HP Touchstone Charging Dock (for the HP TouchPad) Review

I managed to pick up an HP Touchstone Charging Dock (for the HP TouchPad) at a deeply discounted price during this past weekend  ("Black Friday" weekend sale) in Canada. Considering that the HP TouchPad was discontinued a long time ago and I still use mine mainly for reading PDF documents and checking my e-mail/Facebook (and watching YouTube videos), I didn't mind spending some money to get the HP Touchstone. I believe that the manufacturer's suggested regular price for the HP Touchstone Charging Dock when it was originally released (and HP had not decided to stop producing/selling their HP TouchPad) was $40.

The HP Touchstone Charging Dock looks like a typical stand for any tablet but it includes a USB cable which plugs specifically into the HP USB AC adapter (cylinder-shaped adapter). The USB cable must be plugged into the HP USB AC adapter and not to a computer or a laptop's USB port.

The charging unit works using a method called inductive charging. In order to charge the HP TouchPad, all the consumer has to do is place the HP TouchPad on the charging dock. You don't have to "plug" the HP TouchPad onto the HP Touchstone Charging Dock. Once the HP TouchPad is firmly on the HP Touchstone Charging Dock, the HP TouchPad will start to charge and within a minute or so, the date/time will appear on the HP TouchPad's display screen. There are 3 date/time themes so you can pick the one that you prefer.There are other themes that can be selected like a Facebook collage or for your HP TouchPad to scroll through pictures/images from your device.

In the short time that I've been using the HP Touchstone Charging Dock, I haven't tested whether the HP TouchPad takes takes longer to charge when it is on the dock as opposed to when it is plugged in directly to the USB cable. If it does take longer, it isn't a lot longer.

Having a charger at home (charger that came with my HP TouchPad) and having a charger at work (the HP Touchstone Charging Dock) is a big convenience since I use my HP TouchPad to read PDF documents/books.

If you have any questions regarding this blog entry, please don't hesitate to leave a comment in the comments section. Please note that the comments are moderated and any comment that contains a URL link (whether or not it is embedded) will automatically be flagged as being spam and will not be posted.

Palm TX (Palm T|X) Review

I've had my Palm TX (or Palm T|X) for about 2 years and I thought that I would write a review on it since it can still be purchased from some retailers, some private sellers, as well as on eBay.

I've been a PalmOS user for about 8 years. As part of my job approximately 9 years ago, I was given a Palm III for my personal/work use. After having it for approximately 1 year, I was asked to return it to the department when I transferred to a different department within the same company. In the 1 year that I was using my Palm III, I was relying on it heavily for appointments, contacts, etc.. I had also purchased some 3rd party programs and found that since I relied heavily on a PalmOS device, I purchased a Handspring Visor Deluxe. After about 2 years, using the Handspring Visor Deluxe, I upgraded to the Handspring Visor Prism and later purchase a VisorPhone handspring attachment for the Prism. When my Visor Prism got somewhat physically/cosmetically damaged), I purchased a Handspring Treo 600. I later sold the Handspring Treo 600 and upgraded to a Palm Treo 650 (Palm had since purchased Handspring). After getting the Treo 650, I found that I did not have a lot of RAM on the device for 3rd party applications so when I saw the Palm TX on special, I purchased it in order to use with my Palm GPS bluetooth module and TomTom Navigator software.

The Palm TX has bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and has a 320 x 480 screen resolution screen capable of approximately 64,000 colours.. It also has approximately 128MB of non-volatile flash memory where 100 MB of actual storage capacity. It has an SD slot which supports SD cards up to 2 GB (does not support SDHC cards). It runs the PalmOS v 5.4.9. For those of you interested in whether the Palm TX supports non-SSID broadcasting Wi-Fi access points, it does. Because of the enhanced/large screen resolution for a PalmOS device, I find the PDA to be somewhat large.

I occasionally will use my Palm TX for web browsing, RSS reading, and Slingbox viewing since even though it is possible for me to do these things with my Palm Treo 650 or my Palm Treo 680, generally, the GSM SIM card that I put in these smartphones don't have access to the carrier's data network and I don't really like swapping SIM cards. I also have access to Wi-Fi access points at home and at work. I will also use my Palm TX occasionally to watch videos (using a 3rd party program called Kinoma Player) and listen to MP3 (using the included pTunes). Since I have a few dictionaries (including some translation dictionaries) installed on it, I will sometimes use my Palm TX to look up words.

In terms of the construction of the Palm TX, I find that it is constructed very well. My only complaint about it (or at least mine) is that the on/off button on the upper right corner of the device seems a bit difficult to turn on or off. The button is slightly recessed and sometimes when I press the button, my Palm TX does not turn on or turn off. Because of this, when I want to turn on my Palm TX, I will generally use one of the 4 shortcut buttons on it.

For those of you interested in my experience with using the Palm TX and SlingPlayer Mobile for the PalmOS, I find that it works quite well. The only thing is that after a few minutes of viewing, the audio and video will go out of synch. This can be temporarily fixed by disconnecting from the Slingbox, waiting a few seconds, and then reconnecting to the same Slingbox again.

If you have any questions/comments regarding my comments/review on the Palm TX (Palm T|X), please don't hesitate to leave a comment in the comments section.

PalmOne Treo 680 Review

I've been a long time user/fan of the PalmOS platform and I've been using my Palm Treo 680 for approximately 2 years. My previous PalmOS based smartphone was a Palm Treo 650. Before that, I was using a Treo 600 and prior to the Treo 600, I was using a Handspring VisorPhone.

One of the reasons why I purchased my Treo 680 is because I had purchased/found a lot of programs over the years that I wanted to continue using. Even though my Treo 650 was not broken, the Treo 680 had dropped in price and I found that the amount of memory was limited in my Treo 650 (~32MB on the Treo 650 as opposed to ~64MB on the Treo 680).

The Treo 680 is a PDA with quad band (850/900/1800/1900 MHz bands) GSM phone functions. In terms of the carrier's data network, the Treo 680 supports GPRS and EDGE. It does not support 3G nor does it support WiFi. Out of the box, it does not have GPS capabilities but with the proper software and a bluetooth GPS module, the Treo 680 can be used as a GPS.

The Treo 680 runs the PalmOS version 5.4.9. The processor is the XScale processor and the display is 320 x 320 (~64K colors). It comes with approximately 64MB of non-volatile internal memory. It has an SD slot (on the side) which supports SD cards and SDHC cards up to 4GB. The camera is capable of taking pictures 640 x 480 in size with a 2x optical zone. In my opinion, the picture quality is not very good but I generally don't use my cellphones to take pictures unless absolutely necessary.

I find the PalmOS to be relatively stable and most users can find almost any program that they want (provided that the PalmOS hardware supports that feature). For example, if you are looking for a stock program that updates via the internet, your PalmOS hardware must be capable of accessing the internet.

The Treo 680 comes with the built-in standard PalmOS PDA programs (Contacts, Datebook/Agenda, Tasks, Memo/Notes, WorldClock, etc.). It also includes an MP3 playing program called pTunes Basic v3.09 as well as an Microsoft Office compatible program called "Documents To Go Ver 8". If you want to use the MP3 playing program and regular headphones, you will need a 2.5mm to 3.5mm adapter. There are also other programs including an internet enabled web applications like"Web" (which is the built-in PalmOS browser) and a built-in e-mail program. The Treo 680 synchronizes with a PC via a special PalmOne proprietary USB cable or via bluetooth. Certain built-in programs as well as third party programs have conduits which when the user performs a synchronization with a computer, the program will also access the internet to get the information (ex: stock quotes, RSS feeds, e-mail, etc.)

What I like about the Treo 680 is the abundance of programs available for it. I've collected quite a few programs over the 8 years that I've been using the PalmOS platform. I have various multilingual dictionaries, games, etc.

What I find lacking about the Treo 680 is that it doesn't have wi-fi. This means that the only way to access the internet is to use the cellphone service provider's data service since some providers (such as Rogers) lock the ability of using bluetooth to access internet via their customized firmware.

If you have any questions/comments regarding this blog entry, please don't hesitate to leave a comment in the comments section.