CE is more than just a choice... it's a lifestyle

To some the Handheld PC is a godsend, and to others nothing more than a quaint museum toys, as legacy of a bygone age, to which more often than not they were never a part of.
To those of us who diligently remain within the community do we accept the problems that we experience day to day simply as a choice, or is it more apt to see it as a way of life?

After a run-in with a colleague Julio Ortiz explores his thoughts on whether his gravitation to CE world is indeed a lifestyle choice.

View: The CE Lifestyle

Interesting point of view that I understand only to well. I bought a J720 many moons ago after reading several rave reviews. At the time I was still running a 233 Mhz desktop with WIN98 and I thought a H/PC with 206 Mhz must be good. Sadly the software on the J720 wasn’t up to the job and I buried it in my desk amongst other redundant junk I had acquired over the years. Only recently after acquiring a new battery fairly cheaply I reactivated the J720, still the shortcomings had not disappeared. I joint this forum in the hope that software updates or patches would be available. Installing Linux maybe the way forward, but I have to admit what I have seen so far is not very promising. It appears far to complicated for users that have a limited knowledge of programming. This leads me to the view that we have to accept that the H/PC’s running CE are just toys and not replacements for the work environment.
I would love to own a H/PC with decent desktop compatible software and at least 4 hours battery life weighing less than 2 pounds.
I will be looking at the flybook A33i and OQO Model 01 in the near future. Maybe these new machines with a full version of Windows or Linux will provide the answer.
Until then I use my H/PC to write the odd letter and read PDF files.

I enjoyed reading Mr. Ortiz's views on this. I know that at some point, we all get the eye-rolling and the questions about using these devices.

Just today I happened to be at a local retailer (Staples) looking at notebook computers, and found myself looking through a small selection of cf flash cards on display. A salesperson came up to me, asking if I needed help. He had seen me eyeballing a "card finder" chart, and specifically the section on Jornada 680. He immediately began offering me cards for cameras and such, and so I had to explain to him that I was just curious as to what they had. After I explained to him what a j680e was, he seemed thoroughly dismayed and told me that he was sorry and he just didn't know the specs on the cards there, and why didn't I look at some of the more updated devices....blah blah (keep in mind, I didn't ask him in the first place). I gave him an E for effort!

For the most part though, when people see my various computing devices (esp. in action), they are very impressed and want to know where to get one. I know that if they had to search for drivers, patches, etc., they might be less impressed. For me though, it is a way of life.

Actually a lot of HPC users use these devices for serious work. I believe there are enough applications for it to replace a laptop for most people. Ok so maybe not replace it completely, but it should serve the main usage just fine. That is unless you have specific software requirements, in which case you're probably stuck with Windows anyway, and an HPC would be just as useless as an iBook.

The point of the article is not about how good or bad an HPC is. But it is more about who we are, and how we do things. Furthermore it is about who we are not.

I'm only a personal user (a student between semesters), but I find that my 790 - even with it's limited HPC2000 OS - has completely replaced my laptop and surpasses it in a number of ways.


I agree completely with the article - the HPC is indeed a way of life. My good net buddy (we all have one, don't we?) is a heavy PPC user, having moved from an Axim x5 to an x50v and constantly gloating on how many games he can play and what he can run on his shiny zippy little PPC.

I, however, care not. I've got a full(ish) keyboard, a larger more readable screen and having moved from a PPC myself I know what I'm missing and I know what I've gained. And while there are still options, I will continue to be an HPC user as long as I can be.


I think it's more an addiction, though.

In my opinion, I find the mouse/non touch screen models of hpc's more of a laptop replacement.... the transiton seems to be easier than going to a touch screen....

I have both and i do like the mouse operated one's better, size wise as well....and one thing ive noticed for out side viewing non touch screen versions view better, so to me its a better over all CE laptop replacement..anyway's..ive been using HPC's since 1999 and if it wasnt for the fiddling, i'd be bored with them....to me the tweaks, seeing if this works or can i get it working etc, is all in the fun.....!

what are you missing as a former PPC user?

about the original opinion (and the others)..

well i don't agree. i don't know most of the problems mentioned there as i don't really feel it's too much of a pain with a CE machine.. i've never felt so, except maybe the first couple of days, when no one was there to help me, but i figured out everything soon. and even then i was always sure it was going to work out. it just had to. and it did!

so, i have to make few compromises.
maybe i just don't expect too much from them, i don't view them as a full PC. or if i do, then the trick is that i don't use even my PC for everything it could be capable of. i don't use any external hard drives not even for my PC (now two of my CE devices could handle them but i don't care) and i don't want to use a dvd player for any of my hpc's these are just two examples from the article..
i admit finding a compatible bluetooth card was tricky but only because i live in hungary where i can find cards with only widcomm stack (and since then i can use even those cards with a nice hack).
i don't bother with activesync and save everything to CF, it (or a hard reset) is no big deal!
oh and as i said i don't expect too many things from an HPC, but there's still a lot i use them for! basically it is almost everything i do with my PC as well, except some (=few) more specific things but no need for them on the road (neither on my PC, only very rarely).
and others can say anything they want to, i don't care about that either...

... i just think hpc's have been created specifically for me!


edit: some more things.. yes it is a lifestyle, but not in that way that i have to accept it the way it is. i actually like that!

Edited by cmonex 2005-08-16 3:36 PM

Integrated wifi, a beautiful TFT screen, processing power, current software support, pocketability. I think that's the lot of them.

However, the battery life drove me insane. I had to carry a second battery with me at all times and I found myself limiting my usage of the device because of the shoddy battery life.

I can't say I've ever been happier than with the battery life on my HPC. Using Snappy!'s refurbished battery, I'm current sitting at 7 hours, 10 minutes and 15 (or so) seconds of usage, 1 day, 13 hours, 22 minutes and 11 seconds of suspend time - and between 40-50% battery remaining. That's simply amazing.

Edited by corporate 2005-08-16 3:33 PM

hehe, our opinions differ, i like the touch screen more.. but on a bigger device a mouse is more adequate.. still my favourite is touch screen!

yay, tweaking, yes i know what you feel there. i realized just the other day that if my sigmarion had an english OS, it would not be so interesting... i like that i have to tweak it a little!
so that's another reason why i'm not frustrated with hpc's when i have to do a little tweaking...

hehe, not bad, and what's the battery life if you do wifi all the time?
my refurbished battery (2400 mAh like yours) performs similarly!
and it is *very* important...

hm, tft is nice, but i still don't mind dstn screens (even after using the sigmarion! even though it has a very very beautiful screen )
support.. well i can find everything for an hpc too
oh and a pcmcia/cf wifi card often has better range ....

Battery life with wifi is about halved from my total ability, so at least 5 hours? To be honest, I've never gotten it all the way dead before getting to a charger. My backup battery hasn't been used once since I got the device.

Expansion options are better on this device than on my old x3i - even though I usually have to fill one slot with a wifi card of some sort, there are a lot more (and cheaper) options for CF/PCMCIA than for SD/MMC.

It's my lifestyle choice. The world of ce eliminates so many headaches associated with the normal computing world. I'm *not* a Microsoft drone, salivating over the next Windows release.

Let's start with speed. Since I can't buy a faster cpu or add more RAM I've learned to enjoy my ce speed. When I was a desktop user I was always wasting money buying faster systems or better video cards or more ram. I was in an arms race that I couldn't win, at any cost.

Then there's security. I stayed awake some nights wondering if my desktop was secure from attack, MS was issuing patches and updates faster than I could apply them. Worms and trojans were rampant and opening any email could be devastating. Constant virus updates, Spybot updates, hosts entries, ugh, it never stopped. Going online to do banking was traumatic. Am I really safe doing this?

I hated having software envy. It seemed like the day I had my desktop up to date and stable there was always a new software release that promised so much. So here we go again, back on the treadmill. Do I need more ram or a faster system? Bleh.

It was worse when I was shopping for new software to fill a need. Will it run on what I have? How does it compare against other products? what does it cost? Does it cause problems? The list is endless. So much energy and thought was required to pick a simple program for a simple task. Geez, there's probably a million programs out there to choose from. That's insane.

It was worse with demos. I could end up with 6 demos to burn DVD movies on my system at once. Each one had a learning curve and it's own nasties. When I was done and decided on a program I wanted to be completely rid of the others which took effort.

Finally, the time factor. Nobody is paying for the time it takes me to maintain a desktop/laptop. I can't count the hours I've wasted over the years doing all of the above.

I finally got it one day when I excused myself from a family function to spend the day reloading Windows. What the hell was wrong with me? I put this junk ahead of my family?

I want to pick up a computer, turn it on and instantly start using it without fear of attack or keyloggers or vicious email. I don't want to wonder if I should update something just for the sake of it.

I don't want to spend any more hours restoring or troubleshooting a deskop/laptop because it crashes or bluescreens for no fathomable reason. Especially after I've carefully maintained it and faithfully updated it.

When my desktop dies I have no plan to replace it. My g/fs desktop has the same specs so it can take over. When it dies, well, maybe Windows will be truly self-maintaining and stable then.

CE frees me from all the above nonsense. I tweak or fiddle with my hpc because I feel like it. I can trash and restore it on the go in under a minute. I waste little time with new software because there's little to chose from. Now that my hpc is set and stable, I can't forsee any major changes to it until it retires.

Everything I do on a daily basis is handled well by my hpc. When I'm done, instant off and my device is ready for another day.

Life is too short to live on the real Windows treadmill.

Edited by wallythacker 2005-08-16 6:15 PM

wally, do you use your HPCs (and PPCs) as a complete replacement to your desktop? Very interesting!




Myself, I still sit down at my desktop when I come home every day. I loathe that it needs to stay as a Windows machine to sync with my HPC (I look forward to the day when I can put *nix on both of them and save myself the hassle), but I still don't think I could live without my main box. The HPC is more of an extension of my PC, carrying my emails and contacts and vital documents with me everywhere.


That will all change when I get *nix on there though, I think.

Corporate, yes my hpc/ppcs have replaced my desktop for everything except burning disks and mass storage. If I could get CE drivers for an ethernet external disk I'd be a step closing to ditching my desktop.

One more very important tidbit.

If we're such archaic loosers then why is my 6651 *always* the center of attention at wifi hotspots? It's getting so I spend more time demoing it than enjoying my coffee.

Edited by wallythacker 2005-08-16 7:09 PM