Palm Before the PalmPilot 143
Gammu writes "SiliconUser has an in-depth history of the Palm, starting with its humble roots. The Pilot (later PalmPilot and finally just Palm) saved Palm Computing. Before the release of the Pilot, the company was subsisting (barely) on revenue from connectivity packages for HP PDA's and a version of Graffiti for the Newton. This was because its first PDA hardware product had failed under the weight of feature creep and design by committee. The first article in a series follows the early days of this company-reforming product."
Great thingies (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:I miss Visor (Score:3, Interesting)
Sent to palm 3 times at my own expense; they claim there's nothing wrong with it.
In addition, there's a lot of noise coming from the amplifier in the unit - using it with 32 ohm headphones (which most consumer headphones are at) is very very noisy.
All in all, I really loved the unit; the web browser worked well and it played divx/xvid movies with ease. But once you've heard the squeal, it can drive you nuts. Wish I could find a solution. There's a software package out there that is 20$ that is an overclocking utility (warpspeed?) that has the ability to eliminate 95% of the screen noise, but I hadn't dug into my wallet to fix it. I shouldn't have to spend more money to enjoy a product my wife got me for my birthday......
Re:I miss Visor (Score:4, Interesting)
To be fair, the iPaq 1945 series with an earlier version of Windows Mobile was much, much better. I believe today nobody at Microsoft or HP actually uses PocketPCs. Everything has gone over to cellphones, leaving those of us who still need a non-phone PDA for whatever reason (generally, security policies) almost high and dry. I guess they have to follow the market, but I wish they would at least not advertise and ship stuff that doesn't work.
The Zoomer and Pam Vx....mmmmmm. (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Great thingies (Score:2, Interesting)
This afternoon I disassembled, resurrected, and reassembled my Palm IIIc with no problems at all, after it sat in a drawer for three years.
Excellent design that the product can be opened and closed, including battery replacement, with no problem at all and using standard screws. Glad to have my IIIc back, and must admit that I should have never dropped in 2meters onto concrete.
Almost like Woz pining for early days... (Score:5, Interesting)
Now, I do appreciate the greater flexibility of Windows mobile devices, and prefer it over the palm, but the speed, elegance, battery life, and so on, just aren't there. Too bad we can't have the best of both of these worlds...
Awful Article (Score:5, Interesting)
Man, for once I read TFA and what do I get? A barely coherent, unedited swamp of words. Did anyone else find this article a slog to read?
It's never explained what Touchdown is. It's never explained what the "secure feature" is. I'm assuming Touchdown is the orginal name for what was to become the Pilot. But I don't really know. The word is just used suddenlty out without preamble, as if it had been previously introduced.
How about the following:
Perhaps it's just me, but the whole article read like the above excerpt.
Really? Zero to 95% accuracy? That's pretty, uh, fucking awful. Somehow I doubt that's what Macword published.
Wow, spelling mistake and redundancy in the same sentence.
See how the second sentence here should not follow the first? It should have followed the sentence preceeded the excerpt. This kind of construction left me rereading the same few lines several times over.
Guess that woulda bin bad fer bidness.
Hey Silicon User, hire a fucking editor!
Re:I miss Visor (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Great thingies (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:I miss Visor (Score:3, Interesting)
Palm fixed the connection under warranty, apparently by replacing the entire front half of the unit.
Ever since then (it's been about 3 years), it has been totally silent. So, clearly, not -every- unit has this problem, and it can be fixed.