[plug] linux-friendly pda

[Brad Campbell]

Fred Janon wrote:
> You definitely want to avoid the 600. At this point, I would ignore the
> 650 and look at the newer models. Not sure if it is still the case but
> the ones with the external antenna were getting much better signal. No
> external antenna = better look but headache for the signal engineer.
> Don't take my word on it, technology changes fast.
> 

I'd back this up, but honestly.. the 680 is out and has been for a month or two. This means the 650 
is no longer a current model. Do a google on the 650 hardware problems. Like I said earlier, I had 4 
blow up on me.

I looked at the 650 again before I bought the 680, but just could not bring myself to do it. As for 
the better RF performance, Out of a side by side test of 3 Nokias (8250, 5210, 9300) an LG (don't 
recall) and the 650, the 650 lay somewhere in the middle ground with the 9300 way out in front for 
RF quality. The 680 appears to be a little better in that regard but I no longer have the 9300 or a 
working 650 to test against. I'm not complaining anyway.

Interesting recent point, I've started turning off the bluetooth when I'm not actively paired with 
the headset or using it to talk to the PC, and my battery life has doubled. It's a pain in the bum 
having to manually turn it off and on, but then I tell myself it's not much worse than plugging and 
unplugging a hardwired headset.

As for the other comments about only having responses for Palm devices, really I think if you do 
some comprehensive googling and reading of mail archives you will find that the other devices just 
don't work with Linux. SyncML is horribly encumbered and difficult to implement without the specs, 
Windows Mobile is just a horrid abortion of COM calls over the sync lead that nobody seems to be 
able to get right, Qtopia is just poorly implemented and often broken and the rest are a mish mash 
of GSM AT commands and device specific hacks.

At least the Palm sync interface is reasonably mature in linux, stable across devices and OS 
generations. I remember syncing my Palm Pilot Pro with Star Office 5.2 and never having a glitch, 
and that was years ago now.

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