What do you use your HPCs for?

I was wondering what you all use your HPCs for in case it might give me ideas for new uses for mine.

I use one (up to today the Jornada 720, but just switched to the MP790 since I had virtually never used it) for to do lists I make in Excel for the businesses I run and leave it in front of my PC screen, that way I can view my to do lists on the HPC screen and do the work on the PC without having to switch windows (if I were viewing the Excel file on my PC). I'm thinking of getting a new MP900 though as the build quality of the MP790 is very cheap compared to the MP900, but both MP900s I had bought had so many hardware failures they were all but useless, but I know I'd really like a working MP900.

I use my Casio A-20 to calculate things in Excel for my businesses and I made an Excel sheet on it to calculate my soap batch sizes for my soap business, I take it with me and input which molds I want to fill and it tells me how much of each ingredient I need to fill the selected molds.

All the other Windows CE devices I use are Palm Size PCs for uses where that form factor is more convenient such as general to do lists (the considerably taller screen size allows for more items to be viewed at once) and for when I want the screen to always be visible without having to open a lid. I use a Casio E-100 next to my MP790 in front of my PC for general to do lists, a Nino 300 my bed side table as an alarm clock and to do list for things I think of before bed, and a Compaq Aero 1500 in the kitchen for recipes.

Also last year I copied my website files to a CF card and I would go on a bike ride and stop in a park to work on my website on my MobilePro 700 in the sun and fresh air but haven't done that this year.

Any ideas for uses for any of my other HPCs? I have 7-8 that are just collecting dust.

Thanks


Edited by aab 2013-09-09 2:43 PM

I don't use mine for anything really...I just play with them from time to time.

Back when I was a full time college student, I used my MP790...later MP900 every day. We had a pavilion in the library and you could use it to send via infrared, your assignments to your handheld, be it an HPC or pocketpc. I also used it between classes to write drafts with or in the library. I never had to be dependent on finding an open computer.

Plus you already know the instant on/off thingie. Great not having to wait for it to boot to do something with it. Plus small enough I could use it in a science lab or wherever.

I use Sigmarion 3 for texting, a bit of painting in Pocket Artist and seldomly because of Softmaker Office 2010 which handles .???x files. And sometimes for mobile access to USB drives.

I still use HPCs (MobilePro 890 and 790) as my daily organizers, and for taking notes in meetings. I also use an iPaq 110/Celio Redfly combination. I tend to go back and forth between the HPC and PPC. But I find the HPCs to still be very useful - far more useful than the iPad provided by my employer, at least for productive work.

I use a MobilePro 700 for writing primarily. It also finds use in astronomy when camping and occasionally listening to OTR MP3s on those trips. I also use a Casio 2400U-CF for the same purpose (with an iBIZ KeySync keyboard). In some ways the Casio is superior to the MobilePro – better screen visibility in low light and there is no hinge (the Achilles heel of H/PCs ). It’s drawback, to some, might be the odd screen resolution (480x240) which means not everything will run, but it doesn’t bother me.



I think that’s very cool. It’s nice to see older equipment still playing an active role. On another list that I’m on (Newtontalk) there was one guy who used a Newton 2100 to run his business. (And there is also the very cool story about Sir Chris Bonington climbing Sepu Kangri in Tibet with a Newton 130 he used to file updates and photos to a web site. I love equipment being used like that.) (See a writeup on the story at http://myapplenewton.blogspot.ca/2009/06/apple-newton-climbs-tibetan-mountain.html )



I tried that but it didn’t work out. Nowadays my lists are on paper in a nice, thin, leather Filofax notebook (written with a handmade pen given to me by my wife) (yes, I’m spoiled).



Very interesting. Are you writing in straight text or using an editor (bUSEFUL’s HTML Editor or BnKSoftware’s HtmlEdit)?



I’m in the same boat, except that I have about 30 PDAs gathering dust. I no longer use my PDAs (with the exception of the aforementioned MobilePro 700 and the Casio 2400U-CF, as well as a TRGpro). I’ve posted them for sale locally and have sold a couple of the Newtons. One of these days I’ll get around to posting them on eBay or here.

Rick


Edited by Richard Plume 2013-09-12 12:53 AM

I've rediscovered my J720's, which of course forced me to go and buy 2 728s (the first is fine, but without the promised screen condition; the second one is as close to mint as you can get with a 13-year-old machine).

Once I tinker with RedGear and NetFront and Egress (a great RSS app), I have working micro laptops. With mowser and other jiggles of the handle, I can surf the modern web, get/send email, download complete news articles for off-line, word process via TextMaker, sync contacts/calendar w/ Google, etc. Things are just slower and like vampires, these devices have to avoid direct sunlight.

On a desert island, I would choose first my Mobilon 4100 for the obvious reasons (though maybe a Psion 5mx if I was truly off-line), and I would choose either device over a laptop. In the real world, I'll go w/ the J728, whose capabilities, esp w/ 64mb RAM, still amaze me.

Jake

I use my HPJ720 primarily for typing on the go, I write a lot of kiddies' books and do book compiling, so I need to have a mobile unit with enough power to last me a full day. When on the road, a hardware keyboard beats every smartphone or tablet handsdown. I love ny Jornada.

HP 680

Typing Fan Fiction stories, also checking FF from other's on pocket word, fooling around, keep a full address book, use it as the best alarm clock ever (over a week you don't need to wake up at same time each day) Play a nice tetris game on the go, do advanced calculus, Terminal to anything...

No use right now, but I'm hanging on to them as I may have enough time in the future to do some repairs on them. The J720 in particular, has a faulty screen cable, and may be worth my time as the device still has usefulness today.

However, I regret not having jumped on the software bandwagon earlier, as I missed out on some of the best titles like Textmaker, IrcCE, and some games. Even five years ago I had a few apps that I'm not sure I'll be able to find again, my install files got lost in time.

Not sure why I didn't share this earlier, here's the last experience I had with my MC16 when I was experimenting with rocking a classic phone. You may have to skip towards the end to see the HPC segment. The hardware and software still works for the purpose, which is remarkable given how far you would expect cellular data technology to have advanced by now. I'm still considering doing the same thing with my J720 once I get it sorted and, combined with the final WM Opera Mini, would still be functional today. But it depends on how much I value physical keyboards over touch input. For now, I can live with my phone, but it's definitely not suitable for making posts like these. Phones with slide-out keyboards are often too bulky to be used as a phone, and most of the candybars sport screen size compromises.

An ideal setup IMO would be a modern variant of the T9-keyboarded smartphone. The last true device of this nature was the Nokia N86 of 2009, running S60v3, which is no longer supported by most large software vendors. The last notebook PCs with instant-on were made in the mid-2000s. Instant-on has been replicated by far superior software of today but it hasn't made it's way down, properly, to form factors of yesteryear. Or at least, the devices that have made it out were made to a very limited market. If what's in this paragraph could somehow be realised then you have my ultimate setup.

Edited by Paspie 2014-01-09 12:21 PM

If you have a list of your lost apps Paspie, perhaps we can find them from the community and get them into the SCL in the process.

Well this site comes to mind, can't find any containing software in the SCL. Given the (C) sign at the base of the page the developer may need to be contacted first.

The rest are either proprietary or that I have forgotten. Some of my unpublished, disused videos might reveal some software I used to use, so I'll get back once I've looked through them.

Well for whatever reason the screen decided to start working again. Just filling it up again with Opera, nPopUK, and a few games, it should make a decent substitute for my HTC Universal when I want a keyboard at hand.

Edited by Paspie 2014-01-13 5:43 PM

It was probably just being tempermental Paspie...probably jealous of your HTC...it felt...abandoned and left out...

You may want to open the 720 up at some point and check if the cable's connection to the motherboard is a bit loose. Be gentle with it in the meantime as even jarring it a little may cause the display to go out again.

Paperweights.

The last serious use was a trip to Cuba in 2007. At night while waiting for the entertainment to start I used Excel on my 720 to map out a comprehensive table of welding data, input amps, output amps, watts used, wire feed speed, literally everything at a glance for MIG based welding.

Since then, nothing.

Last year I bought a Blackberry playbook. It has been the best computer item I've ever spent $100 on.

I regret not selling my hpc items when they had some value.