One of the holy wars going on in the computing world (besides PC vs. Mac and Amiga vs. everything) is the battle for the pocket computer.
Palm and upstart Handspring have been waging a battle between themselves for a couple of years to determine who will be king of the Palm platform. (Both run the same operating system, the Palm OS.)
On the other side of the world is, of course, Microsoft (a k a the Evil Empire) with its Windows/Pocket PC operating system. I have used various portable Windows machines over the years and every one of them stunk.
And not a little stunk. As the Grinch would say: stink, stank, stunk.
Then I conned Hewlett-Packard into loaning me a new "Pocket PC" running the latest version of Windows for Pocket PCs. As an avid Palm user (I am on my fourth), I thought little would pry me away from my trusty Palm VII with wireless Internet access.
Turns out, of course, that HP and Microsoft have gotten this one right. The HP Jornada 548 that I tested is far and away the best palm-size device I have used.
The tale of the tape: Top-of-the-line Palm VII's memory? Eight megs. Jornada? A whopping 32 megs, with add-in cards available to double it. Palm VII is black and white (sort of green and white) and the HP is full, vivid color. I add more AAA batteries to my Palm than I could possibly count; the HP is rechargeable.
It plays videos, plays my favorite MP3 music and, best of all, runs Microsoft Word and Excel.
And you know what wins it for me? Getting a Palm to sync with Microsoft Outlook reliably and consistently is akin to voodoo. Once a week you need to light fire to a bag of kindling and do a dance before you have a prayer of getting Outlook to sync correctly. That's mostly because the Palm uses third-party software (Chapura's PocketMirror) to sync the VII and it clearly is a work in progress.
Like it or not, when you sync from Outlook to a Pocket PC, you are going from one Microsoft product to another. It works like a charm and the color screen is glorious.
The downsides? If all your friends have Palms, forget beaming them notes and games during boring meetings. The two operating systems aren't compatible. There's also the price; the HP I tested costs about $450 on the street. Up until a month ago that was competitive with the Palm VII, but a price war has dropped the price of that unit to less than $200 as a new Palm is in the works.
It only is a matter of time before all three major makers of Windows-based Pocket PCs (HP, Casio and Compaq) lower their prices a bit.
My advice? If you run a Microsoft-centric office and you need something to keep your life in order, don't automatically head for a Palm. Give these new guys a solid try.
WEEKLY WEB WONDER: All you want to know about the Pocket PC is at www.pocketpc.com.
James Derk is new media editor for The Evansville Courier & Press. His e-mail address is jderk@evansville.net.