We all love our gear - MP3 players, cell phones, portable gaming consoles, PDA’s, cameras, laptops, which all demand the use of electricity accompanied by the associated wires, cords and chargers that supply the lifeline needed to power our gear.

When I go to a concert and see miles of cable strung across the stage, it’s a wonder musicians don’t trip over them. Unfortunately, seeing a miniature version of cluttered wires strung out across my work surfaces and hanging over the backside of my desk like some ugly artsy waterfall of wires mentally trips me out.

Digital Innovations has come to the rescue with a Power Docking Station consolidating all of the wired clutter into an organized mess. It’s pretty straightforward - a rectangular box houses up to four chargers hidden out of sight connected a single 54” two prong plug.

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Q. Hi Judie,

Fantastic review of the Dopod 838 Pro. I’m quite thrilled with mine, since acquiring it in October 2006. I have one big challenge - and a couple smaller ones as well…

When composing text messages, the system dutifully / pedantically stores all word entries that you make (intentionally or otherwise) i.e. , if you type ‘Mary had a little lambbbb’ , and inadvertently hit the space bar as you’re blazing along on the keyboard before correcting the spelling of lamb, the system assumes that you intended to write ‘lambbbb’, and stores that “new” word, seemingly forever.

I have not been able to find out If the internal ‘dictionary” / word suggestion list can be edited by the user. I’d love to be able to refine the list with my own lexicon.

Is there software available that allows this?

Thanks for your time.

Konrad

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Recently my dad�s company bought several of their employees Dopod 838 Pro mobile phones (based on Judie�s review actually :-D). His device arrived at the office a few days ago, but he is in Vietnam for work, so one of his colleagues dropped it off. For the last 3 days I have been using it instead of my Treo, to see if I made the right choice months ago. I have come to a somewhat mixed decision based on several things that I�d like to describe below. My basis for these �ratings� is that I like a device that functions well as both a phone and PDA.

First up is the design. The Treo simply is amazing in this department. Starting with the Treo 600, Palm had a winner. For years I had considered getting a Treo, but going back to Palm OS after using Windows Mobile for so long turned me off. When I think of the Palm OS, I think of simplicity. When I think of Windows Mobile I think of expandability. If I were to give a PDA phone to my mum I would seriously consider the Treo 680, but for me (and recently my dad) I think Windows Mobile is the way to go.

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While it has been available in the UK and a few other places for a short while now, X-Series has just been released here in Australia. For those of you who don’t know, X-Series is an add-on to a standard phone plan that adds a bundle of services. These are the plans available.

How awesome is that!! The going rate for Mobile Broadband here is more than 3 times those prices! Add to that the Skype minutes, unlimited email/eBay/IM and the ability to access Orb (although Orb does eat into your data). I have signed up for the Gold plan and will see how I go. While I haven’t even gotten close to using my 200MB data which until now I have been paying $29/mth for, I think I will step it up a notch and start using my Treo as a modem for my MacBook Pro

Anyone else here in Australia or anywhere else that offers X-Series signed up for it?

Back in 1991, when the HP 95LX was my daily driver, I used to anticipate the day when handhelds would have color displays and be even closer to the laptop computers which they seemed to emulate. When color displays became available, I looked forward to the time when these handhelds would have more memory, better battery life, better connectivity, and a faster processor. As each item on my wish list was ticked off, I finally decided that what I might have wanted all along was a more robust operating system; a true mini PC. Now it’s 2007, and UMPCs are becoming more common. The majority of them are mini touch-screen tablets, which have been appearing from various manufacturers. While the tablet properties that most of these devices display are lovely, the problem with many of these portable PCs is that they don’t include what I would consider to be a practical keyboard.

There always seems to be a trade-off involved in order to get what you really want, and the device I will show you today is no different. The trade-off here is that in order to get a useable keyboard and a laptop form-factor, reminiscent of those HPCs which came before, the touch-screen has been deleted.

Say hello to the Kohjinsha SA1-A, which was graciously loaned to me by G-A of GeekStuff4U for this review. The Kohjinsha is a laptop, but it is one of the smallest and lightest I’ve ever seen. It measures just 8.6″ wide x 6.5″ deep x 1.2″ thick (at its widest point), and it weighs 2 pounds 2.5 ounces. For comparison’s sake, the Michael Crichton hardback Next measures 9.2″ wide x 6.5″ wide x 1.5″ thick, and it weighs 1 pound 8.4 ounces. If you stop and think about it for just a moment, it is amazing that you can read the novel from either source, but with the Kohjinsha you can also surf the web, write a novel, or do almost any other thing that can be accomplished on a full size computer.

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This just in from Palm…

Palm Announces Update to Windows Mobile 6
Coming for Treo 750 Smartphone
AT&T Customers
Also Gain Access to Faster Speeds with HSDPA Capability

ORLANDO, Fla., CTIA Wireless Show, March 27, 2007 — Palm, Inc. (Nasdaq: PALM) today announced that an update to the Windows Mobile 6 Professional operating system will be available for Treo� 750 smartphone customers around the world. The Treo 750 is available from carriers in the United States, Europe and Asia and remains a key part of Palm�s international expansion strategy to make Treo smartphones available to more customers. For AT&T customers, the update also will facilitate High-speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) capability � allowing faster data-download speeds on 3G/UMTS/HSDPA networks.(1)

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If�you travel a lot and the idea of bringing a separate laptop bag and carry-on makes you shudder, then you will will want to pay particular attention to this post…

Yada, from the Palm is Life forum, has�posted�his full review of the Targus Overnighter Travel Case. Yeah, I know - everything is in Chinese, but his excellent pictures say everything that needs to be said.

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SplashData has recently released another in their wide line of productivity tools for Palm users. I�ve been a long-time fan of their suite of products including SplashPhoto, SplashID, SplashWallet and SplashShopper, so my expectations were high for this new product. In this collaborative era of wiki-knowledge and groupthink, SplashData bills this product in their external communications as �a software tool aimed at helping people outline and organize everything from work projects, meeting agendas and speeches to class notes and event plans.�

Perhaps I expected too much from SplashNotes before I took it for a test drive. I had anticipated a Palm-based application that might actually stimulate the process of brainstorming and group collaboration. What I discovered was more of a brain sprinkle instead of a storm. The software itself is an adequate note-taking and outlining tool, but it offers little in the way of stimulating the creative process. I chalk that up to user error, not the fault of the developers.

So let�s take a look at the application itself and what it does well, outlining and organizing your thoughts in a format which can fairly easily be transferred between your Palm and your PC or between handhelds.

Installation was simple and straightforward. The application takes up about 350k on your handheld and promises to eat up about 10k more for each list you save, so it�s not much of a memory hog. The installation includes the application for both the Palm platform and for PC, as well as a 20 page user guide in pdf format. And that�s a good thing, because the software isn�t exactly intuitive from the menu command on the Palm, so it�s definitely mandatory to RTM. (For my first review on www.geardiary.com I�ll be on my best behavior and remove the �F� from �RTFM.� Oops.)

I personally found the PC application much easier and faster to use for outlining due to the limitations of my Treo�s keypad, but again that is not the fault of the good folks at SplashData. More on that later.

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Hi Gadget Geeks �I wrote Judie recently about the frustrating time I had living with a smartphone with a broken touch screen and she thought it would make a good Gear Diary story. Hope you can learn from my experience!

I�ve been a Pocket�PC Phone Edition owner since the summer of 2003, when I bought a Samsung i700 for use with Verizon Wireless. I�ve been using various PDAs (mostly Pocket PCs and an M100 Palm Pilot) since 1999 when I first bought a Casio E-125. Currently, I own the Samsung i730 (bought July 2005) and it�s been a good run. Well, sufficed it to say that I love my i730-I really use it all the time to manage my work day and my personal life.

Whether it�s my banking contacts or the numerous meetings or deadlines I have to meet or managing what and where I�m meeting my girlfriend for our next date (sometimes even trying to figure out where that ladies� shoe store is in Soho or the East Village or to find out if the engagement rings at Blue Nile are really nicer than Tiffany�s) or which doctor�s appointment I need to take Mom to, my i730 is there with pocket internet explorer, contacts, calendar and pocket word (so I can keep notes on how my girlfriend likes her hot chocolate and chai lattes at Starbucks ) to get me through the day. Thank goodness for pocket Google when you�re trying to find that elusive East Village Indian restaurant or need that pocket pc alarm to remind you of that 2pm meeting with your boss! Well, things came to a screeching stop a couple of Wednesdays ago during a busy day a the office - I had a very short lunch break before my next meeting (this was maybe the third of four that day) and I really needed to get to my desk and start eating and check my e-mail. Well, as I was rushing out of the restroom to get back to my desk, my i730, while in its case, fell off my belt to the floor with a sharp thud. I picked it up right away and thought nothing of it - I�ve dropped my phone about a half dozen times in the past. Well, I got back to my desk and took the phone out of its case and oh no, the touch screen was cracked! It looked like someone threw a rock at it - it still worked, right? Wrong! Parts of the touch screen worked but most of the screen wasn�t responsive - I could touch the screen to open the alarms screen but couldn�t cancel or set any new alarms and contacts would open but I couldn�t dial from it or edit any entries directly on the touch screen. In fact, the pocket pc worked fine but it was the touch screen that didn�t give me normal access anymore. The keyboard still worked but honestly, it�s a poor cumbersome substitute for the touch screen. What to do?

�

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This release just came in from HTC; the Advantage equals what we formerly called the Athena, but the Shift is an altogether different (and unexpected) beast. According to an HTC contact, “The Advantage will be available in the US in early summer and the Shift will be available in the US in late summer. ”

HTC Shift

Read on to see why, and then let me know which one you think is more interesting…

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