You can read more about it at VAIO Direct. Well, I have to say that I wasn't expecting this announcement at all and neither were many of the other PDA sites. At any rate, we've been talking about this PDA for some time now and it recently released in Japan with no timeframe on when it was coming to the United States. Well, it's here! Of course, noticeably absent is the color version. Reports are stating that the PEG-S500C won't be coming until next year. Oh well. You can blame the component shortages for that one, I'm sure. The device definitely looks cool, and if you're curious to see what it looks like from all sides check out Sony's CLIE site. It features an interactive Flash presentation that lets you twirl the PDA around.

Two more days - Only two more days left to register to win a Revo and an IR Travel Modem. The giveaway is in honor of PDAGeek turning one. The response has been amazing so far. I'll report on final numbers after the winner has been drawn.

Psion's new Revo - Since word leaked out the other day from Revoworld that Psion is going be releasing a new 16 MB Revo the world has been quiet. From what I understand, there is a press event that will feature a new product from Psion on September 5th in the U.K. That's about all that is being said, though. One can only assume that's for the new Revo. Hopefully my friends at Psion will give me some information that I can leak. Chances are they won't, though, as I heard that the information that Revoworld received landed the "leak" in some serious hot water. At any rate, I'll have more information when I can get my hands on it.

Who's getting GPRS? - Believe it or not, the Indian state of Mumbai is about to get GPRS courtesy of Motorola. According to AllNetDevices, Motorola was just awarded the contract for getting GPRS up and running in the "near future." I've been hearing that there are many foreign nations that have better technology than the United States and this article just proves that point. Makes sense, though. There's less competition in foreign countries and one big contract could wire the whole place!

Internet World goes Wireless - Penton Media, the company that puts on a number of different trade shows (including Internet World), announced that it has created Internet World Wireless. The new tradeshow will be held February 21-23, 2001, at the Jacob Javits Convention Center in NYC. According to reports, the event will feature applications of wireless systems for just about any environment. In addition, MIT Media Labs will be an honored participant. Now we're talking! The last Internet World bored the heck out of me. At least now I can go to an event that will only show off the latest and greatest wireless technology. Let's hope that Ericsson and others come out with all the cool stuff that they normally reserve for events like PCExpo. It looks like there won't be much left for PCExpo, actually, now that a tradeshow for just wireless has been created.

Oh no, not Liberty! - The hype of the Liberty "virus" continues and now Symantec has rushed to proudly announce that Norton AntiVirus protects against "Palm.Liberty.A." Heh. Symantec even gave it its own name. Anyway, it's a serious threat but I still haven't heard of anyone being infected by it. I can't believe the positive spin that Aaron managed to put on the "virus" that he created and accidentally leaked to the world.

Read PDF on your Palm now - PMN is reporting that Ansyr Technology has announced the first PDF reader for the Palm. While there are many conversion programs coming to market that allow you to view a PDF on your Palm, this is the first application that allows you to view the actual PDF in its native format. I took a quick look at Ansyr's site and found no mention of the Palm application--it looks like we beat them to it. The company currently offers its "Primer" product for viewing PDFs on WindowsCE and Pocket PC platforms. The current version sells for $49.95 so my guess is that the Palm one will be priced accordingly.

Yet another new Pocket PC - PDABuzz sent word of a new Pocket PC coming to market. This time it's the P6M from Palmax. The device features a grayscale display, 16 or 32 MB of RAM, an MMC slot, 18-bit stereo, USB connectivity, a 206 MHz Intel CPU, and an integrated 56K modem. The device is expected to be available in October of this year. No word yet on price. Being the curious type, I clicked on the "back" link on the page on the Palmax site and found a nice pic and information on the PD-131! This Pocket PC features a digital camera, 131 MHz CPU, 64K TFT Display, 32 MB RAM, a CF slot, and more! It sounds like some very cool devices are coming from Palmax.

Casio EM-500 Pocket PC reviewed - eWeek has a review of the EM-500. The EM-500 is Casio's latest foray into the Pocket PC market and sports a faster processor and a smaller form factor than previous Casios. It also sports a slot for MMC (MultiMediaCard). The review brings you up to speed on this latest release from Casio but still makes me hunger to play with the iPAQ. I'm also wary of built-in support for MMC considering how many different standards are coming, including the SD (Secure Digital) format which Palm and others have already said they'll support. The review is worth the read if you're interested in keeping up with the latest Pocket PCs.

PalmInfoCenter reviews - PalmInfoCenter has two reviews to tempt you with. The first is of a new product that is currently "hand-made" called the Majeck. The device fits into the spare stylus silo on your Palm V and features an elastic that allows you to hold the Palm V in the "Palm" of your hand. It's an interesting concept and the review features pics and a little history of the device. There's also a review of the first case that I've seen that will hold both the Palm and the OmniSky attachment at once. There are some nice pics in that review as well.

Wireless devices could spread virii - ZDNET has an interesting article that talks about how PDAs and other wireless devices could spread viruses. It's an interesting read and ends by talking about how Bluetooth could really help spread them. I tend to agree and disagree. Right now there's a lot of hype surrounding viruses and wireless devices. By design, wireless devices don't have the same sophistication that PCs do as far as automation, etc. and as a result won't spread viruses as easily. However, eventually a wireless device has to come in contact with a PC, and at that point all bets are off!

Posted Tuesday, August 29 -- joel@geek.com
PDA Horror - We've got some new stories of PD(estruction)A problems for you today in the PDA Horror Stories section. Read about Visors, Palms, and Psions in all manifestations of troublemaking. There are some happy endings in the mix, though, so you won't get too depressed if you read them all. If you've had problems with your PDA, let us know.

16 MB Revo? - Revoworld is reporting that an ad was spotted in Belgium for a Revo+ (plus). According to Revoworld, the ad was advertising a 16 MB Revo. I had a feeling that a 16 MB Revo was in the works. I don't know why the ads are popping up in Belgium, though. Meanwhile, I'm still holding out for all the cool stuff coming from Psion in November. I hear that a number of the products shown off at CeBIT are coming out in November. I've also been told that whatever product is coming (16 MB Revo, perhaps?) I'll be getting one to play with moments after it's announced. If it's just another 8 MB on the Revo that's not that exciting to test, but perhaps Psion will include more software in the ROM, too? EpocCity also claims to have pics and details on the new device and will be publishing it here when it's allowed to do so. Again, if it's just a 16 MB Revo, I could put the pics up right now. :) I'm sure it's more than just MB. If I were to speculate I'd guess that it also includes some sort of secure browsing, since Psion recently announced deals with banks in the U.K. Psion wouldn't do something like what Palm did and just add memory to an existing device and hail it as "new." Ouch--Palm slam there.

Fun with your mobile phone - Simon wrote in with news that he purchased a Nokia 8210 and downloaded a piece of software called LogoManager. According to Simon, in addition to letting you change your logo, the software lets you activate the hidden "Net Monitor" menu on the phone and do cool techie stuff like accessing test cells, bypassing normal cell switching, and more. If only I had found that app when I was testing out the Nokia 8290 for our review. That would have been very cool.

Interview with Hawkins - I reported earlier on the interview that Red Herring had with Jeff Hawkins. Well, now everyone is taking their own little pieces from that chat log and reporting on them, so I figured I'd give you the link and you could take your own pieces. The most reported piece is that cellphone capabilities are coming by the end of the year for the Visor. This is sort of news in that it's the first time that a release timeframe was announced, but those of you who remember life before the Visor should also remember that when the Visor was first in development news leaked about a microphone being built-in, and at the time Handspring said that it was for a future mobile phone attachment.

First trojan horse for Palm? - The media is having a field day with the Liberty "hack" that we reported on yesterday. Apparently, reports are now calling it the first Trojan horse to appear for the Palm platform. CNET, ZDNET, and others have already written cover stories about it. My guess is that InfoWorld and eWeek will have detailed stories next week, too. Meanwhile, Ardiri, the creator of the "virus," has written a Windows program that can detect the Liberty "hack" on your PC and remove it. You can download it here. The download also includes the original source to Ardiri's Liberty hack virus checker program. By the way, if you're infected (and you might be since it's pretty easy to change the name that the program shows up as) you should HotSync with "Desktop Overwrites Handheld" set and you should be back in business. You can bet that we'll be seeing versions of a Palm virus built on "Crack 1.1" (Ardiri's virus). Now we'll just have to wait and see how many sprout up and how quickly other anti-virus companies build detections for them. At this point Ardiri is probably being offered jobs with Palm software companies, or maybe even Palm itself. He somehow is managing to put a positive spin on the fact that he released the first-ever Palm virus into the wild.

Chat with the other Liberty developer - While Aaron Ardiri is getting all the press, Michael Ethetton (Maven) of Gambit Studios will be talking it up in the #palm channel on efnet this Friday. Maven was the original author of Liberty before it was ever called Liberty. Hopefully the chat will focus more on the future of Liberty and not the Liberty "hack." You can join the chat via IRC or use PalmInfoCenter's chat client.

Win a Series 7 - Googol.net sent word that its August competition to win a Series 7, software, and Palm-Tec cases is just about over. There's still time, though, so click here and answer 6 questions to qualify.

Acer's PDA a Palm? - According to an article at AsiaBizTech, Acer has completed the hardware design of its PDA and is now waiting for authorization from Palm to use the software in its Chinese version. We reported on Acer's PDA back in June and wondered why Acer would try to make a PDA with its own proprietary OS. It would appear that Acer was wondering the same thing and is now trying to build it with PalmOS inside. If Acer fails to receive authorization it is also still considering @vis or even Linux to power its PDA.

Start that query from your PDA - TechWeb is reporting that a new piece of software called "Parallel Publisher" that makes it easier to connect Web applications to mobile devices will begin beta testing next month. The software is from a company called iConverse. The company does work with speech recognition, too, so it will be interesting to see what other products come out of it. At my last "salaried" job, I had to write and run macros for a series of processes. It would have been great to have the ability to receive notification that the query was done and then have the ability to start the next one from my PDA while out at lunch.

More PDAs less PDAs - ZDNET has an article that talks about how more PDAs are coming to market at a time when there is a significant component shortage. It's an interesting point and one that I've been thinking about lately, too. I'm sure that in the labs of Palm, Handspring, Psion, and Pocket PC manufacturers there are engineers figuring out ways to use different parts that none of the other PDA manufacturers are using. That's probably why we saw the use of a plastic digitizer for the latest Palm. I have a feeling that Palm is testing that in the market and will probably roll it out in more devices in the future, too.

How Donna Dubinsky really feels - In a recent interview with Donna Dubinsky, CNET asks her a number of things about the PDA market. It's an interesting read because Donna has been in the PDA game since before there was a PDA. My favorite part, though, is the explanation of why Microsoft still isn't doing it right: "They're doing everything right for a different business. It's like they're playing a great game of tennis, but the problem is that they're all on a golf course. " It gets even better, and ends on this: ". . . but it's still Windows, which is too big and a processor hog." I now have a newfound respect for Donna. Lest you think she only slams Microsoft, here's what she said about the Palm m100: ". . . there's really nothing of substance in the product. So as a style statement, it's interesting." Ouch! Seriously though, it's definitely worth reading. One more thing: she also teases about a full line of products in the works from Handspring. I've been hearing that one since before I ever knew what a Visor was.

PDF to go - DataViz has announced that it will license technology from Adobe to add Adobe PDF to the list of formats that it converts for viewing on PalmOS handhelds. I'd love to see a solution that converts just about anything from PC to Palm. It looks like DataViz is working on that.

The eBooks are coming! - Amazon announced that it has inked a deal to offer eBooks in Microsoft's Reader format. In addition, Amazon will have a custom version of Microsoft's Reader software available for download. In other eBook news, Adobe announced that it has purchased Glassbook Inc., a developer of software for distributing and viewing digital books. You can read more about this in today's news item. While I'm happy that eBooks are gaining more support, I still have some troubles with Microsoft's format being forced down our throats, and the overall concept of paying high-prices for the digital version of a paper-based book.

Posted Monday, August 28 -- joel@geek.com
Let's discuss! - I mentioned on Friday that the new PDAGeek Message Parlor is now operational. Please check it out and let me know what you think.

Only four days left! - There are only four days left to register to win a Revo and an IR Travel Modem. Time is running out!

Revo $299 again? - I was browsing through the advertisements in the Boston Sunday Globe and came across a CompUSA ad featuring the Revo for $299. According to the ad, the Revo is selling for $399.99 but then there's a $100 price break. In addition, CompUSA also shows the IR Travel Modem (which works with other PDAs, too) for $129.99 with a $30 "Instant Savings" and a $100 manufacturer's mail-in rebate. Basically, the Revo is $299 and the modem is FREE (eventually). It looks like now's the time to pick up a Revo! If you can part with $100 and wait for the rebate to come back, you get a Revo and an IR Travel modem all for $299. WOW! I reported on rumors of a product launch from Psion coming September 5th in the UK but so far I've only heard that it's a new PDA. No word on what that is or when it's coming to the United States. One more thing: the Psion 5mx has also dropped in price. It's now $499.99 ($50 price break). You can check out the deals online here (about 3/4 of the way down the page).

Liberty scare explained - On Friday I reported that a program was circulating that appeared to be a "hack" for Liberty. Instead, the "hack" would significantly hurt your Palm. Well, it turns out that the "hack" was actually written by one of the coders of Liberty himself. According to Aaron Ardiri, the person who coded the "hack," it was not intended for distribution and he suffered a lapse in judgment and released it to a couple of people and then tried to stop the release. Apparently, Aaron had written the application initially to hurt people who thought they were getting a "hack" program that would let them use Liberty for free. There are now a number of other rumors floating around but the gist is that people are now afraid of anything with the GambitStudios name on it. You can read more about it at PalmStation. It's interesting to see what people are writing and what the Palm community is feeling as a result of this. Imagine a respected Palm author releasing something in the wild that could hurt your Palm. At any rate, I've seen some of Ardiri's anti-hacking techniques in the past. He goes a long way to develop technology so that programs can't be "hacked" and developers can get the money they rightfully deserve. Now we'll have to wait and see how this "lapse" in judgment will affect the future sales of any products from GambitStudios. I think that he should fully disclose the whole ordeal on the front page of GambitStudios and then people will trust him again.

Upgrade your Palm m100 yourself - If you're feeling particularly handy, this site has instructions in English on how to upgrade your Palm m100 to 8 MB. I'm a pretty handy guy but I'm not sure if I'd trust myself to do any upgrade on a device that I need daily. Thanks to PalmStation for the link.

iPAQ review - PDABuzz has posted a review of the Compaq iPAQ. The reviewer really liked the device and even says that he/she is carrying around the iPAQ more than the Palm IIIc. It's an interesting review and talks a lot about the overall functionality and form factor of the device. I tend to agree with all of the author's points, having read many reviews of the device--we also have an iPAQ in the labs currently. I also like the fact that the review was written by a Palm lover. It's a nice perspective. The only problem that I see with the iPAQ is its lack of availability.

Yet another m100 review - The Gadgeteer has posted a review of the m100. It's a great review that features a lot of pics and comparisons to existing Palm devices. In the end she recommends going with a Visor but she does a great job of explaining all of the different features of the Palm m100. She also mentions a button being on the HotSync cable. This is the first I've heard of that and I think it's a great idea! I played with the m100 not too long ago and even beamed a Tetris-like app from another display model to the Palm m100. I'm still mixed on the device, since it's really aimed at kids.

What's your SAR? - Mobile phone manufacturers have confirmed that they plan to start labeling the packages of mobile phones with the devices' SAR (specific absorption rates) rating. If you don't know, the SAR rating is the measurement of the amount of radiation being emitted from the mobile phone. We reported on this a while ago but this is the first official confirmation that also talks about the manufacturers waiting for a standard to be developed. While I'm excited that the rating will exist, I'm a little disturbed that it will be placed on the packaging. After all, I never see the packaging in a mobile phone store. Normally you only see the phones sitting on their perches and the packaging doesn't come until you plunk down your credit card. I think that the manufacturers should be forced to label the phone itself and not just the packing. Anyway, I'm glad that there's going to be a standard that all phone manufacturers will have to adhere to. Of course, there will still be many older phones in use that don't have a specific SAR rating. You can read more at Mercury Center.

GPRS phones coming before the network - Motorola has announced that its Internet GPRS (General Packet Radio Services) mobile phone is expected to be available in the last quarter of this year, much earlier than other mobile phone makers. It seems that there's a race to get the GPRS phone to market. Meanwhile, the network that supports the phone may not be ready for at least a few months after the phones hit. This should be interesting. I'm definitely excited about the GPRS network coming, though. You can read more about Motorola's announcement here.

How well can you see the Revo? - Mike wrote in wondering if the Revo's screen can be seen on an airplane at night with just the ambient light of the main cabin. Since I haven't tried to use my Revo with just ambient light, I'll bow to the readers for the answer on this one. Let us know.

PDF to Palm - Aportis Technologies has announced that it is offering a new product that will convert Adobe PDF (Portable Document Format) docs to the AportisDoc format on a Palm. The product will be free for the next 6 months and is expected to sell for $14.95 after that. You can read more about it and download the application here. I love this announcement. Aportis could have made some money on the new program but instead decided to give it away for free for six months. This is the way to get your format to become the standard. Way to go, Aportis!

Voicestream to buy more - Voicestream is reportedly in talks to acquire Powertel for approximately $5.8 billion in stock. The deal would give Voicestream more GSM coverage and an additional 720,000 subscribers. You can read more about it in today's news item. While I love the fact that GSM is becoming more prevalent in the United States, I fear that Voicestream will hurt its acquisition by Deutsche Telekom if it continues its buying spree of GSM providers. After all, the government won't stand for the only GSM provider in the United States belonging to a foreign company.

Posted Friday, August 25 -- joel@geek.com
Case time! - If you own a PDA and are afraid of looking too Geeky, we have a review of a case that's made of high quality leather and can be easily mistaken for a wallet instead of a PDA case. :) The Handheld Zip Executive PDA Case is priced right and looks great, too.

New Message Parlor! - I finally did what I've been promising for a long time now. Yesterday I spent a considerable amount of time reorganizing the PDAGeek Message Parlor. Please take a look at it and let me know what you think!

Newsletter - I've been using and following PDAs and cellphones for a while now, and I have to tell you that as the line between the two gets fuzzier, I sometimes forget what PDAs were supposed to do when they first came out. Read my thoughts on the subject of what PDAs are really for--and what we should expect of them--in today's newsletter. You should've received it in your e-mailbox already unless you're not signed up to get it ... in which case, SIGN UP! :)

Revo troubles explained - I reported yesterday about having some issues with programs on my Revo after doing some random deleting. Well, it turns out that I'm not alone in my experience and that many of our readers have gone through similar experiences. Thankfully, we have a very technical following and as a result I was inundated with explanations of why the problem occurred and how to correct it. It turns out that when you install an application, it leaves a "stub" with the same name in your \system\install directory. The Revo (or other EPOC devices) then uses the application stub to determine whether or not the program exists and can be uninstalled. Apparently, the applications should have been fine but for some reason corrupted. I remember when I was deleting them I first checked their file size. I was under the impression that they were not that large and therefore could be deleted. Oops! Live and learn. By the way, if you did this to yourself and still want to uninstall an app, you can manually delete it from \system\apps\whatever program. If only it were that easy on a PC!

More free space on your Revo - Bernard wrote in with word that he soft reset his Revo and suddenly went from having 200 KB left (before soft reset) to having 700 KB left. It sounds to me like he had some sort of rogue program running that the soft reset cleaned out. Anyone have any ideas? Talk about it.

Palm upgrades in the United States - If you're tired of your Palm's memory limitations STNE Corporation may have the solution for you. STNE is currently offering 8 MB upgrade packages for the following Palms: Palm V, Palm m100, Palm III, Palm IIIx, Palm IIIe, and even the Handspring Visor. Basically, for $230 ($150 for the unit; $80 for the upgrade) you can be the first on your block to have a Palm m100 with 8 MB! Cool stuff. Remember, this procedure voids your warranty!

Psion rumors - It's that time of year again. Every once in a while rumors start flying about Psion. I've been hearing that some amazing things are coming at Comdex, but today I received a message from Steve telling me that Psion is going to launch a new product on September 5th in the U.K. I also received another rumor about a 32 MB Revo coming. My Psion contacts won't confirm nor deny (big surprise) but my guess is that it's probably an upgrade to some existing device--the Revo, perhaps? The cool stuff is coming at Comdex and I can't wait!

iPAQ can read - Chris sent in word that Compaq is apparently developing a "sleeve" for the iPAQ that will scan in pages of text and just about anything else. Apparently, it will support character recognition, too. I wonder if you'll be able to run it over a picture and have that picture appear on your PDA? Very cool stuff. I love hearing about advancements like this. I bet you'll be able to swipe your iPAQ over those new bar-coded newspapers and instantly go to that webpage, too.

Linux on a PDA - PDABuzz's latest "question of the week" is asking how viable Linux is on a PDA. It's an interesting question and I'm sure that everyone has his or her own opinion. I have a feeling that Linux on a PDA will sell really well once it finally hits the market. There are many geeks out there who would love to have their beloved Linux on their beloved PDA. In addition, Linux will eventually be transparent, so you could have a pretty front-end with a powerful Linux back-end. In that case, many people would kill for a Linux PDA.

Americans DO use WAP! - AllNetDevices is reporting that Hollywood.com had 1.3 million wireless page views in July for its WAP pages. According to reports, users can lookup movie showtimes via ZIP code and state, read movie reviews, and more. I can't remember which phone companies inked deals with Hollywood.com but it makes sense to me that people would be using it. I'm definitely a fan of the movies and the ability to look up showtimes from anywhere is a good thing. Long live WAP! :)

Coola is still cool! - Our own Jen Edwards has defected and put a review of Coola up on her DFW Palm User Group's site. Seriously though, it's a good review and takes you through how to get the software up and running. We're actually working on a review of our own and hope to have some technical information on how the whole thing works. You can check out the program at Coola.com.

Watch out for Liberty! - PalmStation is reporting that there is a fake Liberty application floating around that will remove all the applications from your Palm. Apparently, it has the same icon as the Liberty application and is being touted as a "patch." It's easy enough to download the application at GambitStudios, so if you want a copy of Liberty get it there. Also, for future reference, you should never install anything for a program if the developer hasn't specifically mentioned it on the site. This was bound to happen. Liberty is insanely popular right now and someone with too much time on his/her hands decided to have a little fun at your expense. Be careful!

PalmSource 2000 is coming - Palm has released information about Palm Source 2000. Apparently, Palm will begin accepting registration for the December 11th event on September 11th. The site is all in Flash and looks pretty cool. Of course, a post at PalmStation pointed out that it being all in Flash makes it impossible for Palm users to access it using their Palm. I'm sure that Palm will hear that comment and make modifications quickly.

Invasion of the phones! - Smaller.com has a great article that talks about the future of phones. It's an interesting read with details about some new phones coming to market. I most enjoyed the part where the author's phone died and his wife was laughing at him. I can attest to that one. I constantly make fun of my wife's phone when it drops a signal and she loves to tease me when I go outside my coverage area. Of course, she doesn't know that I'm on a better carrier, etc. ... and she doesn't care, either. :)

Posted Thursday, August 24 -- joel@geek.com
Revo troubles - The other day I decided to try to clean up some space on my Revo. As experience has taught me, I first backed up my Revo before doing anything else. Instead of using the normal add/remove feature built into the Revo, I connected my PC to my Revo and started browsing the contents. In my quest to free up space, I located a number of .sis (program install) files that I figured weren't doing anything important. I deleted them and then tested my Revo. Everything appeared to be functioning fine: my contacts were all still there, my Agenda was accurate, and when I clicked on the Extras icon all of the additional programs that I had installed were still intact ... or so I thought. It wasn't until a little later in the evening when I tried to play Goby that I realized the programs were not actually installed anymore. Fortunately for me, they were all a quick restore away, but now when I go into the add/remove application it's not showing any of the applications that I installed. Sadly, I fear that I now have to do a hard reset, reformat, and start over if I really want my Revo to go back to normal. Chances are, though, I'll just keep on using it as if nothing is wrong. :)

Check in with your Palm - MercuryCenter has an article about a new device by Symbol Technologies that is helping passengers check in faster at San Jose International Airport. According to the article, roving agents for American Airlines are using the SPT 1740 to check in passengers and issue boarding passes during peak periods to help reduce lines. The SPT 1740, or Symbol Palm Terminal, is powered by the PalmOS and features a printer worn around the waist. American Airlines hopes to roll the device out in 15 additional airports next year. Read more about it here. I love this concept. I can't tell you how many times I've had to stand in line and wait for someone to check me in. There have even been times when agents asked everyone to step aside except for people going somewhere on a plane that was about to depart. With this device, people could either stay in line and be attended to or go off to the side and be handled by this particular agent. This is what technology is all about. Now if only I could come into the airport and check myself in with my PDA or mobile phone.

Programming on your Revo - A little while ago I asked if anyone knew of a program that would let you program directly ON the Revo. Ben wrote in with news of nOPL+ from Neuon. Now I expect those of you who are programmers to start writing a whole slew of apps for EPOC! :)

Palm has a StrongARM - Intel has announced its new StrongARM XScale architecture, and rumors are flying about what Palm's next generation device will have under the hood. According to reports, the new XScale architecture will perform over 20 times better than the Dragonball and use less power, too. The chip will also be able to shift performance on the fly. Intel would not confirm that Palm was working on a new device that would use XScale but did say that it's being used in a number of next-generation handhelds. You can read more at CNet. It definitely sounds like this new chip architecture is perfect for EPOC. After all, the operating system already can handle multitasking, and now with the ability to change voltage on the fly it's a sure-fire win. On the other hand, Palm could use a boost now and this new architecture is just what it needs to do full multimedia integration. It'll be interesting to see what devices using this new architecture will be capable of doing.

Is that a Visor around your neck? - Leave it to a hobbyist to make his own holder for the Visor. I found this one while cleaning up my mailbox the other day. Apparently, Tom wanted to hang the Visor from his neck and ... well, you check it out.

From cart to ROM - We've been talking a lot about Gameboy emulators lately and many people have been asking where to find the elusive ROMs. Well, there are a number of sites out there on the 'Net offering them, but if that's not enough for you check out this line of products from Bung Enterprises.

EPOC in Computer Shopper - RevoWorld sent word that this month's UK Computer Shopper contains a few pages on EPOC and EPOC software and sites. Apparently, they're featured with some screenshots, too. I'm surprised that the UK Computer Shopper hadn't previously covered the EPOC spectrum. Hmm. Very odd.

All I need is the Sun - PDABuzz sent word of an article that shows you how to recharge your iPAQ using just the sun and some solar panels. This is the ultimate in geek! I love stuff like this. Now I'm wondering if some inventor is going to try to patent this idea ... I always thought that solar-powered mobile phones would catch on but I can't say I've seen too many around :)

What else can we emulate? - The other day I was wondering what other emulators were out there for EPOC. I decided to check out Tucows' Emulator page and it seems that in addition to Gameboy and PC emulators, you can also emulate an Apple II and a Commodore 64 computer! Emulators are fun, and if you've ever programmed for either of those two platforms it might be time for a stroll down memory lane.

Get your Palm ready for school - ThemeStream has an interesting article that talks about how you can use your Palm to get ready for college and even help you through the semester. The article deals directly with the built-in Palm apps but can be directly related to any PDA on the market. It's definitely a good read. I didn't have a PDA when I went to school so I can't relate. Instead, I actually had to use a PEN and PAPER to keep my life together. **shudder**

Which PDA should I buy? - The TechZone has an amusing buyer's guide for PDAs with a very strong bias towards Palm. It's a very enjoyable read and in the end recommends that you go with a Palm with the most memory. It doesn't go into a whole lot of detail but just enough to get the author's point across. Noticeably absent is my beloved Revo, but I'll get over it. You can check out the buyer's guide here.

PDA sales to keep climbing - According to a new report by NPD INTELECT Market Tracking, sales of PDAs will more than likely double the sales numbers for all of 1999. In addition, the research showed that Palm has lost some marketshare to Handspring this year. For example, June 1999 sales had Palm at 74.8% and this year Palm was at 65.4%. Meanwhile, Handspring sold 21.6% in June of this year and didn't exist in June of 1999. Way to go, Handspring! At any rate, it's interesting to see the stats but everyone knows that PDA sales will more than double last year's sales. That part is pretty obvious. Then again, if hybrid PDA/mobile phones make it to market, it could change everything.

Posted Wednesday, August 23 -- joel@geek.com
Gameboy for Palm gets even better - GambitStudios has announced that a new version of Liberty, a Gameboy emulator for the Palm, is out. According to the release notes, the new version features a z80 core update and a number of modifications to support even more GameBoy games. In addition, the ROMs are now smaller and can be beamed from one Palm to another. You can also now save a game at various points of play. Download the latest version here. One more thing: if you install an older ROM format, the program will let you know when you try to run it. This emulator just keeps getting better. Now you can beam ROMs to one another--that's a very cool feature! I also like the fact that the developers scaled down the size of the ROM. Not everyone has a lot of memory to spare.

The future of Liberty - After receiving information about the new update to Liberty from one of the main developers, I started asking a few questions and surprisingly received information that I wasn't expecting. Apparently, the developers are actually working on enabling sound and, as of this writing, have sound working in the labs on Tetris and Dr. Mario. I'm not sure if that includes music or just sound effects, but either way sound is coming! I also learned that they got the cartridge extractor working, which means that if you own a Gameboy cartridge you'll soon be able to take the ROM right off of it. I was also told that they're working on getting support for Game Genie and Gameshark working. Very cool stuff. I'm most excited about the sound, but the cartridge extractor is very cool, too. I think I'll have to e-mail the creator of Goby and see if he can get sound working on his emulator. At the very least it would be nice to hear some sound. I have PacMan for EPOC from Neuon and that plays sounds at the beginning, when you die, and at a few other points. Unfortunately, it doesn't make noise whenever you eat a pill. Apparently, the developer tried that and gameplay was too slow.

The dirt on the new Cassiopeia - Bob wrote in with news of the new Cassiopeia E-700, which is apparently the Japanese equivalent to the E-125. According to Bob, the E-700 uses SD memory cards and weighs less than the iPAQ. In addition, the cradle supports both USB and serial cables and you can even buy cables for connecting the Cassiopeia to mobile phones. For more information and some pictures check out this page. If Bob is right, it sounds like Casio beat Palm to SD support! Way to go, Casio! I'm still jealous that all of this cool stuff comes out in Japan first. Maybe Bob will send me one to play with.

StrongARMs coming - InfoWorld has an article that makes mention of Intel's new StrongARM processors. While none of the information has been officially confirmed yet, the new StrongARMs will run at 600 MHz (code-named Coyanosa) and 400 MHz (Cotulla), respectively. In addition, Cotulla is expected to feature an integrated processor with built-in support for USB, IR, and LCD. I was wondering what new StrongARMs were going to come to market. After all, Palm mentioned that it would be working on new Palms featuring the processor. I've also heard some rumors that Palm already has prototypes working with these new chips. Perhaps we'll see one demoed at the forum today?

Print via IR to a printer - EpocCity has a review of the Psion Infrared Printer Link. The device looks very sleek and allows for you to print via IR from any Psion device. The author liked it and really put it through its paces. The only part that I don't like about it is that it doesn't have a printer pass-thru port. In other words, if you want to hook the device up to a printer, that printer will be dedicated to IR printing and nothing else. It still looks very cool, though, and I can definitely see the advantage of having something like this. I also remember a long time ago talking with Psion about an IR port for a computer. I wonder what happened to that?

Recap of Hawkins' chat - VisorCentral was the first to put up a summary of RedHerring's chat with Jeff Hawkins (Pappa Palm). The gist of the chat is that Handspring could use another OS besides Palm if it wanted to--even the Pocket PC. The company has a lot of products under development and a cell phone module is coming by the end of the year. Not too exciting stuff, though I'll have to read the full transcript when it finally comes online to really know for sure. I was definitely expecting some hints at a color Visor, but the best we got was that there will be many different products coming. I'm assuming that the transcript will eventually be available here.

Use PC Cards on your iPAQ - BrightHand has a review of the PC Card Expansion Pack for the iPAQ. It's a great read and walks you through the author's impressions and experiences using the sleeve. I actually found this intriguing, since there are a tremendous amount of PC Cards already on the market. Unfortunately, the PC Card sleeve seems to be even more rare than the iPAQ right now. Regardless, it's a great review with plenty of pics.

Streaming video on your PDA - BrightHand also has an article that talks about two companies that are currently capable of delivering full-motion video clips over a 9.6 kbps cellular network. It's a good article and it does a nice job of bringing you up to speed on what the current status of streaming video wirelessly is. I was actually quoted in an article that ran on Inside.com the other day talking about this very subject. It's interesting to see that even when technology limits us, we find ways around it. Who needs to wait for 3G anyway?!

The US is behind in wireless - I've found proof that I'm not the only one who thinks that the United States is behind Europe when it comes to wireless connectivity. CNET has an interview with Gerald Faulhaber, the now chief economist of the FCC. In the article, many points are touched on, but in particular Gerald talks about how the Europeans are really pushing 3G and that other people in the industry think that Europeans have locked themselves in and that it's a bad idea considering that a better standard may emerge. Meanwhile back in the United States, we don't have a solid commitment to one standard and as a result are behind. It also makes mention of Deutsche Telekom and other foreign companies coming in to our market. It's an interesting read. I love it when someone else shares my opinions.

Will i-mode make it to the US? - FT.com has an interesting article that talks about whether or not I-mode and other Japanese marvels would make it in the United States. The article takes a different perspective than the technology barrier one and looks more towards the differences in calling plans and behaviors of the different cultures. It's an interesting read, though I tend to think that the I-mode would be HUGELY popular in the United States.

Find a lost PDA - We've been talking a lot about how lucky Allison was when someone actually returned her Palm to her after she left it in the taxi cab. Well, coincidentally, a service called ReturnMe uses that exact situation as an example of how their service can help you. Apparently, you join their service for free, pay $9.95 for ID Tags that you place on anything you may lose, and if someone finds your personal belongings they call a toll-free number or contact the website and the company organizes the pickup and delivery back to you via FedEx. So you pay for the tags and you pay for the shipping charges if it has to be recovered for you. This sounds like an amazing service and I love the fact that it uses a story just like what Allison went through to prove its business model. You can read more about this service at ReturnMe.com. I should really consider this. I'd hate to lose my Revo, my phone, or my many other gadgets.

3Com plays football with a new PDA - 3Com has announced that fans in luxury boxes and some press people will receive a "Web pad" that will allow them to check e-mail, look up players' stats, and more--wirelessly at 3Com Park this season. I talk about this more in today's news item. It sounds to me like this is some sort of a Palm device. Most notably, it will connect to the 'Net wirelessly and will be given out free for use during the event. We'll have to see if someone successfully gets out of the park with one of these things and starts hacking it.

Posted Tuesday, August 22 -- joel@geek.com
Geeking Out - I talked yesterday about how I was going to have the opportunity to play with a Pocket PC again last night. Well, I did, and I have to say that once again I wasn't impressed. This time my friend and I were trying to get a new 56K CF Card modem working on his Pocket PC and no matter what we did it just didn't want to work. Not only that, but when we tried to connect his Pocket PC to the 'Net via my IR-enabled phone, the phone connected fine but the Pocket PC said there was no connection. This just reinforced my feeling about the Pocket PC and the problems that one might experience. I'm very fearful of Microsoft products not because of how they will eventually perform, but the time and effort involved in getting them set up to perform correctly. In addition, I had previously connected his Pocket PC to my phone with no problems and attempted to use the same connection setting that was already set from last time. At any rate, we gave up on it and played with the BlackBerry instead. Needless to say, the only problems I've had with the Blackberry are lack of sync support for Eudora and ACT 2000. That and occasional drop-out areas. One more thing: my Revo connected perfectly to my IR-enabled phone on the first try.

Sharp and Mitsubishi going mobile? - Reuters has a news item that talks about Sharp and Mitsubishi considering jointly building a new handheld computer with mobile phone capabilities that would work on GSM. As of this writing, details haven't been confirmed, but reports are speculating that each company would market the device under their own brands and that the device could be expected in Europe by next spring. Very interesting stuff. Of course, now we have to wonder which OS it will run and what features the device will have. Let's hope there is some standardization there. I vote for Symbian, since it's going to be marketed in Europe initially.

Monochrome iPAQ in the works - According to this week's eWeek, Compaq is planning to create a lower-cost monochrome screen version of the iPAQ Pocket PC. I'd have to say that it's a good move by Compaq. Right now there are no iPAQs to be found but people definitely want them. If the monochrome iPAQ copies the same style as the regular iPAQ, Compaq is sure to have a winner on its hands.

Overclocking the iPAQ - Yianni sent word that Jimmy Software has succeeded in "over clocking" the iPAQ. According to the front page, the techs can now force the iPAQ to run at 236 MHz. They also report that they can "figure out the Double Buffered Direct Screen Access for it too. (Forget the GX again...)." I have no idea what this last part means but I'm sure it's a good thing! At any rate, they're going to push the hardware to its limit and release some new games that take advantage of what they've figured out how to do. Basically, the cool news is that they're now running an iPAQ at 236 MHz instead of 206 MHz. That's definitely quite a gain.

Nokia wants you to WAP! - Nokia has announced that it is making its WAP Browser 2.0 available to mobile phone and other manufacturers as source code. The new browser is compliant with the WAP 1.2 specification, which includes support for WML 1.2, WML Script, and Push functionality. Nokia is hoping that the release will speed up the overall success of WAP. What a great move by Nokia! Since Nokia seems to be at the forefront of a number of WAP technologies, I applaud the company for having the foresight to realize that by releasing the code to everyone, WAP will finally get the support it needs. Long live WAP! :)

Where are the Springboards? - James sent in word that VisorCentral has an article that explains why there are not a lot of Springboard modules on the market right now. According to the article, many of the developers are missing release dates as a result of the component shortages. In addition, Handspring has now stepped in and is assessing the requirements of its Springboard developers and building those needs into its own forecasts for the flash manufacturers. The article also mentions that some developers are redesigning their modules to not need the component that is currently unavailable. While I agree that there is a component shortage, many of these products have been in development long before the shortage came about. Now Visor owners will have to wait for the shortage to either dissipate or for developers to re-engineer their Springboards before they come to market. The article is really a great read.

Locking up your Palm - Many readers wrote in with suggestions of how Allison can lock up her Palm in the future and have it display her owner info when someone turns it on. The most common response was to use the Owner Info functionality built directly into the Palm. Basically, go to the Preferences application, enter in information under Owner, and then lock the unit when turning it off by either going into the Security application or by performing an upward stylus stroke. If that's not enough for you you can download TealLock, IDPalm, Check-In, or Commander Lite. As you can see, there are a number of different ones to choose from.

Train with Symbian - Symbian has announced that it will provide certified training to developers, companies, etc. interested in developing for the Symbian platform. You can read more about it at PMN Publications. According to the article, the training is only happening in the U.K. right now, but Symbian is looking to expand it into the US. I'd have to say that I'm a fan of training programs being given by the company that created the product. In this case, the developers are sure to learn about all of the ins and outs of the operating system.

Install Palm apps without a HotSync - Envi.con has announced the release of Pilot Install. According to the website, the program allows you to install Palm software with one mouse click, without needing to HotSync. I have received many e-mails from friends who can't stand the fact that they have to sync their entire Palm every time they want to install a new app. According to what I've read, someone might have finally been listening to their complaints.

Traveling with a lot of gadgets - VisorCentral has a great article that details the reviewer's trip across the country. On his trip he takes a boatload of devices with him, including the RIM 950, RIM 957, Palm V, OmniSky services, Palm VII, Visor Deluxe, IBM z50, and more. His goal is to show how you can connect from various devices, etc. throughout the country. It's really a great article and I think I may have met my match as far as a gadget-geek is concerned. :) The article also includes reviews of each of the devices and services that are used throughout the trip.

Posted Monday, August 21 -- joel@geek.com
m100 feelings - My newsletter from last week really sparked a lot of interesting comments. Most people agree with me and think that the money spent on the m100 should have been spent improving the Palm product line. Meanwhile, others wrote in to tell me that their child is very excited about getting his or her hands on the m100. Since the "child" is whom Palm was targeting I'd have to say mission accomplished for Palm!

PDAGeek Giveaway - If you haven't registered to win a Revo with an IR Travel modem there's still time. The response to the giveaway has been amazing and I'll let you know how many registrants we had after August 31st. One thing I found interesting is that over 67 percent of the people who register are also signing up for the PDAGeek newsletter for the first time. If you read PDAGeek daily you should definitely sign up to receive the newsletter, too. You'll be glad that you did.

What Sony is really up to - Bob, my resident translator, sent word that I mangled the information about Sony's new PDA site. Apparently, the name of Sony's PDA is CLIE and CLIE Plaza is the name of the website for supporting the device. I wasn't that far off ... yeah, I was. It takes a big man to admit when he's wrong ... etc. etc. In addition, Bob also sent word that Muchy.com has a review of the PDA. It's not in English, though.

Palm lost now found - Allison wrote in with news that she accidentally left her Palm Vx in a NYC taxi cab recently. To her surprise, another passenger actually turned it on, looked at her schedule, and called the person she was meeting with for lunch the next day to tell her that she had found Allison's Palm. Wow, did she get lucky! As I'm sure you know, whoever found it could have done a hard reset and walked away with a new Palm Vx! Allison also wants to know if there's a program that will automatically display the owner's contact information when it's turned on. I know that Psion devices can do that but I'm not sure which program is best for the Palm. E-mail me.

Talk with father Palm - PDABuzz sent word that Redherring.com is hosting a chat with Handspring cofounder and "father" of the Palm, Jeff Hawkins. The chat will be on August 22nd at 4 P.M. Eastern time at RedHerring.com. Wow! How'd they work that one? I'll have to remember this and see if I can get in on the chat. I wonder if Jeff will release any info? Want to bet PDABuzz'll be asking him about a color Visor?

Terra Force does color - Terra Force, a hugely popular tank shoot-em-up for EPOC devices, is now available in color. In addition, it's still free! I downloaded Terra Force as soon as it came out and have already logged a couple of hours blowing up tanks. Now it's available in color for my Series 7, too. I can't wait to start blowing tanks up in color. The game also features blood-curdling screams at the appropriate times. It's a must download. You can get it from FReEpoc.com.

EPOC on a PC - Ever wanted to run EPOC programs on your PC? EpocCity put together a guide that will show you how to do just that. It involves using the EPOC emulator and a couple of other programs. It's actually a very interesting read, complete with screenshots. I can't say that I've ever wished I could run EPOC programs on my PC but I'm sure something will come up. Read the guide here.

Which Pocket PC is best? - The Gadgeteer has a comparison review of the Casio E-115, the Compaq iPAQ 3650, and the Hewlett Packard Jornada 548. It's a very comprehensive review and she does end up recommending the iPAQ for most activities. If you're interested in the Pocket PC at all this is a definite must-read. Also, I received word from PDABuzz that the Casio E-125 is about to start selling in October. It apparently has a 150 MHz processor, 32 MB of RAM, USB connectivity, and will sell for $599. You can see a pic and some details at Dale Coffing's Pocket PC page. I'm expecting to play around with a Pocket PC more this evening, actually. A friend wants to show me some new modem he got for it and I'm going to bring the Psion IR modem to play around with, too.

Another take on Sony's Palm - PurePalm wrote in with news of an article posted on the site that talks about how Sony is dabbling in Pocket PC territory. It's a good read but I don't agree with one main point. The author says that Sony's device has to be priced under $450 to make a dent. I have a feeling that people would still buy it even at over $500. After all, people don't have a problem parting with a lot of cash for Pocket PC, and Sony's Palm will have a lot of multimedia functionality built-in.

Palm vs. paper organizer - Time Digital has an article that talks about deciding whether or not to ditch the paper in favor of the Palm or any other PDA. It's a very long read but definitely worth the time. I can tell you that I struggled for a couple of days when moving from paper, but being able to have a backup of my contacts and schedule won me over. By the way, that's when the Palm Personal was a little under $300. Now you can buy better than that functionality for $150 or less. The article also talks about a feature in the m100 that no one else has mentioned. Apparently, it features Word Complete, a feature that completes your words for you as you write, built-in. Hmm. Is this really true? At any rate, it's a great read and really gets you thinking about how you can convert your non-PDA friends to PDAGeeks!

Posted Friday, August 18 -- joel@geek.com
Newsletter - I went to CompUSA yesterday and played with an m100. I came away with two questions: who hires those CompUSA salespeople, and why did Palm bother to make the m100? Read much more in today's issue of the newsletter.

New Goby - Our reviewer Milan Tjioe got his hands on BacklitGames' new version (1.1) of Goby, the GameBoy emulator for EPOC machines. The programmers have added a lot of improvements and even lowered the price, so check out Milan's Review Update and three new screenshots.

Sony's new Palm revisited - Everyone has been talking about how Sony is now calling its PalmOS-based PDA the "CLIE" instead of "PEO." Apparently, everyone is wrong, according to this article over at The Register. "CLIE" or "Communication Linkage for Information & Entertainment" is the first piece of the name of a new site dedicated to delivering Web-based content about PDAs. The service, CLIE Plaza, will debut on September 9, the launch date for the PDA in Japan. The new site will feature news, e-zines, comic books, video, and still images. It looks like I'm about to have some competition from Sony now. Anyway, there are definitely conflicting reports of what Sony's new PDA will be called. According to CNET the device will be called the "PEO," or Personal Entertainment Organizer. I say: who cares what it's called as long as it gets the job done! :)

No more PDA! - Eric at Smaller.com has written an article about living without a PDA. It seems that Eric sold his soul ... er, his Palm to a friend and has been without PDA for quite some time now. He talks about how he uses his mobile phone and various SMS and other services to keep himself in line and how his PDA was really no more than a phonebook and an appointment keeper. Well, I have to say that I enjoyed his article and will enjoy talking with him when I see him next month. Rumor has it that Eric will be forced to use a Pocket PC. We'll see if he's still PDA-less come this time a month from now, or if he surrenders to the evil Microsoft empire :)

Sanyo plays with EPOC - Sanyo announced that it has licensed Symbian's EPOC platform for use in wireless devices. According to reports, Sanyo plans to use Symbian/EPOC (which includes the OS, WAP, Bluetooth, and more) to create mobile phone/PDA hybrids. I love this item. It's about time a bigshot like Sanyo latched on to this movement. For example, Sanyo is an expert at mass production and bringing the cost per item low. If Sanyo does that to the wireless devices that combine PDA and mobile phone technologies, they'll soon be everywhere.

VTech goes retail - VTech has announced that it is moving its Helio handheld into the retail space. According to sources, the Helio will soon be sold in Target, national electronic stores, and office supply chains. The Helio will sell for $179. I fear that the handheld may not survive in the retail market at that price point, though. Why would someone want to buy a platform that competes with Palm, Pocket PC, and EPOC if it's priced the same as the other offerings? Perhaps I'll be proven wrong. My guess is that the price of the Helio will drop substantially once it hits retail. Then again, this could be the first Linux-based PDA to hit retail if VTech accelerates its Linux efforts.

PalmGear wants you - PalmGear.com has announced that it is looking to hire someone for the position of Business Development. It sounds like a great job considering PalmGear's always one of the first to know about some new technology that hits the market from Palm. I'm more curious to see where the company's getting all of its money from. Is it bringing in that much money that it can continue to add to its staff? Anyone know anything? Anyway, I give PalmGear a lot of credit. It was one of the first to come online as a Palm reseller and has grown immensely since. I've been a daily visitor since I first bought my Palm.

Programming on the Revo - Randall wrote in wondering what developers out there are using to program on their Revo. Most importantly, he was looking for programs that will allow him to actually program physically ON the Revo. I'm curious, too. Perhaps I'll write an app or two ... if only I had the time.

Presentations on your PDA - This one is more for EPOC users but it's still not a bad concept. EpocCity has an article that talks about how to make presentations on your PDA. The article goes step by step and shows how you can make a presentation on your PC using PowerPoint and then export images of the pages to your PDA. At that point you can use an image viewer to present your slides. I actually tried this before but the image quality wasn't good. At the time I exported as GIF and in the article he exports as TIF. Hmm. I think I'll have to try again, considering my Series 7 has a beautiful 256-color display.

Some new PDA concepts - PDABuzz pointed me to a page at Ericsson that features pictures of a number of concept devices. There are some very cool looking devices and I've actually seen some of them at various trade shows in the past. I want the future to be here already! I'm ready to sign some non-disclosures so I can play in their prototype labs!

Palm m100 EXPOSED - PalmStation sent word that some tinkerers have taken apart the Palm m100 and posted pics. There's also a link to a page that talks about a 12 MB Palm M100. It's about time! I love it when the hackers upgrade Palms beyond what Palm wanted them to. How do you upgrade a 2 MB Palm to 12 MB? WOW!

Palm to do more acquiring - PalmInfoCenter has an article that talks about Palm's fiscal year 2000 annual report. In particular, it mentions that the company plans to do some strategic acquisitions. I've been wondering about that one. After all, there are many companies out there that can play a major part in the Palm's future. First up would have to be AvantGo. Next up Vindigo. Then some hardware manufacturers of MP3 player add-ons to add to what's integrated in future Palms. Perhaps a piece or two of a BlackBerry wouldn't hurt, either. Any small phone companies for sale out there? :) You can read the full report here.

Posted Thursday, August 17 -- joel@geek.com
Dinner without BlackBerry - Last night I went to my monthly dinner that I have scheduled with a number of non-technical friends. I usually bring whatever my latest gadget is at the time, so this time I brought the Blackberry Unfortunately, for some unknown reason the Blackberry wasn't able to grab a signal so I was unable to demo the coolest feature of the device. Regardless, one of my friends was so taken by the Blackberry that he's going to buy one for his father. Not bad. I wish I got a referral fee every time I end up influencing a purchase of a device I'm playing with. :) At any rate, I found it odd that I was unable to get a signal considering that I was in a part of Boston and in a pretty techie area. It just goes to show you that wireless still has a ways to go. I also have spotty reception on my Voicestream phone around that area, too. One more thing: these non-technical guys have managed to buy a Visor and two Palm Vs since the beginning of the year. It looks like even the non-technical people are now being invaded by PDAs.

MP3 Palm - It looks like the folks over at PocketPyro are now also working on an MP3 player for the new m100. The device will be called the "Porta-Sound," will be powered by the PocketPyro Dragon Thunder multimedia engine, and will be produced by Singapore Shinei Sangyo Pte Ltd. There are some nice pics of the device but no ship-date as of yet. In addition, the company is working on the Pyro for the Palm. This device will come in three different versions: 64 MB ($299), 128 MB ($449), and 192 MB ($589). The prices are not final and there is no ship-date on this one either. Again, nice pics, though, and the Pyro can also double as a storage device. I've been watching this company for a while and it seems like it is pretty close to shipping, considering the quality of the prototype at this point. If I'm not mistaken, I actually used one at PCExpo a couple of years ago. It'll be interesting to see how this add-on with MP3 catches on. If you're interested you can pre-order the Pyro here.

Superheroes on your mobile phone - Riot Entertainment has announced that it will create games and icons for mobile phones and other wireless devices based on more than 4,700 characters from Marvel Enterprises. The first game will be "X-Men: The Wireless Game" and is expected to work on WAP phones in Europe and Asia later this month. Read more at Yahoo. Very cool stuff. I wonder how many minutes of airtime it takes to finish a game? I like the concept of WAP-based games but with the current, terrible wireless access plans in the United States, no one is going to want to waste his or her minutes on game playing.

Instant battery in a pinch - PalmInfoCenter sent word that Electric Fuel is working on an "Instant Power" battery for the Palm. According to reports, the battery can work as a power source and even recharge the Palm's rechargeable battery several times. I've heard of this battery before for use in mobile phones and it was only a matter of time before it was adapted for PDA use. It's really great technology. Basically, you can just have a spare battery lying around that can be unwrapped and used at full strength. Afterwards, simply toss it in the trash. Definitely something that every power user must have. I'll have to think about grabbing one or two for my mobile phone. I hate running out of battery power.

WAP in color - EdgeMatrix has announced that it has created the first color WAP browser for the PalmOS. Previously, the company had released WAPman, a program that allows users of the Palm or PC platform to browse WML content. Since its inception it has been downloaded more than 100,000 times. Both the Palm and Windows versions of WAPman Color will be freely downloadable from the EdgeMatrix website. Color WAP? Wow! Is it really going to look that different? After all, aren't we really still just browsing text? It's still a cool announcement, though.

i-mode coming to the United States? - Yahoo has a story about NTT DoCoMo, the creator of the HUGELY popular I-mode, being in talks to buy a minority stake in a proposed U.S. wireless phone company. Apparently, SBC Communications and BellSouth Corp. are in talks to create a new venture and DoCoMo might want in. NTT DoCoMo earlier wanted a piece of Voicestream but that didn't happen. I was just talking with our Chief Editor the other day about the I-mode coming to town--it looks like it might actually happen at this point. I actually don't know that much about the infrastructure required to support the I-mode but I know that DoCoMo has plenty of money to go around to help it out. I've also been receiving e-mails from users of the I-mode and they tell me that it's the best phone they've ever used. Soon the United States may get a taste, too.

Visor to do "Always-on" wireless - AllNetDevices is reporting that Glenayre Technologies has received FCC approval for its two-way wireless messaging module for the Visor. @ctiveLink allows a Visor user to have always-on connectivity to the 'Net over the ReFLEX wireless network. It looks like the Visor is about to go wireless in another way. No more sessions, just always on. Well, I have to say that I'm upset that once again another wireless network has crept in. Today is the first time that I've heard of the Reflex network. With all of these competing networks you'd think that the price of wireless connectivity to the 'Net would be much cheaper. Nope.

FireViewer is free! - FirePad Inc. has announced that its FireViewer product will now be available free of charge. The company is hoping that by making its FireViewer product free, more companies will use the enterprise edition. If you don't know, FireViewer can display large, hyperlinked images and serve streaming video. You can find out more about it at FirePad.com. What I find most intriguing is that you can covert your GIFs, JPGs, and more using FireConverter and then display them on your Palm using FireViewer. As I'm sure you realize, the viewer should spread like wildfire now that it's free. Just look at what happened to Macromedia's Flash--it's on just about every website nowadays.

eBook gets an upgrade - If you read eBooks on your EPOC device, check out Revoworld's latest review of EBook version 2.0. The reviewer talks about the benefits of paying the registration fee and upgrading to version 2.0. Basically, if all you do is read then the free version is fine. On the other hand, if you want to copy the text and put it into another app, pay the $15 registration fee. I'm a big fan of reading on my PDA and I use eBook pretty regularly.

Posted Wednesday, August 16 -- joel@geek.com
New Linux PDA - The news of the morning is that Agenda Computing has come out of nowhere with a Linux PDA that will sell for $149 in October. While there has been much hype surrounding companies making Linux work on the iPAQ, this company came out of nowhere with its own PDA design, fully functioning with Linux. The Agenda VR3 was demoed at the LinuxWorld tradeshow and, according to Agenda's president, the company is hoping that the Linux community will start developing apps for it before it ships. The Agenda VR3 sports a NEC 32-bit 66 MHz processor, 8 MB of ROM, 2 MB of Flash, a 240x160 LCD monochrome, 16 greyscale display, a backlight, IrDA port, RS-232 port, and more. You can read all of the specs here. It sounds like a great device and ships with e-mail, a calculator, agenda, etc. standard. The Agenda will also come in two other models: Agenda VR3+, which will include 8 MB of RAM and 4 MB of Flash, and Agenda VR3s, which will include 8 MB of RAM and 8 MB of Flash. You can read more about the Agenda here. This really sounds like an amazing PDA. By launching it before shipping it the company has just guaranteed that it will have a user base. After all, the target market will be the millions of Linux users. In addition, you can run a webserver off it or go to the Linux command prompt for all that "geeky" stuff you like to do in Linux. There's also a great review of it over at LinuxDevices. If anyone knows what you can do with a Linux PDA, the guys over at LinuxDevices do.

PDAGeek giveaway continues - We've received over 400 registrants for our giveaway so far!! If you haven't registered to win a Revo bundled with an IR modem, register to win now! I'm in the process of working deals to giveaway non-Psion products, too. More details to follow.

Help finding your way in the Jungle - Robert sent word that JungleSoft has released the beta version of JunglePort.com. The new service allows users of the PalmOS to create customized versions of maps and local content for all major cities in the US and then download their "JungleSafari" directly to their Palm device. The current beta version includes handheld maps, dining guides, and yellow pages for Boston, Chicago, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Miami, and New York. You can download the client here. This sounds like a great product and makes me wish I still were using my Palm. I know many people who use two different PDAs at all times. Perhaps I'll have to join that crowd. Then again, that would mean that I'd be carrying around a Revo, a Palm, a BlackBerry, and a mobile phone. Hmm.

AltaVista does WAP - In a move that can only be viewed as a competitive strike against Google, AltaVista has released a beta version of its WAP search engine. The search engine can be found at wap.raging.com or wml.raging.com and currently provides an index of 2.5 million WML webpages. Just as I read about how WAP is dead, companies spend $$ making WAP search engines. WAP will live forever! :)

Where's Intellisync for Symbian? - Nick sent word that Intellisync for Symbian is still on schedule. According to Nick, they're currently working on support for Notes 5 and Organizer 6 and a lot of the code has been changed since the beta. We also have unconfirmed reports that