[finknottle]

I have never had a PDA before but think that is something that I would find useful. I have about €500-550 to spend and am going to Sacramento CA in two weeks so I hope to get one there (tax in Rep of Ireland is 21%). I would like to get one that has the Palm OS.It would be nice to play mp3's on it (I know memory capacity is small), I also have some audible books. My hardware is an iBook 800mhz with d-link and a t68i phone.
Models I have looked at online are
Palm Tungsten, Sony Clie PEG NR70V (flip over mobile phone design) and PEG T675C.
Which one would be the best to go for? Is there much of a difference between Palm OS 4.1 and 5? Do they all work with iSync - apple website says "Sony Clie Models" for compatibility so is there no need for Missing Sync? Is there any other models that you would recommend?

Final question - where would be a good place to go in Sacramento to buy one?

I have bought my phone and digital cameras from recommendations on this forum and have not been dissappointed yet
Thanks in advance,

[geekwagon]

Originally posted by finknottle:
I have never had a PDA before but think that is something that I would find useful. I have about €500-550 to spend and am going to Sacramento CA in two weeks so I hope to get one there (tax in Rep of Ireland is 21%). I would like to get one that has the Palm OS.It would be nice to play mp3's on it (I know memory capacity is small), I also have some audible books. My hardware is an iBook 800mhz with d-link and a t68i phone.
Models I have looked at online are
Palm Tungsten, Sony Clie PEG NR70V (flip over mobile phone design) and PEG T675C.
Which one would be the best to go for? Is there much of a difference between Palm OS 4.1 and 5? Do they all work with iSync - apple website says "Sony Clie Models" for compatibility so is there no need for Missing Sync? Is there any other models that you would recommend?

Final question - where would be a good place to go in Sacramento to buy one?

I have bought my phone and digital cameras from recommendations on this forum and have not been dissappointed yet
Thanks in advance,

I have owned all three of the PDA's you mention. I am kind of a junky. BTW, the 675 is the European name for what is known as the T665C in the US(same unit different name.)

The NR70 was a great unit, but the hinge broke on me in about 6 months. It's also nowhere near as snappy as the NX due to using the slower Dragonball processor compared to the ARM in the new NX. In my experience, any of the Clie's which have MP3 players (both of the units you mention) will NOT work with isync without a seperate piece of software from Mark/space called "the Missing Sync." Units like the 615 without an MP3 player work fine though.

I currently use the Tungsten. I like it better than any of the other options out there because it is so FAST. Things just happen instantly on it. Here is a list of the features that makes this PDA stand head and shoulders above the rest for me:

• Bluetooth so I can browse the web with my T68i
• Awesome D-Pad and the software has been built to utilize it
• Uses SD cards instead of Memory sticks

One of the nice features of the Palm Web Pro browser is that it goes through a compressing proxy server. I can browse for days with this thing and I hardly use any data. It transfers less data browsing the real web then using WAP directly from the phone! I found that amazing.

The D-pad is awesome, you don't realize how cool it is until you realize you can use the whole unit one handed until you need to graffitti something. I really impress people when they see me browsing my address book with one hand and dialing my phone which is in the other Oh, and just today the price dropped from USD$499 to USD$399.

One downside to the TUngsten is that it is a bit crashier than previous PalmOS units I have used. Mostly when using older os4 apps or heavy bluetooth usage. Still less crashy than the iPAQ I used to have.

Anyway, this is getting long. But you can see where my preference lies.

[tooki]

Apple says that Clies require the Missing Sync (TMS).

I have a PEG-T665C (the U.S. version of the T675C) and I love it.

Yes, you'll need TMS, but it works great. Note that I don't use iSync, I rely on good old Palm Desktop.

tooki

[engaged]

Apple says that Clies require the Missing Sync (TMS)

Not all of them - could be worth trying before getting TMS. The SJ Series doesn't need it. Admittedly, I don't know which others don't, nor if you're considering an SJ anyway; sounds like you aren't.

[finknottle]

Thanks for the info. I think from what has been said especially Mr. Geekwagon (the PDA junkie ), I will go for the Tungsten. Does theis PDA have a mp3 player. I remember reading somewhere (at least I think I did) that Palm OS5 does not have a mp3 player...is there a third party solution?
Is Comp USA, which I hear a lot about in these forums the best place to go in California or is there a Mac reseller that sells PDA's in San Francisco or Sacramento?

Thanks again for the help!!

[geekwagon]

Originally posted by finknottle:
Thanks for the info. I think from what has been said especially Mr. Geekwagon (the PDA junkie ), I will go for the Tungsten. Does theis PDA have a mp3 player. I remember reading somewhere (at least I think I did) that Palm OS5 does not have a mp3 player...is there a third party solution?
Is Comp USA, which I hear a lot about in these forums the best place to go in California or is there a Mac reseller that sells PDA's in San Francisco or Sacramento?

There is a software MP3 player out there. I believe it is called Aeroplayer. Unfortunately the sound is really bad right now but according to people on the various Palm forums I hang out at that will be fixed by a software patch in the next couple of weeks. One of the developers who work on the MP3 player said he had a beta of the patch and it sounds good. So we'll see.

As for where to buy it, it probably doesn't matter much. CompUSA is good, so is Best Buy. If you were going to be keeping it in the US I would recommend Best Buy simply because their extended warranty plan is better and cheaper than CompUSAs. I break my PDAs all the time so that is a concern for me

Be sure not to pay more than $399 for it though, as that is Palms new MSRP but not all of the dealers have gotten the message yet.