High-End Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs)

Apple Computer's Newton was the first personal digital assistant (PDA) to make headlines, but since then a slew of others have come along. PDAs are principally useful for businesspeople who travel frequently and who need to do mobile communicating and other on-the-road tasks. Prices new range from around $400 up to more than $ 1 600, de­pending on the amount of memory installed and the kind of wire less services ordered. (Older versions may be found at discount for as little as $200.) Many have pen-based input only.

One experienced computer journalist, Phillip Robinson of the San Jose Mercury News, divides PDA tasks into three main categories: (1) delivering information (as a reference source), (2) communicating information (faxes and e-mail in and out), and (3) handling information (accepting your input and organizing it). "Any PC or Mac can do all three, if you add the right software and training," he says. "No PDA can." This is because—being the size of a video­tape cassette or smaller—they don't have the processing power or the software options.

Most PDAs depend on pen input, although a few have miniature keyboards. All run on AA or AAA batteries or on their own special battery packs. Beyond that, general fea­tures of high-end PDAs are as follows:

1. All PDAs contain an address book.

2. PDAs also contain a calendar or appointment man­ager for scheduling appointments. Most have alarms that will signal you before a scheduled event.

3. PDAs usually contain spreadsheet programs or make them available.

4. Probably the most important feature: All high-end PDAs have a communications link. Some are wireless; others provide a cable modem, so that you can exchange electronic mail and faxes, connect with in­formation services such as America Online, get news and weather reports, and so on. Be sure there's a connectivity kit (usually a cable and a software program) that will work with your Macintosh or PC. It's a lot easier, for example, to type your address lists on a full-size keyboard, then transfer them to your PDA.

Date: 2015-04-20; view: 1038