Power Extender is a backup power supply for different types of PDAs. Doesn't look too big so wouldn't be burdensome to carry when travelling. If they continue to provide new adapters it will also not become redundant when you change your PDA. Pocket Games looks like a very good site to buy useful accessories like this. They also claim 'we export almost anything' so is a good option for people outside Japan who wanted to get hold of products only available here.
Casio have announced their first Pocket PC 2002 device which will be released at the end of March in Japan. There had been rumours that they would leave the Pocket PC market but it doesn't seem so, which is good news given that only Toshiba, Fujitsu, DoCoMo, HP and NEC are the only other companies currently selling Pocket PCs here. Unfortunately the device looks decidely boring adding hardly any interesting features compared to other Pocket PC 2002 devices which have already been on the market for the best part of a year. For comparison purposes I'll use Toshiba's latest model, the Genio e550GX. (Toshiba is the Pocket PC market leader in Japan and the e500GX is the highest spec Pocket PC on the market here).
First the good points. They are claiming a 15 hour battery (compared to 10 at 400MHz for the e550GX) life or 30 hours with the optional higher capacity battery. For IR users they claim a maximum transmission speed of 4Mbps (compared to 115.2kbps). The screen type literally translate as 'LED backlit semi-transmissive TFT color LCD' and from the pictures it looks good. The text says it works well outdoors but I'll leave it to the screen gurus to judge whether this is any better than the e550GX's 'frontlit, reflective, low temperature polysilicon TFT'. Finally the E3000 has 6 hardware buttons, a 5 way directional pad and a two way scroll contrl on the side. The Genio only has the five hardware buttons and this makes one-handed operation much more difficult.
Now for the not so good points. The physical hardware specs which are very important in a PDA look particularly poor compared to the Genio:
3.5" screen compared to 4"
78�~135�~17.6mm compared to 76.5 x 125 �~ 15.9mm
190g compared to 170g
The processor is the now standard (for any new devices) XScale 400 Mhz PX250, but the device has only 64MB of RAM compared to 128MB for the e550GX
Win CE Fan is saying that the device will be around the 60,000 yen mark which will probably make it a bit cheaper than the Genio but only by a few thousand yen. If Dell, ViewSonic or HP ever decide to enter the market with their lower end devices they will really shake things up. The Casio does have both a CF and SD memory (no mention of SD-IO) slots which you would expect for a device of this size.
The bundled software certainly contains no surprises. The only minor difference from other makers is Casio's own schedule, address book and mail software which can be downloaded. Notable ommissions are map, text to speech software and Java.
Overall it's good to see more support for the Pocket PC market here which should lead to more services and accessories targetted at the platform.
Related links:
Casio Press Release (Japanese)
e3000 Product Page on the Casio site (Japanese)
Pocket PC Thoughts Post and Discussion (English)
Win CE Fan Announcement and Review (Japanese)
Toshiba will be holding another eBusiness Solutions seminar on the 39th Floor of their Tokyo headquarters on Tuesday 4th February 2003. The seminar program look good if you have any particular interests but the exhibition floor featuring 25 companies will also be well worth a visit. It is worthwhile visiting a show like this to see what products and services you can expect in the near future. Companies include those involved in mobile mapping, GPS, data communications, business solutions and other peripheral and software vendors. Of course Toshiba will be strongly represented with the Genio and services and solutions offered by different divisions of the company. Toshiba had held a number of similar seminars over the last year and strongly support third party seminars and expos which really shows their commitment to the PDA market. For more details and to sign up see the this web page (Japanese only).
