PalmOne m505 Color Handheld
by Palm
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Our Price: $444.57 Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $29.00 (click here) Category: CE See more product details |
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Digital Cameras Photo Reviews of PalmOne m505 Color Handheld
Customer Review: You need to see this Palm and decide for yourself
Summary: 4 Stars
It is all in the screen. If you read the other reviews, you can see that people are bitterly divided over the screen on this new Palm. Honestly, I was disappointed when I first saw it. It appeared dim and if you don't look at it straight on, the colors are washed out. However, having used it for a week or so now, I've adjusted to it. Now that I know the angle to hold it at, the screen looks great. It has an energy saving mode, but this is too dim for all but brightly lit environments.Compare the M505 side-by-side with the Palm IIIC and there is no comparison. The IIIC screen is much brighter and easier to see. Although the IIIC only has 256 colors and the M505 is claimed to have over 65 thousand colors, you won't notice it when you directly compare them. Palm claims that the M505 has a screen that is easier to use in direct sunlight. I have to take their word for it because I work indoors and can't imagine ever using my Palm in direct sunlight. If you a lifeguard or work at the beach, this is definitely the Palm for you!
The unit is smaller than the IIIC and fits more comfortably in the pocket. The memory is expandable which is a major advantage over the IIIC. And gone are those incredibly annoying and unreliable batteries. The unit has rechargeable batteries and it charges up whenever it is in the cradle. I don't know how long the batteries last, but it easily lasts the day. I recharge mine every night.
Overall, this is a nice palm. I bought it the day it came out, based upon its tremendous prerelease press. That only goes to show that you can't trust the reviews and, perhaps, that you should look before you leap. Honestly, I wouldn't trust this review either. Although I've adjusted to the Palm M505 and I'm happy with it, I'd advise anybody contemplating its purchase to compare it directly with the Palm IIIC and whatever other color handheld you may be considering. You need to compare the screens directly and decide for yourself.
Customer Review: The Best Palm Yet
Summary: 5 Stars
I've had various Palms since my first 1000 and would not be without one. Palm have always produced solid products. They annoy you a bit changing connectors and making you buy new peripherals and I'm sure there must be some logic behind altering the diameter of one of the pen holders and making the other one shorter - but that's life. Although OS 4 might still not set the world on fire it's a good system, you know what they say - "if it aint broke don't fix it." I purchased a Palm M505 and a 32Mb SD card and would heartily recommend the machine to anyone who is in the market for a new PDA or an upgrade. Don't be too influenced by the anoraks and sad people who berate the screen unmercifully. It might not be the brightest on the market but the 16 bit colour is really good.
Setup and transferring data from my old machine was a breeze and the new native USB connection is very fast. Pictures downloaded from SplashPhoto, providing you use good quality images and take a little care over adjusting contrast and brightness, are very pleasing and have received excellent feedback from colleagues and friends who have seen them. It's really nice to have digital images of your family with you all the time. Especially when you or they are away from home.
I upgraded from a Palm 5 as memory was getting tight. The extra 6 Mb of memory plus the 32 on the SD card are already being put to good use. The machine is really fast although retrieving data from the expansion card does slow the system a little but not to any great extent. Colour programs such as City Time and AddressPro 6 are really good and add much pleasure when using the machine. It also fits in the Montblanc case I bought for my Palm 5 which was a great relief and it looks really great in it.
If you are a Palm fan buy an M505, we live in a world full of colour not a monochrome one. Only go for the M500 if funds are really tight. You will not be disappointed with your purchase.
Customer Review: disappointing
Summary: 3 Stars
I was an extremely loyal Palm V user, craving more "real estate" to load applications and more speed. I got both with this, but the color is EXTREMELY disappointing. Also, one reason I got the Palm instead of migrating to the Compaq Ipaq was all my software and hardware investments in the Palm V which I stupidly thought would be preserved by sticking with Palm. Wrong. I need a new travel charger, a new travel synchronization cable (why this can't be one item is beyond me, but there you are), and a new GPS connector for my Earthmate from DeLorme. Not only do the connectors not fit the new device, there seems to be no adapter to use the old peripherals on the new device AND Delorme does not yet make a cable for the Earthmate to interface with this Palm, so I can't even make it work. That pretty much makes the software I bought for the GPS useless as well. The backlight is still not much light and when it is off, the screen is horribly dim. The Photosuite software to show off pictures of your dog or whatever cannot overcome the muddy colors of the unit itself.Next irritation: The old Palm V cradle had a little hole to put your stylus in while you were not using it. They have left this feature out and now I am always either unprying the stylus from the unit itself or searching thru the paper on my desk to find the stylus. (By the way, if you bought something for the Palm V that was a cover using the left stylus slot, it will not fit in the M505. The left slot of the M505 does not hold a spare stylus, either.)
Finally, the 16 meg expansion card did not come with the unit. You have to send away for it. Since my unit did not come from Amazon (it was a gift, sorry Amazon), it came from Palm itself, this was pretty stupid. After all, they had the address and the serial number when they shipped the thing. Why make us supply it again? They also got the same info when I registered. Just another pain in the you-know-what.
Customer Review: Good product, but don't get too enthused over the color.....
Summary: 4 Stars
This is my third Palm, so I am obviously sold on the usefulness of the little machines! If you are a busy person--not necessarily a BUSINESS person, but a person who has a busy life, and has to remember lots of information, keep lots of appointments, etc., I believe you will fall in love with these devices if you try them. I use mine for the traditional purposes of keeping track of appointments and recording phone numbers, but also to put reminders to myself in the future, such as "rebalanace mutual funds in IRA" twice a year. I also use this as a memory bank for odd little bits of information I may find useful, by recording the information in a note, along with several key words I will think of when I want to remember the specifics months later. I search for the keywords, and there is the note, displayed so I can see it.As to the specifics of this particular Palm, the two main advantages it has over the Palm V series are color, and the ability to use memory cards that can be inserted into the device. Bluntly, I am unimpressed with the color. You can use Palm m505 to display color photographs, but the display is not bright enough or large enough for this to be a good way to show off your pictures. I have hopes that the color will be useful when I acquire mapping software later, but I haven't done that yet.
So far I haven't used the memory cards as anything but an expanded memory, but Palm and other providers are already offering memory cards with all sorts of programming included--Huge databases of tourist information on cities, maps, game programs, and all sorts of things. It looks like this will be good, if your needs extend to that.
I highly recommend this product if you are buying your first PDA, or if you have a very old one (Palm III or something) you want to upgrade. If you have a Palm V or Palm Vx, I'd suggest waiting to upgrade unless you have a burning need for the memory cards.
Customer Review: A major disappointment, even though it was a gift!
Summary: 2 Stars
I received my m505 as a birthday gift, replacing my broken but beloved Palm IIIx, so I hate to criticize something that was free. However, I am mad that a loved one paid more than $... for this gift. I realized what a disappointment the device was before I even did my first HotSync. The cheap stylus, which is hard to remove from the handheld and has no weight for writing, was the first tip-off.
It seems like a small thing, but the stylus is the primary tool for using the handheld, so it really makes a difference. I hurt my fingers trying to get it out of the side slot and it hasn't gotten any easier to remove with time. Also, my old styluses, which are much nicer, don't fit into the side slot so I can't use them unless I carry them around somewhere else.
And what use will I ever have for an expansion slot? The cards seem like a useless gimmick to me, with the possible exception of using a card to back up files when away from your desktop. For me, that's hardly ever.
I also don't need more space. Even as a busy journalist with lots of notes and records, I haven't used half of what is available. Moreover: Don't need more games. Very few U.S. cities are available on the travel card.
In a way, I wish Palm or some other company would give us something worthwhile in the way of card programs. But isn't the idea of carrying a Palm to streamline and get away from carrying extra things, like expansion cards?
Unlike some other reviewers, I am fairly pleased with the monitor, which is a major improvement from my prior Palm. I also like the quickness of the computer. I like the notepad program, too, but I noticed it doesn't work with as much accuracy as it could.
However, none of these positives outweighs the negatives and the high prices of these new Palms. I'm sure a lot of people will soon agree and make plans to jump to a better product.