I've had my Palm Zire for around about two years now and it was great value for money when I got it (£20 in the bargain basement section of Woolworths) and I have used it on and off every day since. The software that comes pre installed is quite useful and it is very easy to find additional software on the internet.
The unit itself ships with a CD containing the Palm Desktop software for synchronising the Zire with the computer, which means that if you lose one zire, you can simply buy another Palm handheld and the information that was on your zire can be copied to that very easily. The unit also contains a usb cable and a protective screen.
The zire is very small and will fit into most pockets without leaving a massive bulge. The internal memory isn't very good (2MB) and the screen is not backlit, but if you only want something to save phone details and your appointments on, the Zire can more than cope with those tasks. The range of fonts isn't great but all the text can be enlarged. There are five buttons on the bottom of the machine, the power button, two 'quick launch' buttons which are set by default to open the date book and the phone book as soon as they are pressed, but it is possible to reconfigure them to your favourite applications, and the scroll buttons, which when the zire is off, pressing the up button displays the time for a few seconds.
The input is done with a stylus, and it can recognise most letters as people would normally write them. There are some exceptions, but there is the option of putting up an onscreen keyboard in any application that requires writing and you simply tap the stylus on the letter you wish to type.
The battery life lasts for weeks as long as you don't use it heavily (by that I mean you don't have it on all the time playing games) but it uses an inbuilt rechargeable battery and the battery can be charged by either using the supplied power cable or by connecting the unit up to a pc.
I've only given this three stars as it is basic, for people who do not want the gizmos and the gadgets that are available on all the other PDAs on the market.
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Handheld - 128 MB RAM - Screen: 4 in inch - Display: TFT active matrix - CPU: XScale PXA310 - Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi - Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.0, Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.0 Classic
Oct 30th, 2008
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