POWER IN YOUR PALM
 Feb 15th, 2002
Advantages:
Small, Light and very powerful !
Disadvantages:
Some dust can get under screen, which cannot be removed .
Recommendable:
Yes
Detailed rating:
Look & Feel
Memory / capacity
Comfort & Portability
Ease of use
Value For Money
more
  garyohallo1
About me:
I am going to do the Playstation 2 game reviews later. I have some other things to write about firs...
Member since:04.01.2002
Reviews:12
Members who trust:12
Review rated by 62 Ciao members on average: very helpful 
This review received a counterstatement by a party concerned
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We all love our first wage packet, don't we? Well, as soon as my first wage packet entered my hand, thousands of thoughts came into my head about how I could spend it. I had wanted a lap top computer for a long while, so I went out searching for one. The real reason I wanted one is so that I could have something to do on long journeys, and it is handy when you are at college. However, most of the laptop computers today cost more than a PC. I didn't have that much money, and so I looked for something a bit cheaper. I decided that a PDA would be better suited to my price range, and so I went in search of one of those instead. It didn't take me long before I had found the one I wanted. I was searching online at Amazon (as usual), and I saw the Hewlett Packard Jornada 568. It looked sleek and stylish and my first impression of it was that it looked like the sports car of PDA's. I didn't want to mess about looking for cheaper prices, so I basically bought it straight away! It cost me £498.99 from Amazon. This is quite a lot of money, but as I shop from Amazon quite a lot I trusted their prices to be quite low, and that the product would arrive safely. £498.99 is quite a lot to spend all at once, so make sure you really want the product before buying it. It may have been a lot of money, but I have not regretted it. This is one of the best things that I have ever bought. It is fun to mess around with at first, and is extremely helpful to me when I am at college. This would also be a great product for a businessman/businesswoman or just for someone that has too much money.
*~~THE HEWLETT PACKARD JORNADA 568~~*
The Hewlett Packard Jornada 568 is a PDA (personal digital assistant). It is a handheld computer, which can do basically what a computer can do. Obviously
it doesn't have as much power or memory. They are a handy little thing to have, especially if you are travelling a lot or if you want to bring some work to college or work.
*~~SPECIFICATIONS~~*
The specifications of a computer are often the most important part when buying. It is no different with a PDA, and so here is a list of the specifications of the Jornada 568.
MANUFACTURER........Hewlett Packard
OPERATING SYSTEM....Microsoft Pocket PC 2002
INSTALLED RAM.......64 MB
ROM.................32 MB Flash ROM
MEMORY DATA BUS.....103 MHz Memory Data Bus
PROCESSOR...........206 MHz 32-bit StrongARM
WEIGHT..............6.1 oz (173g)
WIDTH...............3.01 in. (76.5 mm)
HEIGHT..............5.20 in. (132 mm)
DEPTH...............0.68 in. (17.2 mm)
INPUT DEVICE TYPE...Touch Screen
BUILT-IN DEVICES....Microphone, Speaker, Display.
DISPLAY TYPE........3.5 in. Colour Reflective TFT LCD.
COLOUR SUPPORT......Up to 16 bits (65,536 colours)
MAX RESOLUTION......240 x 320 Pixels
EXPANSION SLOTS.....Compact Flash Type 1
BATTERY.............Rechargeable Li-Polymer Battery Pack
AUDIO...............Mono Speaker / Mono Microphone / Stereo Jack
CONNECTIONS.........Serial / IrDA at 115.2Kb / USB
PRICE...............£498.99 (Amazon)
*~~LOOKS~~*
As with all handheld devices, they need to be small and quite light. The Jornada 568 is very compact and lighter than many other PDA's. It only weighs 6.1 oz, and its dimensions are 3.01 x 5.2 x 0.68 (W x H x D). So as you can see it is small and light, which allows easier storage and use. As I said before, it looks like the sports car of PDA's. It has a stylish and compact design. The front is not overcrowded with buttons. In fact it only has 7 buttons on the front (which consist of 4 hot keys for access to the HP home menu, the address book, the calendar, and the to-do list and a navigation pad. Below the navigation pad is an action/return button) that are situated under the screen. There are more buttons on the side (record button and up/down buttons), and there is an earphones port (jack) for when you want to keep it personal. There is another jack for an AC adaptor. All the buttons are spaced out and specially designed to be easily accessed.
The actual screen is touch screen, and with the use of the pen provided you have easy access to everything. You can just think of the pen as being the mouse. You have to be careful though, because if you push too hard it may damage the screen. The pen is round and nylon tipped, so you shouldn't have to worry about damaging the screen that much. There is a little compartment in the top right hand corner of the PDA, which the pen can easily slide into. This keeps the pen safe and is hardly visible. The screen takes up most of the space on the front of the PDA. Leaving room at the bottom for the buttons. The Jornada 568 has a detachable plastic cover, which helps protect it when you are not using it. The cover only covers the front, which is the most important because of the screen that can get easily damaged. The main colour of it is silver (metal), however, a dark grey colour surrounds the screen (plastic), and curves round at the bottom. The cover is also a silver colour (but made of plastic), with a small HP logo on it. The plastic parts help keep the weight to a minimum.
One of the problems with the design is that dust can get under the screen. It is impossible to remove, but if you take good care of it and keep it covered, you should have no worries.
*~~DISPLAY~~*
The Jornada 568 has an incredibly sharp, reflective colour screen. You can see the screen just as easily outside, in bright sunlight, as you can inside. It is capable of displaying 16-bit colour (65,536). This allows for excellent picture quality. The screen is a bit smaller than some other PDA's, which means that the dot pitch is also smaller. This makes text and pictures look clearer. The screen has a sidelight, which can be adjusted by an onscreen slider. It has a sensor, and allows the PDA to automatically turn the light on or off.
*~~POWER~~*
The Jornada 568 uses a rechargeable Lithium Polymer battery. It can be removed from the back of the PDA. The battery will last about 14 hours after being fully charged. It also has a 3 Volt Coin Cell back up battery. This allows you to backup data onto a Flash RAM partition, which means that there is less chance of losing work.
The Lithium Polymer battery can be recharged either by plugging the cable directly into the bottom of the PDA, or by putting the PDA into a cradle that holds it while it is being charged, a lot like an electric toothbrush charger.
*~~SOFTWARE~~*
The Jornada comes with a wide range of software installed on it. It also comes with a CD, which you can install through your PC. You can also download software from the Internet. The software that comes with the Jornada 568 is: MICROSOFT POCKET PC 2002 INCLUDES:
Microsoft Windows for Pocket PC
Pocket Outlook (manages calendars and tasks)
Pocket Internet Explorer (browse Web Pages, Microsoft Mobile Channels)
Pocket Word (view and edit Word documents)
Pocket Excel (view and edit Excel documents)
Microsoft Reader 2.0 for Pocket PC (read electronic books)
Windows Media Player 8 for Pocket PC (listen to digital music)
MSN Messenger
Terminal Services Client
Note Taker
Voice Recorder
ActiveSync 3.5
Calculator
Solitaire
File Explorer
HP Jornada Settings, Backup, Home Menu, Task Switcher, Image Viewer
LandWare Omnisolve 1.01 (business and financial calculator)
CodeWallet pro v3
Access Panel Platinum CD INCLUDES:
Microsoft Software: ActiveSync Version 3.5
Internet Explorer (desktop version)
Microsoft Outlook 2002
Microsoft Pocket Money for Pocket PC (manage stocks and check account)
Microsoft Reader for Pocket PC and PC
Microsoft Reader eBooks
Microsoft Transcriber
Hewlett Packard software: MusicMatch Jukebox 6.0 (internet radio, record, organise and play music)
AudiblePlayer 2.0 for Windows and Pocket PC (listen to audio books and news)
PhatWare HPC Notes 3.05 Lite and Professional Trial (Create and organise notes)
Microchai (hp's smallest Java? application environment)
User Manual
Although many of this software sound the same as on the PC, it actually can be very different. I'll take Microsoft Word for example. It is nothing like on the PC. As you don't have a keyboard you would think it would be very hard to write anything, but actually it has been made quite easy. You can either use the pen to pick out each letter from a keyboard on the screen, or you can write each letter with the pen in a special box. It can recognise the characters and transfers the letter or word to the document. This does not work properly at the start, because it does not know your handwriting. It will get better as you go along and correct it. You need a lot of time to fiddle about with that. I just use the keyboard. The Internet Explorer is more or less the same. It allows you to view many web pages, check e-mails, etc. It also contains a download manager so you can download software onto the Jornada 568. I have not done this as I use the PC most of the time. I have not downloaded anything onto it either, but I did find some web sites that contain good software downloads for PDA's:
http://www.microsoft.com/mobile/pocketpc/downloads/default.asp http://download.cnet.com/downloads/0-10003.html?tag=dir
*~~ACCESSORIES~~*
Here are some of the accessories that you can get for the Jornada 568 and their prices (if possible. The ones that have prices were found online at http://www.hpstore.hp.co.uk):
Standard Battery Pack..........£38
A/C Adaptor ? multi-voltage....£29
Accessory Case.................£11
Serial Cradle..................£29
Stylus Pens....................£9
Pretec CompactFlash Modem......£180
USB Cable......................£21
Serial Cable...................£19
Leather Clip-on Pouch..........£34
Extended Battery Pack
PC Card Adaptor
Battery w/MMC Expansion
Targus Stowaway Keyboard
Smart Card Battery Pack
Dual Slot Charging Cradle
Car/DC adaptor
Leather Case
USB Cradle
Pocket Keyboard
HP Pocket Camera
Psion Modem
*~~SUMMARY~~* I haven't had any other PDA's so I have nothing to compare the HP Jornada 568 with. I am very happy with the Jornada 568. I have had no problems with it and it has been very helpful for me to use at college. It has 64 MB RAM, which is very good for a PDA. The Jornada 565 is exactly the same as the Jornada 568, except that the Jornada 565 has only 32 MB RAM. So if you don't think you will need a lot of memory, then the Jornada 565 would be great for you, and it is the cheaper option.
The Jornada 568 looks great, feels great and is great! It has been a great help to me, and I was no longer bored on long journeys. It has definitely proven to be worth the amount of money I spent on it. I would have liked it to be cheaper of course, but unfortunately it is a very expensive item.
*~~USEFUL WEBSITES~~* HEWLETT PACKARD UK SITE:
http://welcome.hp.com/country/uk/eng/welcome.htm
HEWLETT PACKARD UK STORE:
http://www.hpstore.hp.co.uk AMAZON UK SITE:
http://www.amazon.co.uk
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17.07.2003 00:55
Great op! I want one of these but way out of my price range! Matt
01.05.2002 18:45
Very Concise and detailed opinion.
28.04.2002 18:39
Thanks for the read. Zoe xx