Comments on: The State of Mobile Devices: Part I http://www.phixation.com/2009/04/27/the-state-of-mobile-devices/ chad's thoughts. Mon, 02 Jan 2012 04:14:16 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3 By: Genghis http://www.phixation.com/2009/04/27/the-state-of-mobile-devices/comment-page-1/#comment-407 Genghis Tue, 28 Apr 2009 14:14:26 +0000 http://www.phixation.com/?p=118#comment-407 I'm surprised that you didn't find much to do with your Newton. Was it because you weren't allowed to use it at school? What model did you have? I'm interested to see how a Psion 3a was more useful than a Newton. Here's an alternative perspective: I had a HP200LX and it had tremendous versatility because you could run most DOS applications written for an XT class PC on it. But because of the small keyboard it didn't get as much use as my Newton MP2000. I found I used the HP200 for about 30 minutes a day. Newton usage commonly comes in at 3-4 hours a day. Then when I bought an Newton MP2100 and found it could do Wifi and email, the average usage rose by another 2 hours a a day. The 5.5" screen enables me to do some serious writing and spreadsheet while I found every other smartphone a pain for getting something done. The Newton is getting past 10 years now. Even if the software keeps going, and the hardware is working great at the moment, it must eventually fail due to corrosion or decaying capacitors or something; so I have been looking at the HTC Advantage as a potential replacement; I like its screen size; its format is similar to a Newton with added bonus of a built-in cellular radio. Both the main telco's in our area are adopting WCDMA technologies in a couple of months so there should be some good data deals on offer soon. On a modern smartphone, emails are kept short because the keyboards and screens are too small. At least they let me see my MS Office and PDF files which often arrive as email attachments. I’m surprised that you didn’t find much to do with your Newton. Was it because you weren’t allowed to use it at school? What model did you have? I’m interested to see how a Psion 3a was more useful than a Newton.

Here’s an alternative perspective: I had a HP200LX and it had tremendous versatility because you could run most DOS applications written for an XT class PC on it. But because of the small keyboard it didn’t get as much use as my Newton MP2000. I found I used the HP200 for about 30 minutes a day. Newton usage commonly comes in at 3-4 hours a day. Then when I bought an Newton MP2100 and found it could do Wifi and email, the average usage rose by another 2 hours a a day.

The 5.5″ screen enables me to do some serious writing and spreadsheet while I found every other smartphone a pain for getting something done.

The Newton is getting past 10 years now. Even if the software keeps going, and the hardware is working great at the moment, it must eventually fail due to corrosion or decaying capacitors or something; so I have been looking at the HTC Advantage as a potential replacement; I like its screen size; its format is similar to a Newton with added bonus of a built-in cellular radio. Both the main telco’s in our area are adopting WCDMA technologies in a couple of months so there should be some good data deals on offer soon.

On a modern smartphone, emails are kept short because the keyboards and screens are too small. At least they let me see my MS Office and PDF files which often arrive as email attachments.

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