Advice for a PDA

[Eric714]

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Hi everyone,

I'm in the process of researching different PDA's to buy before I start rotations. I was wondering if anyone out there had any comments, advice, etc. on what to buy. The factors I've been considering are: Palm v. PocketPC, color v. mono, and how much memory.

Thanks your help!
Eric

 

[drchris33]

Eric--
I have a Handspring Visor and I really like it. I will be a MSI this fall and I have already downloaded tons of programs for medicine.
The best website for a lot of free programs is:
<a href="http://www.healthypalmpilot.com" target="_blank">www.healthypalmpilot.com</a>

I have a 16 MB memory; that is plenty. Also you can get an expandable memory stick for it as well.
Hope this helps

Chris

 

[PTjay]

I have a Palm M500 and love it. I bought the folding full size keyboard and now am able to take all my notes in classes on it (basically a poor man's laptop). The Palm comes with a program that allows you to view, edit, and start new word documents, excel spreadsheets, and even powerpoint presentations.

I decided on the palm because of it's size, size of memory card, fact that memory card can be used in digital camera, and because it runs PalmOS which has tons of free software available. Every student should check out FourZero (a program that allows you to input your syllabi and will calculate your GPA as you go). The m500 is basically the V but lighter and with a memory card slot (better backlight too). While you're looking you might want to check out the Sony's. Their color models are real crisp (not sure they have a keyboard for it but that may not matter).

 

[Malvina]

My husband does PDA support for a big compnay and he has a few recommendations:

The M500 is a pretty good buy and you can get them inexpensively at the Palm store on Ebay ($209 on ebay versus $260 through the Palm Web site). YOu have more keyboard optioin with the Palm M500 and this can be very important if you hand writing speed is already slow, Graffiti will slow you down even further. The Sony Clie is a great little Multi-media machine, but if you're going to spend that much on a mulitmedia PDA, consider an iPaq. Unless you are playing games or watching video, color really isn't worth the extra price.
There's plenty of Palm OS based medical software out there, NOt sure about PocketPC (iPaq).
If you want the ultimate bragging rights wait until the fall and get a color Treo communicator from Handspring (Handspring will be discontinuing the Visor line here in the near future, although they will continue to support it.)

My husband is willing to answere other questions, you can email him at [email protected]

 

[Eric714]

Thanks for all the input.... I'm starting to figure out which things are important to me regarding a Palm.

One question: Is a memory card slot the same as a memory stick slot?

 

[migraineboy]

I currently use a Visor deluxe with 16MB of memory. It has served me well the past two years on rotations. My recommendations are: 1) don't spend the $$$ for a color screen if you don't need to. 2) Find something with plenty of memory. Many of the programs you can download off of the net are small, but the quality medical programs (5-minute consult, Harrison's, Merck, Ferri's, Taber's, etc...) eat up memory in a hurry. I have 16MB and it is all filled right now. Also, if you add memory (stick or card), make sure that the memory is readily accessible. Some cards/sticks allow you to store programs, but you must transfer the programs to the machine to use them (not good when you need info fast). 3)Epocrates, probably the best pharmaceutical program out there and one of the most commonly used programs by students on rotation, is only available for PalmOS machines (at least the last time I checked), so take that into consideration. 4)Most of the PocketPC machines are very expensive right now, but will certainly come down in price in the next few years. Maybe start off with a lesser expensive palmOS machine and see if you will even use it enough. Just my thoughts...

 

[PTjay]

a memory "stick" is from sony i believe and a memory "card" is what everyone else calls their storage device. my palm m500 came with a 16MB memory card and has 8MB on the machine itself. you can purchase up to a 64MB card for the palm and the thing is the size of your thumb nail (amazing). it is called an SD card and as said before works in some digital cameras.

i like visors but the memory cards are huge (relatively speaking) so you can't carry 2 or more easily. sony's memory stick is a little longer but like i said works in a lot of other sony products. a memory card will not fit in a memory stick slot and a memory stick will not fit in a memory card slot.

take a look at the m125 if the m500 is too pricey right now. m125 has a memory card slot with the m100/105 type styling.

 

[Sweaty Paul]

Eric714

You also might want to consider the Handera 330. It has a 33 mhz processor 8mg ram, but, it has two expansion slots, a speaker, and microphone. I have a 128 mg compact flash card that allows me to store a variety of references on the card. The best thing about the compact flash memory and the Handera 330 is that you can read all of the stored info right off of the card, which means, unlike some other PDA's you don't have to pull the info you want to access into your RAM memory and move other software to your storage memory which is big for convience and time saving. Good luck with your purchase. I'd def. get my handera again, though I do wish that it had a color screen. Oh well, you can't have everything. Good luck on your search. If you find something really cool let us all know.

Sweaty