HP iPAQ Pocket PC H5550

...It's a review of my HP (Hewlett Packard) iPAQ h5550 (h-5-5-50?) PDA (Personal Digital Assistant), which I bought a few weeks ago. Call it what you like, a Pocket PC, palmtop, PDA, iPAQ, or whatever; it's basically a handheld computer. This one is mostly silver with black at the top, has a large touch screen, eight buttons, a fingerprint scanner, and a place to store the stylus. You probably saw the picture. Sleek looking design, don't you think? ...
...give you a spare. Official HP accessories are expensive; however, you could just shop around and/or get unofficial stuff sometimes. There are lots of accessories for these though.

May take a bit of getting used to if you've never owned one like me. I mean, I didn't even know how to take out the SD Card properly! I thought I was supposed to pull it out when I was supposed to push it down for it to spring up. For the first few weeks, ... more

Thanks for clicking! It's a review of my HP (Hewlett Packard) iPAQ h5550 (h-5-5-50?) PDA (Personal Digital Assistant), which I bought a few weeks ago. Call it what you like, a Pocket PC, palmtop, PDA, iPAQ, or whatever; it's basically a handheld computer. This one is mostly silver with black at the top, has a large touch screen, eight buttons, a fingerprint scanner, and a place to store the stylus. You probably saw the picture. Sleek looking design, don't you think? Expensive looking too! Main reason I wanted a PDA was to use it as a GPS (Global Positioning System) or Satellite Navigation since I keep getting lost when driving in areas I don't know that well. Only thing with using a PDA as a GPS is that you would also need to purchase a GPS receiver unit, software and normally, a memory card to store the maps and this isn't cheap!

H5550 COMES WITH…

You get a docking cradle with USB and Serial connectors, AC power adapter, AC power plug adapter to connect to the PDA, two styluses (one already slotted in the PDA), Quick Start Guide, and warranty documents. It also comes with a CD containing the Microsoft ActiveSync, Outlook 2002, and some other bits of software (some are only trial versions). The manual is also found on the CD in PDF format. I know some people prefer hard copies but this saves paper and probably lowers the cost a bit so I'm all for it! The manual is quite thorough and covers pretty much everything you'd need to know about the PDA including illustrations.

JUST OUT OF THE BOX

After charging up your iPAQ h5550 (usually overnight) and the first time you turn on the device, you are guided through a screen alignment procedure. You simply tap the centre of crosses a few times after it moves. It then takes you through a short exercise on how to do the equivalent of click and right-click on the PDA, as you would on a desktop PC (tap, and tap and hold in this case). After that, it's the Time Zone setting. After the initial settings, you can change various other settings like the backlight, volume, themes, backgrounds, sounds, etc. The Operating System (i.e. Windows) is pre-installed onto the IPAQ into the ROM. You do not ever have to install this even if you reset it to factory defaults. The Operating System software provided is Microsoft Windows Mobile 2003 for Pocket PC, which is just a smaller version of Microsoft Windows. The 'Start' menu is at the top left-hand corner.

You can connect the PDA up to your computer via the docking cradle but before you can do that, you must install the ActiveSync software first, or your computer blows up! (Just kidding) If you don't install ActiveSync first, your PDA won't EVER work with your computer (or so the packaging and manuals say all over the place). I reckon a clean install might do the trick but I'm not going to bother trying. You will need Outlook 2002 (included) or above to be able to synchronise stuff like your inbox, notes, appointments, etc. Outlook 2002 requires 'activation' (that annoying thing that needs to be done with Windows XP), where you have to connect to the Internet to activate the software so that you can use it for more than 30 days. Software requiring activation can normally only be activated once but you can get them re-activated if you had to do a clean install of everything, by giving the software vendor, in this case, Microsoft, a bell. It's to stop piracy of the product but is more work if you need to reinstall. I already have Outlook 2003 so I didn't have to use the 2002 version included.

I'm using a USB connection to connect the cradle to my computer, because it's faster than the serial connection, which the cable also has. As soon as I placed the PDA into the docking cradle, my computer synchronised with the PDA. It also asked for the password I had set up on the PDA but I checked 'Remember Password' so it wouldn't bug me again. All went well. When I connect the iPAQ to my PC (using the cradle), the iPAQ plays a four beep tone to acknowledge my PC and then synchronises the appointments, calendar, emails, etc. You can choose what to synchronise.

WHY THE h5550?

The main reason I bought it is because I know people who have this model already and they say it's one of the best. I've also read reviews on it and most were generally positive. The iPAQ has a clock speed of 400MHz, has 128MB of RAM and a 48MB ROM. That's Random Access Memory and Read Only Memory, for those who don't know. RAM is the memory a computer uses to run programs. ROM is the type that can only be read and not written to. "Clock speed" refers to the processing power. Although these figures sound low, they are pretty good when you're talking about PDA's. They're some of the reasons why I chose this one. The other reason is because this one is flexible since it has built-in Bluetooth, which means I can buy extra toys to use with it (=D) and Wi-Fi, meaning I can access the Internet if there's a Wireless Access Point nearby (i.e. My house, Starbucks, other coffee shops with Wireless Internet). I can even go on Ciao with it! The screen's a bit small though, so lots of scrolling.

I actually compared it with the, newer, hx4700 at the time. The hx4700 has a 624MHz processor and 192MB onboard memory. That's 128MB ROM and 64MB RAM. The processor is 224MHz faster than the h5550 so that's a big improvement. The screen is bigger (much sharper too), and the battery life is longer. The hx4700 supports CF (Compact Flash), CF II, MMC (Multimedia Card) as well as SD (Secure Digital) memory cards but it does not have a fingerprint scanner! This is a shame because it's a cool and spiffy feature. Instead, they've also gotten rid of the big button in the middle and chucked a pad there. Also, the operating system is the Windows Mobile 2nd Edition. I've had a play around with the hx4700 and the screen has a much higher resolution than the h5550. Everything is MUCH sharper. I just don't like the touchpad and tiny buttons on it.
When deciding which PDA to buy, it was neck and neck between the hx4700 and the h5550. In the end, the victor was the h5550 because of the fingerprint scanner and the big button in the middle.

FEATURES AND CAPABILITIES

You can think of the h5550 as a miniature computer, because well, that's what it is! You hold it in one hand, and the stylus in the other to tap the screen to navigate, as it has a touch screen. The h5550 fits nicely in my hand. You don't even need big hands to hold onto it, as it's quite small at 8.4 cm x 1.6 cm x 13.8 cm. Screen is 3.8 inches when measured diagonally. You can use your fingers to navigate too, if you don't mind getting your fingerprints and dirt on the screen and even risk scratching it. The buttons can also open up programs. You can set these to open what you want.

Since it's a computer, the h5550 has many, many uses. Some of the software included allows you to use it as a clock, calculator, notebook, voice recorder, calendar, address book, and so much more! You can even buy software to turn your iPAQ into a remote control to use with your TV/VCR/DVD/etc using the built-in infrared. You can use it for word processing, and spreadsheets since Microsoft Word and Excel are included. Something about word processing is that since the iPAQ doesn't have a keyboard (can be purchased separately) so you need to use the onscreen keyboard. You tap on the keys to type but the buttons are quite small. It is possible to increase size of the keys but fewer keys will be shown so I prefer the smaller onscreen keyboard. I often miss the keys that I want and get the one next to it but I suppose I can practice and improve my accuracy. This'll take some practice. If you don't like to type this way, you can also use character recognition, where you write a character or words and it recognises your character or words depending on whic you mode you use, and converts it into a printed version. I find this slower so I'd rather use the keyboard for now until I practice a bit more. If using the 'Note' feature, for taking notes (obviously), you can just handwrite your notes without them being converted.

The h5550 has a built-in fingerprint scanner, which I think makes it stand out from other PDA's in the IPAQ range, or any other PDA range for that matter. I love this feature! It's really impressive and sure to amaze your friends. Truly something any gadget-fanatic would love to play with. The scanner is located directly below the middle button but it's discreet since the scanner isn't obtrusive. People probably wouldn't know that it was a fingerprint scanner if they weren't told. To use it, you simply access the 'Password' settings section. There you can choose whether to use fingerprint protection and/or use a 4 digit PIN number or password. If you choose the fingerprint option, you are asked to do some 'Fingerprint Training'. This is optional but is recommended so that you can get some practice. This involves you scanning your fingerprint and you have to get 6 out of 8 successful scans before you can move onto the next stage. After that, it's 7 out of 8 successful scans. Takes a little practice since it has to be just right or the scans show up funny and will not be accepted.

After the training, you can choose which finger's fingerprint you wish to store into the iPAQ (you can store all fingers if you want). I'd recommend doing that if you choose 'fingerprint only' protection because you won't have a PIN or password as an alternative method to get in. If you only enrol one finger, then you can only use that finger's print to get in. Now what if you cut your finger? You won't be able to get back in! Anyway, once stored, you can use any of the fingerprints stored to access your iPAQ. You can also set the number of login attempts allowed. I don't know what happens after the maximum allowed login attempts. Might lock me out or something so I won't be trying that! Doing a Hard Reset doesn't remove the PIN's, passwords and fingerprint information so that's not a way to overcome the protection.

Sometimes I find it difficult to cancel tasks or close programs that have started. For example, certain windows, even after I've pressed the cross to close them, it keeps popping back asking what I want to do because it can't find for example, a Bluetooth device. This is the case when I load up TomTom Navigator 3 (a GPS program). It asks me to select a Bluetooth device, if I clicked Cancel, it goes back to the Desktop but it loads itself again. I think the operating system is to blame. Another thing is that, you can access the Internet on the iPAQ if there is a wireless network (Wi-Fi) within range. It supports the 802.11b Wi-Fi standard, which 'supposedly' capable of transferring 11Megabits/s. For this, there would have to be a Wireless Access Point (WAP) near by within around 50 metres (164 feet), but this depends on the surrounding area.

My iPAQ has crashed on me a few times. Luckily, it doesn't happen excessively so I'm not too bothered about it. Only happened occasionally and I'm not sure what causes it to crash. Too many programs running at the same time maybe? When a program is open and I try to close it, it's unresponsive. When that happens, I reset it but pressing the reset button underneath the iPAQ. Should I say that Microsoft is to blame? Another problem is that I've experienced times when it doesn't turn on when I press the power button. This can happen if you've just performed a 'Hard Reset' or if you battery is completely dead or has been taken out but it's happened to me even when it was fully charged with the battery in place, and when I had not performed a hard reset. To resolve this, I simply press the reset button. By the way, a 'Hard Reset' is when you hold the bottom two buttons and the reset button at the same time for the iPAQ to reset itself back to how it was when you first got it (factory default). This means you lose all files and programs installed on it though so be sure to back up and synchronise your iPAQ with your PC so that your appointments, notes, contacts, etc. are also on your PC. Sometimes, the iPAQ seems to turn itself on when it's on the cradle. Can be annoying if you want it switched off. I think it has something to do with ActiveSync. No big deal though.

You can expand the memory so you can store more programs/games and/or files, with the use of SD memory cards. Unfortunately, this is the only type that the h5550 can use. The price of these have dropped, and are only slightly more than CF cards but I would have liked a bit more flexibility and would have liked to be able to use other types of memory cards as well. Without an SD card, the onboard memory is hardly enough for anything other than a few programs/games/files so it's worth investing in an SD Card to increase the storage.

My main quibble with the h5550 is the battery life. They claim that it can last an average of 10 hours but with continuous use, I estimate it's more like 4 hours. There isn't always a wall socket or USB port about so battery life is always an important issue to consider before deciding on a portable device. If I turn on Wi-Fi and/or Bluetooth, then the h5550 uses a lot more power (especially with Wi-Fi, which can drain it). Speaking of using more power, the iPAQ makes a marvellous mp3 player and it even comes with Windows Media Player. Annoyingly though, playing mp3's with Windows Media Player can also drain the battery because the screen will remain 'on' whilst you listen to music. This is still the case without the backlight. Okay, you don't really need the display when you're listening to music. All you need is the sound output and the buttons to control the player. My solution to the problem was to use GSPlayer, which lets you switch off the display whilst playing music. Excellent feature! Now why couldn't Microsoft think of that? There's a headphone socket so I can plug in my headphones so I don't get a punch in the face for disturbing people on the train. There's also a vibrate function just like a phone so it can remind you of appointments this way. Excellent!

You are also able to play

You can buy a spare battery but they're expensive. You can also lower the brightness of the screen and the backlight's settings and turn off Wi-Fi and Bluetooth when you don't need them to prolong the battery life but it's still a bit annoying. At least the charging time is only around two and a half hours, which isn't too long.

It 'seems' quite durable. It's flown out of the cradle in my car while going over a speed bump straight onto the floor, luckily not landing on anything hard but it still works. Only thing is the screen is quite fragile and can easily scratch or even crack of you drop it on something. If you cracked it, you'd have to pay for an expensive replacement.

BUYING

The price of this particular model is quite high at £370.49. I got mine off the back of a lorry….errr… I mean I bought it online from E-Atay, whom also have a shop in/near Tottenham Court Road in London but that price is their Web Exclusive price so it'll probably cost more in store. That's also the cheapest I managed to find this PDA for without having to resort to eBay. Ebuyer are selling it for just over £480 after they have added VAT. You can find this model new and old on eBay for even less than that but I thought it would be best to get a new one with a warranty. Some eBay sellers don't honour their warranty so didn't want to go that route. They've stopped manufacturing it so it would be harder to find in shops but can be found online from the places mentioned.

ACCESSORIES

There are loads of accessories for the iPAQ. Pity most of them don't come with the PDA when you buy it! You do get the docking cradle, holster, power adapter (and converter), a spare stylus, but that's it. You can get stuff like car mount kits, screen protectors, cases, sync cables, batteries, styluses, SD cards, memory expansion jackets, aluminium cases, and much, much more. I do like the fact that it comes with a holster (with belt clip) though. I mean, it's an essential accessory to carry around and protect your iPAQ while you're out and about. I mean, sometimes even digital cameras don't come with a camera case so I think they made a good decision to include the holster. The holster that it came with is made of leather and was made in India. It's black and has a clip to clip your iPAQ to your trousers or belt. The cover contains a magnet instead of a button/clip to secure itself so it doesn't flap about when you're moving about. I quite like this holster since it seems to be of good quality. It feels 'tough' and unlike a certain products with clips, this one clips to my belt securely, with virtually no chance of it coming off and falling to the ground accidentally. I would have liked for it to expose the screen and buttons without me having to take the iPAQ out so that it is more convenient but replacement cases/holsters can be purchased separately.

I've noticed that the official stuff is very expensive. I think they could have at least included a sync/charge cable so that you don't have to carry the cradle around if you want to hook up your PDA to i.e. a PC at work, and charge it without having to carry around the adapter and without the need of a spare wall socket. Something that I would have liked is a screen protector to err….protect the screen from scratches, fingerprints, etc. Keeping the PDA in good condition means it'll be worth more when I come to sell it in the distant future. Screen protectors can also be expensive, even though it's just a sheet of transparent plastic. I saw some (not for my model) selling for £24.99 each down Tottenham Court Road, which is a bit excessive. It will probably be cheaper if you shop online and/or buy unofficial stuff. I reckon they could have thrown in a 128MB SD card. They can be pretty cheap nowadays if you know where to shop but still, it would be nice to not have to buy it separately.

THE GOOD

It's powerful with it's high specifications, and flexible with it's range of wireless capabilities (i.e. Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, Infrared). Bluetooth lets you connect all sorts of devices to the iPAQ, broadening your options for accessories. Wi-Fi lets you use the Internet where there are Wireless Access Points. I hear some Starbucks branches have wireless Internet. The infrared can also be handy for transfer files to a laptop or computer with infrared receiver. Can also be a fun substitute for your remote control, as I had mentioned before.

Being a computer, there is a lot of software to choose from. Software can be downloaded for free or bought. There aren't as many programs as desktop computers but it's still enough to keep you busy. There are plenty of applications for leisure (i.e. Media Players, Games) as well as useful ones (i.e. GPS Navigation) for the iPAQ. Possibilities are endless! It makes a blinding mp3 player.

It's good that it came with a holster and a spare stylus. Sometimes, companies can be a bit stingy and may try to make you buy things separately. There are lots of accessories that the iPAQ doesn't come with but I'm glad it came with 'something'.

The specifications for this device are high. Even though it's not at the top now, it's still pretty good compared to many others. Also, it's a great gadget to show off!

THE BAD

Battery life isn't that great at only around four hours continuous use. Activating the Wireless Networking (Wi-Fi) function DRAINS the battery. Activating Bluetooth isn't as bad but still uses more power.

It can crash sometimes. Well, it IS a computer, and it IS running a Microsoft operating system. Can be frustrating but can't really do much about it. It also lacks memory for viewing large images. For example, I have a London Underground tube map jpeg image on my SD Card but my h5550 cannot view it at 75% or above zoom. If I try, it says it does not have sufficient memory. Also, you can't play certain video formats like .AVI with Windows Media Player. It needs to be wmv but you can play other formats by installing different media players (i.e. Pocket Real Player for rm files and Pocket MVP for avi, mpg, etc, ). These are all freeware, which is good news but you can find shareware and probably retail too. I find that PocketDivX (for playing avi) gives ALWAYS gives an audio error and doesn't play avi movies. Probably not unless you have one that's encoded in a particular way. When playing movies, there's the problem of storage, processing speed and screen size. Video files can be quite big and you would need quite a bit of storage to store them and the internal storage is not much use so it has to be via memory cards. When playing larger video files, there's the problem of the video being jerky. Most likely because the processor isn't fast enough or it can't read the data quickly enough. Tiny movie files are not affected but larger ones are annoying jerky. Lastly, the screen is smaller and playing a full sized movie file you got off your PC may be a bit too much for the PDA's screen. I've found that a lot of it is 'cut off' because it doesn't fit. I would have thought that the player (been using Pocket MVP) would be able to shrink it down enough but I was wrong. With these problems, the h5550 is not a very good video player. Fair enough, it wasn't meant to be one so it's nothing major.

The h5550 only takes SD cards unless you buy an expansion jacket so you can use CF and CF II cards, but the jacket costs around £80. Just SD cards are fine though, so long as you get a big enough capacity one to store all your stuff.

The screen is a bit small for normal web browsing, as I've found out by loading up the Ciao website on it. I don't think there's much that can be done about this but I think using a laptop would be better for web surfing, if you had to have a portable computer. The iPAQ is still better than using a WAP mobile phone though! However, I do find that the speaker isn't very loud.

I did find that I could not use Windows Messenger, which is included with the operating system. It says it's not the correct version or something and I don't know why this is, since it ought to be, as it came with it. I might just need a software update off the net to sort this out. Very odd!

The stylus holder turns out to be a bit annoying. You push the stylus down to pop it out. It seems great and convenient but I've found that I often accidentally pop it out while I have the PDA in my pocket or while I the PDA clipped to my trousers/belt. This means I'm more likely to lose the thing. No wonder they give you a spare. Official HP accessories are expensive; however, you could just shop around and/or get unofficial stuff sometimes. There are lots of accessories for these though.

May take a bit of getting used to if you've never owned one like me. I mean, I didn't even know how to take out the SD Card properly! I thought I was supposed to pull it out when I was supposed to push it down for it to spring up. For the first few weeks, I've been using tools to pull it out because I found it difficult. Now if someone saw me, I'd look a right wally. Also, you may pick up on new things with the software after playing around with the software a bit. I'm still finding out new things even after a few weeks of using it.

Lastly, try not to let the power run out completely. If so, you may have trouble starting up the iPAQ again! Not impossible but it doesn't seem to even charge until after a hard reset (which erases everything).

VERDICT

I can recommend the HP iPAQ h5550 to those who have the cash (because it's not cheap at £370-£480), to people who like their gadgets, executives, and those who need a flexible and powerful PDA. If you just want a PDA to use as a GPS and/or use it as an organiser, then I would recommend a cheaper one. You can get new iPAQ from £100-200. Sometimes even less if you look on eBay. However, if you wanted something with more memory, and faster processor and/or that supports a wider range of memory cards, then you might want to consider getting the hx4700 instead. Also, if you want the best quality picture, then the hx4700 would be a better option because the h5550's display, although good, isn't exceptional. You still see the 'lines'. The display seems obsolete when put next to the hx4700.

Aside from the display not being as good as the hx4700's, the h5550 still holds its own. The h5550 is intended for executives, businessmen/women, (and strange people like myself), which is why the price is higher than most other PDA's in the range so I can't really complain too much about the price. I still think it's a very good PDA overall. The fingerprint scanner is still just too cool though!

Overall, I give the HP iPAQ h5550 an 8/10.

Thanks for reading!
 

...less