Simple yet Versatile

I purchased the Palm IIIx earlier this year, because I wanted some way to store all my little pieces of information in one place. To tell you the truth, I also wanted a little gadget to play with. So far it has met both of these needs. Anyone who needs to have access to bits of information will benefit from one of these. Those who like gadgets will find a Palm especially appealing.

I will give you a quick rundown on the Palm IIIx device itself. It is a small device, about 12cm long and 8cm wide. It has a 6cm x 6cm screen which displays the information in black and white, and several shades of gray. The intensity of the screen can be changed with a dial at the back, so you can have the screen very dark or light depending on your preference and the ambient lighting situation. There is also a backlight which will let you happily work on your Palm in total darkness. The Palm IIIx comes with 4mb of memory, which for me is the perfect amount, I always have a safety net of 500k or so. I don't really thing you need more than 4mb unless you want to read War and Peace on it.

Now to the actual usage of the Palm. I won't go into painful details of the programs that you get with the Palm IIIx, but suffice to say that you have everything you need to store your addresses, appointments, expenses, tasks, and notes in one place. A calculator is also provided, albeit a very simple one. But all is not lost, as you will soon see.

You interact with the Palm itself by using a stylus, a kind of large toothpick. Inputting data on the Palm can be done in a few ways. With the Graffiti system you use the stylus on the little area below the screen to write individual letters. It is similar to printing in early primary school, with some letters being slightly different. After a week or two of use you should be able to write using Graffiti on the Palm about as fast as is takes to write at your neatest on paper, unless you are one of those who was born with the ability to write in cursive perfectly at any speed. Alternatively you can tap on a little onscreen keyboard, which is fast but for me gets tiring, I just prefer the Graffiti method.

You can also type the data on your computer and then "Hotsync" it to your Palm. So if your Palm gets stolen, you still have the data all on your computer. You can enter an appointment or address or whatever on the computer, and then after you plug the Palm into the little "cradle" and you "hotsync", your data will be on both the computer and the Palm. This of course works the other way around when you input the data on your Palm. Being able to view your data on the computer is very useful because on the bigger screen you can see a full month and all the text for your appointments.

There are literally THOUSANDS of program available for Palm that you can download from the Internet and then Hotsync from your computer to your Palm. There are programs of any type, from big RPG games to spreadsheet programs. There are many programs that will increase the "toy" appeal of your Palm, as well as a lot of actually useful stuff. Sure, you might not care when high tide in Sydney Harbour is, but if you want to know then there is a program that does it. I am sure that if you are into fishing then you might find it very useful. To get an idea of the volume of programs available, check out www.palmgear.com

Now I will write about how I myself use the Palm, as opposed to a "London one day, New York the next" type of person featured in most Palm advertising.

I go to University, and the Palm is very helpful for me on many counts there. Firstly, I have put all of my classes in as appointments. This did not take very long because you can put in one appointment and set it to repeat every day/week/month whatever. For me for example I have the same class at 0830 on Tuesdays and Thursdays. I only had to put that in once, I could make it repeat every Tuesday and Thursday, until the 5th of November which is when the semester is over. Then also I set an alarm for that appointment which goes off 90 minutes before the appointment (you can set whatever delay). This means that I don't have to set an alarm every night like you do with a regular alarm clock, I just go to bed as usual and the Palm wakes me up @ 0700 if it is a Tuesday or Thursday.

Using another program from PalmGear I can also answer any questions from my family when they want to call the US or Europe, and they want to know what time it is. (Yes I know it is amazing, an Australian with a Palm). I can also find out what time the sun will rise and set in any given location in the world on any given day.

I an learning German, and the program "List" (free from PalmGear) is very useful for entering my vocabulary. Now if I get stuck on a word that I have done before but can't quite remember the meaning I can just turn on my Palm and enter the first few letters of the word, and there it is. I can also store example sentences for each word to help me learn the word in context.

Using one of the programs from PalmGear I can store all the information on the weightings for assignments in all my subjects, and keep track of my progress to estimate my grades.

Of course the to do list comes in handy for remembering homework and readings. I also find that the Palm is excellent for keeping all the tidbits of information that the lecturer may give out in the course of a lecture. In our lectures the notes are all on the Internet, so no one comes prepared to write anything. Of course if I was a REAL hardcore Palm user I would Hotsync the lecture notes to my Palm. When the lecturers utters the magic words "For the exam you should study..." there is a flurry of bags opening, papers flying and pens being readied. Before the first bag zip is fully opened I am armed and ready with my Palm.

Of course I also keep all my addresses on the Palm as well. This is very useful, because although many people have a paper address book, it is usually at the phone at home, not with them when they need it the most.

A lot of people ask me "But you can do all the stuff that you do on paper and an alarm clock."

Sure.

But the point is that the Palm consolidates all the information into the little unit that it is.

One more thing. If you get a Palm then GET A CASE. I can not overstate this enough. Before I got my Titanium Slider case (www.rhinoskin.com) I was always worried about my Palm breaking. Now I just leave it in my pocket and treat it like my wallet.

In short the Palm IIIx is a nifty device that you will immediately love and use upon getting it. Any of the other Palm or Handspring brand devices will do the job too. Some people prefer the Windows CE devices, but I like the simplicity of the Palm, not to mention the huge amount of extra software available.

My advice? Above all, use the device that you are going to buy, preferably out of the store environment. See if a friend has one and have a go.