PDA Reviews

The seller has my money, was supposed to ship by 11/27, sent him an email and he said he would ship by 12/2. No merchandise was ever received! It is now 1/6/03 and I still have not received anything.

The serial cradle is just as fast as the USB cradle! Very nice!

The serial cradle works just as well as the USB (only a little slower). Windows NT does not use USB ports. This cradle allows synch actions between NT and my Visor Edge. The cradle looks and feels just like the USB cradle. One-push button is all it takes to keep Outlook 2000 and the Edge in perfect synch.

My Jornada 547 pooped out in less than a day. It took the replacement over a month to become brainless. What a piece of trash. And returning it? Forget it, HP and the store owner both wouldn't let me send it back for a refund the second time.

However, all the peripheral equipment worked well. Too bad I can't use it.

If you are on the road, you need this item. If you charge at the office everyday or at home, you don't! Works well and is a high quality product.

I work as a business consultant and I usually travel by car to a city near hometown. I takes me two and a half hour to get there, meanwhile I connect my Jornada 458 to a cassette adapter and into the stereo, plug the DC adapter into the car lighter outlet and enjoy listening to my favorites mp3 songs or audible books of my preference

Otherwise, I think I'll run out of batteries on my Jornada

Got the pack for my HP Jornada 548. It is basically a peel-and-stick film. Firstly, its size is less than Jornada's screen - about 1 to 1.5 mm on each side. Secondly, the film has some sticky residue that was left on the screen after I removed it. I like the idea of a sticker as opposed to original HP's "clip-ins," but it could be worked better. When returned to Amazon, I was warned I'd be charged return shipping costs because "item did not fit my equipment" was my fault (!??). Not a biggie, but description could be clearer to avoid similar experiences. Again, my experience applies to Jornada 520/540 series PDAs.

I've got an Axim X5 and noticed that the screen size on this thing was exactly the same. They're WAY cheaper than the Dell brand ones, and they've worked great! Get some before you scratch your screen :)

These Screen Protectors work just as advertised...Definetly a great buy at a great price!!!

It has some compatibility problems with the SanDisc MMC that came with the MiniJam. I formated the disc and then I couldn't use it again! I kept getting fatal errors, even with the patch! Also, the 64MB on the MMC is only for music downloads. You cannot move files from your PDA to the MMC with the program provided. You can only use the 2MB of flash on the MiniJam module for PDA storage, which goes down to 1MB with the preloaded software. The MMC are also expensive. Better off with a MiniDisc player with cheap minidiscs than expensive MMC that store only about 10-15 songs per 68MB MMC. Not a value!!!!

I chose this MP3 player over the Sounds Good because it offers the Peanut Press Reader. I also found it at a better price. My only recommendation for this MP3 is that they should look into making something similar to the SoundsGood energy clip so that you can use it as a stand-alone unit, and you don't need to take your Visor with you. I think it is great and I love the different 'skins' it offers! However, as far as I can tell, you can only use the provided memory for music, not the peanut press books.

I would like to start off this review by letting everyone know that I was on Amazon.com when I was lokking for an mp3 player, tons of them were [...] priced and they didn't have the options I wanted! I happened to look over to the right of my screen and saw a recently reviewed item, WOW it was an mp3 player, so I checked it out, even though the price was out of my range. I printed out the information to compare it with the other I had chosen, and read the review for the Minijam...a five star review...and the only one on the page. Well I was dissapointed with the price of the MP3 player, but not all of the wonderfull features. At the point I was reading the technical data, I had no idea you needed a Visor to use the MINIJAM, I found this out later after I bought the thing on [...], but that did not bring my hopes down, it was a great product and I even found a brand new visor on Ebay. So I get the visor and the minjam in the mail and hook them up together and put all of my Mp3's I can onto it, then plug in the headphones they come with, those headphones are not good headphones, but I had some nice [$] Sony ones that worked great. But the design of the Minijam is nice and goes perfect with the visor the picture viewer and Peanut reader are very nice as well. The ability to turn off the visor while listing to mp3's is great when in school, or riding a bike, or working. But even better I was riding my bike at about 15mph and the visor slipped out of it's case (because of my own dumb fault) I was on a gravel road and taking a sharp turn, well the player and visor hit the ground at I only had a couple scratches and the minijam was still playing to perfection. The different settings on the minijam are very nice as well along with going from song to song. But the player looks very cool and the best thing is no one knows what they are! The memory cards are nice and it only takes about 10 minutes to Hotsync the mp3's onto the minijams 32mb cards that are very compact. Additional memory is a key to mp3's and the extra 2mb that the minijam provides for the visor will kepp you out of trouble with memory problems. Handspring did a great thing teaming up with Innogear. This product is nice, I got mine for [$], and the visor afterwords for [$]. Buy one you will not be let down. The sound quality is great and the ability to put new skins on the player always will let you expand onto better things.

Pros:
Excellent accuracy. On-screen maps. Waterproof and floats. Rugged. Big buttons. SD cards (add a card reader and save hours).

Cons:
Big & heavy. Buttons too easy to press accidentally. Serial connection (serial?! why not USB?). Screen hard to read in shadows. Messy menu navigation.

On a like-for-like comparison to other mapping handheld GPS this gets 5-stars. On the basis of what it could have been had Magellan really thought it through, it gets 2-stars.

I'd say this (and others like it) are the last of the 2nd generation GPS. Good for their time, but rapidly being obsoleted by developments in other areas. Expect to see a switch to a variety of GPS/PDA/phone/bluetooth/radio combos with much better integration into the wireless PC world coming in the next product cycle.

This was my first GPS. I ended up returning it. Here is my experience:
Cons:
(1) Difficult to use for driving even though it received signals very well. When I bought it I thought it was voice prompted. Actuall it was audio prompted, meaning that it beeps when it thinks you should make a turn.
(2) Rerouting is not automatic. You have to press a button. That's not convenient.
(3) screen is small and black and white. Looks primitive. For $450, I thought it should be better than that.

Pros:

(1) Does have detailed street level info when you load the CD.

The Meridian (h/w)/Direct Route (s/w) combination is the best value going today. It does *not* provide voice directions, but can be set to an audible beep when a turn approaches if desired. It is not color, but color does not really add much to a GPS anyway (and consimes more battery power), it is the resolution that counts and the Meridian is more than adequate.

The nice thing about this GPS is that you can use it in your car for turn-by-turn navigation, while hiking in the woods to keep track of where you are and how to get back, as well as on your bicycle etc. There are better specialized GPS units available (for instance ones for use specifically in a vehicle), but they lack the flexibility of the Meridian to use where you want to use it.

Finally, the Meridian can hold a lot of street level detail through the use of SD cards, where most, if not all, of the competition can only use the built-in memory supplied with the unit. I think you will find this to be a huge advantage when you find out how much you can store on these cards, and how limiting the built-in memory is.

This module/software does allows you add your own recipes, but they cannot be synchronized to your handheld. That version is read only. So your getting a cookbook for your visor but it's not your favorite recipes. If I had known this I wouldn't have bought it.

The thing I adore most is the ability to download recipes from web sites without having to retype them. While I'm sure there are computer programs that will do the same thing, the PDA keeps my work and home files matched and is great to have at the store (for example, when there's something on sale and I need a recipe). The computer program prints out recipes or shopping lists which I use to save battery power. The PDA, of course, is helpful for adding items to the list when walking down the street, watching tv, etc. Finally, the module saves the PDA's memory for other programs. Now if only they'd make one for wine records...

This is a Great Product! I buy a lot of cookbooks and I've purchased cooking software in the past, but being able to carry this around with you on your Visor is really convenient. This product gives you thousands of recipes, but the best feature by far is the shopping list. When you choose recipes, the exact amount of ingredients required are added to your shopping list automatically. I would highly recommend this product.

First off, if you have Quicken on a PC, have only one account on it just for you, and want EVERYTHING in Quicken on your Palm then this might work for you. But then there's the rest of us...

My girfriend saw me using Quicken 2003 and asked if they made something similar for Palm. I was surprised to see that they did! She doesn't use a PC for anything except internet. Everything else is on her Palm. So I brought her Palm to work to install PQ only to have it ask for the quickenw file. Great! Now I find out that's not a standalone app. I look on the box and sure enough it says it's a, "Companion" to Quicken. So after a few minutes I talk my girlfriend into using Quicken on my PC. Finally she concedes and we set up an account for her. OK! So I hotsync with PQ only to discover...that there's MY account also on her Palm. WTF? I delete it from PQ and resync - there it is again! I come to find out that you can't choose what accounts get uploaded to PQ. It's all or nothing. OR - you can, "hide" your main Quicken account and have PQ, "omit" it which is terribly inconvenient. Give me a break. For the $40 we paid this thing is a joke. It should have the option to standalone for that price, but to not be able to choose accounts is a travesty. This software is half-baked IMO and should be avoided unless you fall into that first rare group.

I have been a Quicken user for so long I can't even remember when I started using it! I purchased my PQ with a gift certificate I was given, but even if I had to spend my own money, I'd be just as happy with this product!

I absolutely love the pocket companian app in PQ! For those of you who want the ease of entering info as it happens, instead of trying to hold on to receipts until you get back on your pc, pocket quicken is your answer!

It was so easy to load, and very easy to use. Manual, what manual? Never read it!

Hope it works as well for you as it does for me.

To the first reviewer I'd say, you're probably the one in the minority. I'd bet the majority of PQ users are already Quicken users dealing with one person/household set of accounts. I hope you don't dissuade too many users from trying this great product.

PS: My favorite feature is the password protection you get on your PDA, just in case wandering eyes or a lost PDA befall you.

I've been a user of Quicken for 5 years now and I'm addicted to tracking my finances through it. When I bought my Pocket PC 4 months ago, I wanted to use it to track my finances also, but it was too expensive at the retail stores. When it finally dropped a few bucks, I decided to try it. I'm mainly wanted it to track the cash I'm spending because in my business I deal with a lot of cash transactions and it's too easy to spend the cash without tracking it and it's a total pain to sit down at a computer with a pocket full of reciepts.

Just like other software, I popped in the CD followed the instructions and everything loaded onto my Pocket PC with the greatest of ease. All of my transactions (the last 3 months), account information, memorized transactions, everything. I printed off the intructions and I'm off and running. Seriously easy to use, I'm just amazed.

If you like to use Quicken, and have a Pocket PC, this software is a MUST have! I absolutely don't regret spending the money on it now.

This cover looks nice for the first week, then winds up getting dented EASILY!!!!

Buy if your VERY careful

It's a fairly basic product - the only reason you would but it is to spruce up your Pocket PC. I would just caution that the color is not really navy blue at all. It is more of a metallic dark purple.

The only thing I disliked about my HP Jornada 525 when I first bought it was that there was no place on the device to put the stylus, and there was no cover for the screen. This cover corrected all of that. Before I bought the cover, I read other reviews for it that said it didn't fit right on their Jornada 520, but I had no problems installing it. It works and looks great, and fits in my pocket easily. As the last person who reviewed this said, it is more of a dark, metallic purple, but it still looks good.

The major problem with this unit is that the top is always a little bit loose and needs to be tightened once in a while.

Bottom Line: Not really necessary to dig into your pocket to buy this one. It's about the same as the original stylus came with the palm unit.

If functionality was everything this stylus would get a higher rating. I got this stylus on the strength of the first review, but the bright(!) silver styling contrasts poorly with the matte surface of my Vx. if aesthetics are important to you, you may want to wait for a matte version. Another product, the Palm combo stylus/inkpen has its faults but it has a great matte surface and looks terrific flush against the Vx.

this stylus sticks out like a chrome thumb.

The Palm V Custom Deluxe Stylus (Chrome) from PDA Panache is a grest replacement for the metal/plastic styli that came with your Palm V.

The Chrome is a durable electroplated finish. While fitted into the Palm V, the fit is perfect and the tolerance is very small giving it a very snug fit. It does not matter whether it is fit into the right or left stylus slot.

The additional weight of this stylus makes writing easier due to better balance. The shape of the stylus is in an ergonomically pleasing hourglass shape. The barrel is thinner near the bottom where your fingers would be. The thinner area also has grooves that keep the stylus from slipping from your grip. The top of the stylus has a rounded cap. There is also a bulge near the top of the stylus. It is considerable easier to remove the stylus than the original stylus that came with my Palm V.

The best part of this stylus is the screen-safe EasyView orange writing tip which is injection molded from 100% virgin DuPont Delrin. This tip is considerably more smooth than writing with the original Palm V styli and the orange tip is extremly visible.

I really love this stylus. I picked up the original stylus the other day and I just completely forgot how it felt. It just does not feel as right in my hand anymore. If you start using this stylus, you will never want to go back.

Pros: Very attractive styling Fits in both stylus slots. Great writing tip. Lifetime free tip repair.

Cons:

None

Gun metal? Within a month of purchase, the pen snapped in half while in my pocket. I was AMAZED since they are so proud of it being gun metal. I am sending the pen back and will update this post when I hear what they say.

The Platinum Pen Executive is a beautiful instrument. It is solidly constructed, well-balanced and has a luxurious feel to it. The pen, pencil and stylus are equally well-designed and are joy to use.

I only have two nitpicks about this product. The mechanical pencil can only hold one lead at a time, so when you're out of lead, you're out of luck as well. The other gripe has to do with the teensy eraser under the cap.

However, those are minor gripes compared to the overall quality of the product. It was worth the [money] I paid for it last year, and is a bargain at the current price.

I agree with the previous review about only one pencil lead at a time and the eraser, however, I have yet to find a 'nice' mechanical pencil with a worthwhile eraser. The pen works great and I am going to order another as, unfortunately, my first one was lost.