket PCs sync with MS Outlook for PIM information and email. Outlook 2002 is included with Pocket PCs. They can also sync with and read/edit MS Word and Excel files. Advanced formatting is not supported by Pocket Word and Excel, but the basic stuff is supported. ActiveSync, the syning app for Windows and Pocket PCs is also included with each unit, and is available as a free download from Microsoft's www.pocketpc.com web site.

Palm OS PDAs can sync to Palm Desktop, which is a full-featured desktop PIM application or Outlook.. Many Palm OS PDAs come with Documents To Go, which is a very capable Office suite for Palm OS that allows you to work with Word, Excel and even PowerPoint files (see individual reviews to find out if Docs To Go comes with the PDA). Docs To Go supports more advanced formatting than does Microsoft's own Pocket Word and Excel! You can buy Documents To Go or one of the other Office suites for Palm separately if your PDA doesn't come with it.

Screens

Both current Pocket PCs and Palm OS PDAs have color screens (there are a few exceptions, such as the $99 palmOne Zire 21). Pocket PC screens are 320 x 240 pixels, and a few VGA models such as the HP iPAQ hx4700 , ASUS A730W and Dell Axim X50v came out in the Fall of 2004. Palm OS PDA screens come in a variety of resolutions: from the basic 160 x 160 pixel screen, all the way up to 320 x 480 on the Palm LifeDrive and Tungsten T5 PDAs. All Sony Clie models had either 320 x 320 or 320 x 480 pixel displays, and Sony pioneered higher resolution displays on Palm OS. All current PDA screens are viewable indoors and outdoors, though they do wash out in bright sunlight and look best indoors.

Other Competitors

If you're a Linux fan, you can check out the Sharp Zaurus SL-6000 and SL-C3000. These have specs similar to Pocket PCs (better in the case of the C3000), built-in thumb keyboards and run Linux. They don't have huge market share in the US, but nonetheless are fine units. Nokia communicators such as the Nokia 9500 and smartphones like the Nokia 7610 run Symbian OS, which has its roots in the Psion OS. Symbian Series 60 smartphones such as the 7610 and N-Gage QD are quite popular in Europe and are catching on here.

Want a Camera with That?

Sony Pioneered the idea of including a digicam (digital camera) in a PDA with the now discontinued Clié NR70V. In fact most Cliés had a camera. Current models with a 1/3 megapixel built-in VGA digital camera (640 x 480 max resolution) include theTreo 650 Palm smartphone and the , HP iPAQ 6315 Pocket PC phone. The HP iPAQ rx3715 Windows Mobile Pocket PC and the Palm Zire 72 have a 1.2MP digicam. The discontinued Sony Clié NZ90 had an even higher 2.1 megapixel (1200 x 1600) CCD digital camera and a flash. If you have a camera-less Pocket PC you can buy digicam CF or SD cards like the Veo and FlyCam.

Mobile Phone and Wireless Integration, Internet Access for Email and Web

In recent years, we've seen several Palm OS Smartphones and Pocket PC Phone Edition units hit the market (see this page for those reviewed on our site). These units marry a cell phone with a PDA, which means you can have all the benefits of a PDA and make phone calls and surf the web using one device. These convergence units are starting to catch on now that they've become less bulky and prices have dropped to $500- $600 (or less, depending on mobile carrier rebates and specials). The first smartphones were Palm OS and Symbian. Pocket PC Phone Edition came out in 2002. The Treo 650 is the hottest Palm OS smartphone and it's currently offered by all US carriers except T-Mobile. For Windows Mobile Pocket PC Phone Edition models, the Samsung i730 from Verizon, HP iPAQ 6315 from T-Mobile, Audiovox PPC-6601 from Sprint and the Siemens SX66 from Cingular are current and very popular. The good points are having all your info in one device and wide coverage for data access (email and web surfing). The drawbacks include: if you're a geek and like to upgrade your PDA frequently, you'll have to deal with the added complexity of changing phones frequently, PDA phones are larger than standard cell phones and battery runtimes are shorter (they need a charge every 1 to 2 days on average).

If you're interested in wireless services not provided by cellular carriers, such as Bluetooth or WiFi, then you've got several Pocket PC and Palm OS PDAs to choose from! Bluetooth: most current HP iPAQ models, Dell Axim X30 and X50 wireless models, palmOne Zire 72, Tungsten T3 and T5 and the Sony Clié UX 40 / UX50. WiFi: most current iPAQs, Palm LifeDrive and Tungsten C and the Sony Clie UX50 (discontinued). You can also buy WiFi CF cards and Bluetooth CF and SD cards for Pocket PCs. And you can buy Palm's SD WiFi card for select Palm brand PDAs.

You can get a traditional landline 56k modem (the kind that plugs into a phone jack via a phone line) for all current PDAs. These come in CF format for Pocket PC, Bluetooth for those PDAs with Bluetooth and IR pocketable modems for all PDAs.