I saw a number of innovative and fun Windows Mobile products at this year's Computer Electronics Show.
All-in-one Pocket PC, GPS, and Phone
I ran into Dr. James Oyang, the CEO of Pharos and one of the nicest people I have met in our industry. He showed me a pre-production unit of their new phone-enabled GPS 6000 Pocket PC with integrated GPS. When I arrived home, I found that Pharos had sent me a unit to preview. I was pretty busy for a few days, so I gave it to Sambit Bhattarai, the director of our Used Handhelds department (http://UsedHandhelds.com). He got back to me in a couple of days, saying "I love this little monster... It's something I have been waiting for a while—one unit that does it all." Below is his list of pros and cons:
The new Pharos phone-enabled Pocket PC with GPS.Pros:
- Beautiful screen that is clearly visible even in the sunlight.
- Powerful GPS capabilities.
- Phone signal reception is better than on my iPAQ h6315.
- Incorporates an unlocked EDGE-capable GSM phone so it can be used just about anywhere.
- Comes with Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, a GPS receiver with Ostia navigation software, and an FM tuner, making it one of the most capable Windows Mobile devices on the market.
- The 2.0 megapixel camera with flash works great.
- Sensitive, high-quality microphone and the voice recordings are very crisp and loud.
- A Windows Mobile 5 device that supports push e-mail. I haven't used this capability, but it seems like it would be helpful.
- Has a nice suite of add-on software, including Voice Commander, FM Tuner, Sim Toolkit, Ostia GPS navigation software and maps, and more.
- Very small and light-weight device that is easy to carry around.
Cons:
- No built-in QWERTY thumb keyboard.
- Software suite does not include a backup program, which would certainly be helpful.
- I had some problems charging the device with the USB sync/charge cable, but none using the AC power adapter that came with the device.
- Uses a microSD slot for expansion. This currently limits you to a maximum of 2 GB of additional file storage.
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