Genio e550G Report

A bit slow on posting a report, but I finally splashed out for the Genio e550G (http://www.genio-e.com/pda/) - a long awaited PDA upgrade on the 6th June - the first day of release. I'd been itching to upgrade since at least last November but was determined to wait for the right device and am convinced I made the right decision. So what's so good about it?

Size - Much smaller than my GFORT and one of the smallest and lightest PDAs on the market with two expansion slots. 170g, 125x76.5x15.9

Screen - it spite of the small body footprint it sports a great 4" screen. I don't know of any other PDA in this size category which has a screen of the same size. Of course the screen has the normal

Processor - XScale PXA250 400 MHz. Much improved performance over the GFORT 140 MHz. Can handle downloading e-mail in the background while you are surfing or using other apps.

Expanison - In-built CF II and SD slot. USB host in cradle or with optional cable. PCMCIA jacket option. Hard to beat for expansion options and there are a huge range of Pocket PC compatible accessories to take advantage of.

Pocket PC OS and software - (Is this where the controversy starts ;-) I really like the OS. Very easy to use and the bundled apps cover all standard PDA needs. For the most part they are well designed but see the 'bad' section below for a few niggles. In addition there are now a humungous range of apps for the Pocket PC to cover almost every conceivable need and as mentioned above a huge range of compatible hardware apps. The OS is also very stable and never crashes. There are a wide range of input methods including keyboards, kanji drawing input, hand writing recognition and note recognition. Additional third party apps are also appearing. Setting up network and internet connections is very easy.

Bundled apps - A great selection is provided on CD including Japanese dictionary, JR Travel Navigator, Flash viewer, i-appli viewer, Personal Java, map viewing software and maps, photo viewer, T-Time Japanese e-book reader, Word, Excel and PowerPoint native format viewer (the Pocket versions of Word and Excel take files which are converted to pocket version automatically by Active Synch, neat speech tool which reads Japanese text, Windows Media Player 8, MSN Messenger and of course Pocket Internet Explorer. The is also a while designed customizable home screen app which is an ice addition to the Pocket PC native Today screen. I find I use both for different purposes. For the first time I feel like I have a useful desktop on my PDA.

Flashable ROM - Can update the OS with new updates.

Track record and accessories - Toshiba made a good impression with the first generation Genio Pocket PC. They made available a range of accessories and they are popular enough that 3rd party manufacturers make accessories which support the Genio.

Well designed and information packed web site.

And now for a few minor bad things:

Battery Life - This is by far the biggest problem with all Pocket PCs. Supposedly around 10 hours for the Genio at 400 MHz with front light off but I really doubt it would last this long with real usage. Using the front light, processor heavy apps playing lot's of multimedia or using energy hungry expansion cards all add load. You can manage all these things but what's the point having them if you are going to turn them off. It really is a serious deficiency for a PDA to have battery life problems and I'm sure Palm users everywhere will be shouting victory, but in my opinion this handicap is worth putting up with for all the other benefits. I haven't run out of batteries so far but I do find myself plugging in at every available opportunity and being careful not to waste power. Depending on how I end up using the device over the long term I may carry a spare battery jacket or get the PCMCIA jacket which also has inbuilt power.

In-built PIM (Pocket Outlook)) - There are a few niggles or things on my wish list which would make the PIM much better software. Just a small niggle. Pocket Informant is a 3rd party PIM app recommended by all the Pocket PC gurus which uses the Pocket Outlook databases and costs just $19.95

No in-built Bluetooth - Not such a bad thing in reality but some people may argue no built in Bluetooth is a disadvantage. I think there will be a new generation or two of Pocket PC by the time Bluetooth really takes off and in the meantime a CF or SD card will probably be perfectly okay in most situations.

No screen protectors - There were no screen protectors shipped with the Genio and as the screen is larger than usual no cut-to-size 3rd party ones are available yet. Have to cut one to size for now.

No scroll wheel - I missed the scroll wheel on the left at first but have got used to not having it and may actually be doing things more efficiently without it though. In fact though it's not really a wheel that you find on most Pocket PCs but an up-down scroll button. I like the button-wheel (like a mouse wheel-button) I have on my Sony video camera and would like this navigation option on more PDAs.

Cursor button - The default button was convex and a bit difficult to use. An additional button with an in and out concave design is much easier to use though. Still got to get used to this compared to the scroll button though.

Firmware/OS Update - An update was released just six days after the original release to fix a few minor bugs.

Price: At around 67,800 yen it's pretty expensive, beaten only be the iPAQ. You also need to factor in the costs of cases, screen protectors, extra chargers, battery jackets, PCMCIA card jackets and other peripherals like CF and SD cards if you don't already have these and want to make the most of the PDA.

Japanese OS: If you want an English version you are out of luck as no English version has been released or announced yet. The Japanese version was slightly delayed by about a week supposedly to ensure they had enough devices to meet demand so perhaps like the iPAQ before it demand will exceed the speed that they can be manufactured.

Overall all the many good points far, far outweigh the minor bad points and it is a very well designed and powerful PDA. I'd certainly recommend it as the best Pocket PC and arguably the most powerful PDA available on the market at the current time.

AsiaBizTech has a brief article on Skywave's VoIP software and possible supporting services which would allow us to make VoIP phone calls with our Pocket PCs by early 2003.

WindowsCE Fan has a good article about the Hitachi NPD-10JWL Pocket PC. In brief this is a business consumer targetted unit based on Windows CE.NET with a XScale PXA250 400MHz processor. Here's the Japanese article and English machine translation.

Not Japan specific, but the news on the web is that the Jornada will disappear and the iPAQ will surive as a result of the HP-Compaq merger.

Yodobashi (67,800 yen - 10% points) have the device in their online shop but no exact shipping date yet. BIC only have the e550G/MD at 99,800 yen - 10% points but they used a photograh of an older model!

The J@pan Inc. GadgetWatch newsletter mentions the Toshiba e550G in their May 9th Newsletter (a very well-written and worthwhile newsletter for Gadget freaks). As usual I've also made some posts about the device in the tpc.mobile newsgroup.

Toshiba has released an astounding looking device scheduled for release in Japan at the end of May. No info anywhere in English yet, but the Japanese page is very well designed: http://genio-e.com/pda/

I've been pretty lazy keeping this Blog up-to-date - but one of the reasons is the Tokyo PC Users Group tpc.mobile newsgroup to which I post quite a lot. You can link to the the web or news version or sign up for the mailing list here. The group is great for finding out about the latest tools and services available in Japan and worldwide and the knowledgeable people there are very forthcoming with help and advice.

Following the release of the Casio E-2000 and the NEC Pocket Gear things have been pretty quiet on the Pocket PC scene here in Japan. Toshiba and Hitachi have announced they have new devices planned with Intel XScale processor, but Fujitsu has been most forthcoming with a device for the consumer market, announcing a planned release date of the end of May. CNETAsia has a nice article on it.

I decided not to upgrade from my G-FORT for the moment. The NEC PocketGear was almost right but I really wanted 64MB of RAM. The Casio looked cheap compared to the flashy images on the web and the bundled software was uninspiring. Will wait for something better. It's interesting that the Fujitsu mentioned about will come with Bluetooth in Japan but wireless phone functions instead elsewhere in the world.

The NEC PPC 2002 was out last Friday and the Casio E-2000 is out this Wednesday. Here's a quick comparison I did of the two:

Casio E-2000
Kakaku.com (Japanese)
BicBic.com (Japanese)

Intel StrongARM SA-1110 Processor�i206MHz�j
ROM: 32MB
RAM: 64MB
Screen: 3.5 TFT 240 x 320 - 65,536
130 x 82 x 17.5 mm 190g
PC Card jacket, USB connectability
12 hours

Main advantages: 64 MB RAM, Backlit screen
Main disadvantages: Screen slightly smaller, bundled software not as interesting.


NEC PocketGear MC�^PG5000
Kakaku.com (Japanese)
BicBic.com (Japanese)

Intel StrongARM SA-1110 Processor�i206MHz�j
ROM: 32MB
RAM: 32MB
Screen: 3.8 TFT 240 x 320 - 65,536
126 x 78 x 18.5mm 190g
PC Card jacket, USB connectability
12 hours

Main advantages: Larger screen, bundled software, slightly smaller
Main disadvantages: Only 32 MB RAM

I posted this to the tpc.mobile newsgroup with the subject 'Comparing Casio E-2000 & NEC PG5000' so check there to see the ensuing discussion.

How I have let this site go on so long without adding anything. Since I last wrote we've seen the release of the iPaq in Japan, new models from Casio and HP, Toshiba in on the market with the eGenio and shortly the release of NEC's first Pocket PC. All models are much pricer at 50,000 yen plus then Palm OS devices which seem to be hitting the shelves at less than 20,000 - at least that's what the headlines say. Perhaps the only exception to this is the Sony's Clie. This is actually the only Palm which has caught my attention and one I would consider buying ........ if it wasn't a Palm. Back to Pocket PC's, HP in the US are coming out with the lighest Pocket PC yet, but it still only features a CF Type I slot which doesn't seem much use. It is expandable to Type II with some type of adapter I think but obviously you'll have something sticking out the back. iPAQ have yet to change much and will start losing ground to the eGenio which have two inbuilt slots (CF II and SD Card) and is also pretty light and has a good screen. The NEC is looking very promising thought - light in weight, the same two slots plus a PC Card jacket option - you can't ask for much more expandability than this. It will also be the first Pocket PC 2002 device on the market in Japan when it hits the shelves on 30th November. Pocket PC 2002 has a nicer XP-like interface and MSN Messenger pre-installed. This can't be downloaded and installed so the only way to get it is with the OS. PPC 2002 presumably comes with MS Reader which hasn't been available on many if any Japanese devices until now. Presumably networking options have improved with the latest OS and I guess there will be many other small and inconspicuous improvements like this. Back to the hardware. The only disadvantage I can see with the NEC model is that it only has 32MB of inbuilt RAM. Unless the Flash memory can be used as RAM (and I don't know anything about whether flash memory can be used in this way) I would prefer to have more than the 32MB in my G-FORT. Casio have a model coming out in the US which has the two slots and 64 MB RAM. Can't remember whether or not it have a PC card jacket. Will have to check that. For me their are not quite enough benefits to justify the cost of upgrading at the moment. I've got my sights set on a new laptop for Christmas instead. I guess I'll be waiting another year for a 24-7 connected device due. The flat rate packages at $40/month are pretty good but the CF card would drain down the battery too quickly to keep the device connected for any length of time, and it's still dial up. Oh - and the final thing I need for any new model I get is a fold up keyboard, not only to use on the move, but to keep connected at home so that if anyone should IM me through Yahoo! or MSN - no power problems and a wireless 802.11b CF card to connected to the net - I won't have to worry about not being able to have a normal speed chat.

That's all for this time. Remind me not to leave it so long until the next update!

Two reviews in Japanese of the G-FORT. Use the sites mentioned below if you want a machine translation:

http://k-tai.impress.co.jp/review/2001/01/26/gfort.htm
http://www.wince.ne.jp/snap/ceSnapView.asp?PID=73 (Part 2: http://www.wince.ne.jp/snap/ceSnapView.asp?PID=74)

Press releases and other links can be found in both of these articles.

There are a few good Japanese language sites out there for Windows CE and mobile news.

Windows CE Fan: http://www.wince.ne.jp/
Keitai Watch: http://k-tai.impress.co.jp/
ZDNet Mobile: http://www.zdnet.co.jp/mobile/

Unless you understand Japanese these won't be much use, but I recommend the following two machine translation sites:

E-lingo: http://www.e-lingo.com/browse/browse.php3 (Also available through: http://www.excite.co.jp/world/url

Amikiai: http://www.amikai.com/browse/

Using one these you should be able to get a gist of what the article is about and understand the main points.

There are three mobile Japanese language general mobile computing magazines I know of in Japan. The two monthly ones (both 680 yen and published on 24th of the month) are 'Nikkei Mobile' and 'Mobile i'. They both contain good, comprehensive information about the latest products on the market, comparisons of different devices and lots of other useful and interesting info. The thrid, Mobile Press, is thicker less glossy and published 4 times a year. It contains longer articles, including ones on interesting looking hardware hacks if that's of interest to anyone. It also comes with a CD with freeware and shareware. All three mags cover all types of mobile computing devices from credit card or watch type up to A4 notebooks. I'll post the URLs at a later date but none of the mags have web sites which feature more than a table of contents for the latest issue. I'll let you know when this changes. I've also seen but not bought a number of Palm publications on the shelves in Japan. I think it's too soon to see a Pocket PC dedicated publication. This will obviously depends on increasing the number of Pocket PC users. With the large number of competing devices available, it's difficult to say when that critical number will be reached. At the moment we have Jordana and Casio models on the market, as well as a device made by Casio but marketed by NTT DoCoMo called the G-FORT. More information on these to come on a related web page at a later date. It's been reported we'll see a Japanese model of the iPAQ later this year ..... I'll believe it when I see it. When they do eventually get it out the technology may already be starting to date. Casio is due to release the E-707 for business users this month which has inbuilt communications functionality as well as Compact Flash and MMC/SD card slots.

Well. Here goes. Pocket PC has still really got to take off in Japan, and faces a lot of compeition from other platforms. MS and Pocket PC supporters are going to have to do a lot to see it really take off here. In particular MS should have a better Pocket PC web site to match the US version. There are some posts to the Microsoft Pocket PC newsgroup about localized versions of the Pocket PC web site and the fact the MS seems to be ignoring Pocket PC users outside the US. We'll see if the situation improves. Anyway, back on topic. This is the start of my blog. Lot's of things to catch up on and hopefully lot's of interesting stuff in the future, but I don't know of any other site covering the Pocket PC in Japan, so hopefully this will become the place you go to get the latest info.