# Solved: PDA/Phone Consensus



## inwaterby8 (Apr 21, 2005)

Attention all super-wired info age sensory overload types. 

My work is pressuring me to get a mobile phone. I figure I'll kill the land-line at my house, and buy a pda / phone. I don't need top-of-the-line. I just want to browse the web, have a phone, and read emails. Any suggestions as to what brand / model to get? Which to stay away from?

Thanks for any and all input.


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## tgal (Apr 6, 2005)

*My first vote is a Treo 600, Treo 650 2nd, and thirdly hp Ipaq h6315. Blackberry is great for email but cell phone is questionable. Palm based also since there are so many more software appz, yes I am aware some company just came out with a program that allows you to run Palm software packages on a pocket pc but I have not had any experience with it as of yet. Also bear in mind any internet access plan you get is going to be slower than dial up speeds at best at this point in time. Keyboard is a must especially for email. Those are my thoughts and suggestions.*


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## storage_man (Nov 6, 2003)

You also need to make sure that the Phone will work at your house ! If you are me, I have had 5 previous phones that would not work at my house. My current phone/service works a little bit (ie. If I'm in the right position and don't move I get a good signal). I would never get rid of my land line for this reason. I have had 4 different services over the years and only one works a little bit. You need to check to see if your home is located in a good signal area.

Storage_man


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## oblivious69 (Jun 11, 2004)

The blackberry cell phone is fine, I've used it in places where no other cell phone would get a signal. Email works great as long as you want to only reply from one email address...browsing is just horrible. Plus you would need access to a BES to us any of the decent apps on it.

If browsing the Internet is a priority, don't get a blackberry.


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## DoubleHelix (Dec 10, 2004)

You don't want "top of the line", but you want it to perform 3 major functions? A cell phone/pda/mini-computer will never do all three perfectly. You need to set priorities. What carrier do you plan to use? Some devices only work with certain carriers. What OS do you want for a PDA? Palm OS? PocketPC? Smart phone? BlackBerry devices have their own OS based on Java. Do you want a PDA-shaped device or a phone with PDA capabilities? What kind of web browsing do you want to use the device for, and what size screen would you be comfortable using?


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## Cadet (Dec 23, 2004)

I use the XDAII

http://www.mobiles2yourdoor.co.uk/o2-phones/xdaii/


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## JohnLF (Jul 24, 2003)

Have a look at the Nokia 9300, or 9500 if you want WiFi etc.
John


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## kiwiguy (Aug 17, 2003)

Check the cost of mobile data before you start browsing over a phone/PDA, unless you are a millionaire.

It is $10 per megabyte here (NZ), but as you don't give a country its hard to know if that is a valid comparison.

And I second the Treo 600/650 as probably being the best compromise between phone and PDA.


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## sprint BLOWS (Jun 9, 2005)

If you buy a Treo 600 buy insurance! I've had mine just over a year...correction...I'm on my fourth since these things break so often. DO NOT use Sprint. Their service department sucks for basic phones, they are totally useless when it comes to PDA phones. Palm will not help either. I've spent more time reconfiguring, updating, researching, replacing, etc than I've spent actually using it for other than basic phone service.

It's awesome when it all works, but that's been less than 30% of the time in my case. If you do some research you'll find many similar stories. Never ending SW "upgrades" create as many or more problems than they fix. Few fully test SW...in the PDA Phone world that's not true. I don't believe they test it at all.


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