Registered: May 2002
Location: Dallas, TX
Posts: 78

An Idea for Handspring that could make it #1

The main problem with the Visor is its thickness. Why is it so thick? The springboard. Now dont get me wrong I love the springboard and have many and will buy more in the future, but really thats the Visor problem and Handspring thinks that they made a solution for that problem and thats the Treo. But since when is the solution to problems throwing your products uniqueness away? Thats what Handspring did, do you see a springboard (Handspring unique idea) on a Treo? No. So Handspring here is an idea that is possible and could give you the number one title, that would keep a Visor thin yet still have the springboard capabilities and many more.

Now when I started thinking of what could be a way to have the springboard but make it thinner I started thinking of thinner springboard, like something that would start a whole new creation of springboards that are a lot thinner. But then it clicked, The EDGE. What makes the Edge so small? Ah ha, that removable springboard . People who own Visors dont always use that big springboard slot in the back, some never do at all. So why cant Handspring make some device that has a removable springboard slot, like the Edge, yet this device has tons more. Here it is.

This device is sleek and beatifully designed to fit the modern age. It has 16 ram of memory, which is plenty for most people. A 66 dragonball processor, not the fastest but fast enough (im trying to conserve money) and has the Palm OS 5 operating system with that convineint rechargeble battery.

This device could be as thin or slightly thicker than the Edge. It would be very light too, not as light as the Treo 90 but way lighter than the Prism and the screen would be great. It would have a 16 bit TFT LCD color screen similair to the Clie models. There would be many more pixels than 160X160 like the Visors have but not as much as the Clies. The screen would be nice and big just like the Visor Prisms.

There could be two versions of my idea. One with a keyboard and one with virtual graffiti. The version with the keyboard would have a keyboard exactly like the Treos have, but one kewl add on would be parallel and above the keyboard would be those 4 silkscreen buttons placed horizontally to one another (The house, the menu, calculator, and the search). I find the biggest problem with the Treos is that they dont have the simple one tap silkscreen buttons like all palms have, but now with this device you got the silkscreen and the keyboard all in one . The graffiti version would be like anyother graffiti pad on a Visor except it is virtual graffiti. The usual buttons (datebook, address, todo and search) would be on both versions.

The expandabilities on this Visor would be one of a kind. The Visor would come with the similair type of the removable springboard slot like the Edge. Whenever you need to use a springboard, first snap on the springboard slot then put in whichever springboard you want to use. Without the springboard you would have one of the lightest and most powerful Palms on the market and with it you would have a light and the most extremly expandable Palm on the market thanks to the springboard. Now heres what I think would definitly seperate this Visor from the other Visors. With the Visor on the side would be a SD slot. All those little SD cards that Palm users own could use those on this Visor. The SD slot would support SDIO making it even more great. Now you have the springboard and the SD all in one. KEWL!

The Visor would have all the wireless capabilities thanks to the sprinboard (VisorPhone, ThinModem ect.). It would be compatible with all the accesories (Targus Keyboard and so on). The price would definitly be high as this Visor does have a whole lot to it. Im guessing 400-500 something dollars is correct, but hey all that is worth it in my opinion. This Visor would be one great PDA and if Handspring acually does make something like this I think it could have the ability to change Handspring to a #1 handheld device company.

Please post your thoughts and suggestions and tell me if there is anything not possible with my idea. Hey, you never know, maybe indeed Handspring is making this Visor now . You never know .

Cya lata guys and happy posting!

Jonathan

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The Internet is a great way to get on the Net.
--Bob Dole

Registered: Aug 2002
Location: St. Louis
Posts: 108

Minor nit to pick....

You said:

>The Visor would have all the wireless capabilities thanks to the sprinboard (VisorPhone, ThinModem ect.).

This implies that ThinModem has wireless capability. It does not.

Otherwise, you have good ideas. I am sure, so did many engineers, marketers, and product designers at Handspring who worked on the Visor line. I already described in another post what I thought might be a "Prism II". It soundsl like you are describing an "Edge II" or perhaps a "SuperEdge"!

But it is highly unlikely HS will reverse its course at this point. They have already done too much to wreck the future of any possible new Visor product. Springboard manufacturers are in full retreat or out-of-business. Most retailers are so convinced Visor is dead, they are getting rid of all Visor accessories at cut-rate prices (See "CompUSA Blowout").

However, if you feel as strongly about this as your writing indicates, maybe you are the man for the job! See my last post on the "Laptop Competition" thread. You could be that young (judging from your photo) entrepreneur who approaches Handspring to buy the rights to the Springboard technology. Who knows, maybe Mr. Hawkins just might admire your spunk and offer you a cut-rate deal! Then you could travel to the far east to make manufacturing deals, hire away some of the surely disgruntled top talent at Handspring and Palm, and find the "riches in niches" that await the savvy entrepreneur.

And Monkees might fly out of my butt, when mystical elves cast a spell on Britney Spears, making her my love slave, magical gnomes while away their time turning my collection of lead pipes into gold, and Elvis re-surfaces to give his last farewell concert in my backyard.

Sure, it could happen!

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The Prismer

"I am not a number, I am a person!"

Registered: Feb 2000
Location: Moved to Clie Land
Posts: 331

Re: Minor nit to pick....

quote:

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Originally posted by Prismer2
You said:
And Monkees might fly out of my butt, when mystical elves cast a spell on Britney Spears, making her my love slave, magical gnomes while away their time turning my collection of lead pipes into gold, and Elvis re-surfaces to give his last farewell concert in my backyard.

Sure, it could happen!

---

This enthusiasm would have been appropriate two years ago. Face it, HS is a has-been. Sony has kicked their arsses about the playing field and HS�s only response has been the lackluster Treo. IF PalmOS continues to be a player, it will be only because of Sony�s involvement at this point.

And BTW, one of the major reasons the EDGE failed so miserably was because no-one wanted to carry around yet another piece of equipment(sled). HS failed their customers, their developers and their vision.

HS will be a player again when Monkees fly out of my butt, when mystical elves cast a spell on Britney Spears, making her my love slave, magical gnomes while away their time turning my collection of lead pipes into gold, and Elvis re-surfaces to give his last farewell concert in my backyard.

Sure, it could happen!

***I just loved that so much I had to repeat it!

Registered: Mar 2000
Location: Heidelberg, Germany
Posts: 85

Palm OS 5 was designed to run on the Strongarm processor, not the Dragonball processor. That's not to say it couldn't, but it would be akin to running Windows XP on a 486 processor.

As much as I have supported Handspring in the past, I think their move to a cellular phone/PDA was a mistake. Some people just don't like the convergence. I think the compromised too much in the Treo design with the smaller screen and lack of expansion slot(on the Treo 180, 270 and 300).

I still have a Visor Deluxe and Platinum which are serving me well, but I also have a Sony NR70V which will arrive soon. Why the change? The screen is beautiful, the built in digital camera will be useful at work, and having 128 meg of music to listen to will make travel more pleasant. Sure, I can do most of the same stuff with a Visor, but I'd end up with something like a Batman utility belt with all the Springboard modules.

I'll be on the lookout for Peter Tosh or Davey Jones being rapidly expelled from your butt...

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The following space intentionally left blank...

RadarGreg

Registered: Jul 2000
Location:
Posts: 3034

quote:

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Originally posted by RadarGreg
Palm OS 5 was designed to run on the Strongarm processor,

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Actually, it's designed for the _ARM_ processor. StrongARM is just one variant of the ARM core. Palm designed it so that any ARM manufacturer could write their own DAL (device abstraction layer) to optimize their core for PalmOS.

quote:

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not the Dragonball processor.

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To confuse matters, Motorola is releasing an ARM chip under the Dragonball name (the MX1).

quote:

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That's not to say it couldn't, but it would be akin to running Windows XP on a 486 processor.

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No. It couldn't. It'd be more like trying to run MacOS on a 386.

quote:

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I'll be on the lookout for Peter Tosh or Davey Jones being rapidly expelled from your butt...

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heh...it's Peter _Tork_ or _Davy_ Jones. I don't think that a rastafarian or some guy whose locker is always talked about were in the Pre-fab Four.

Registered: Feb 2000
Location: Moved to Clie Land
Posts: 331

Micky Dolenz and Michael Nesmith the multi-gazzilionaire from WHITE-OUT

Registered: May 2001
Location: NY metro area
Posts: 219

Toby quoted & said: I'll be on the lookout for Peter Tosh or Davey Jones being rapidly expelled from your butt... heh...it's Peter _Tork_ or _Davy_ Jones. I don't think that a rastafarian or some guy whose locker is always talked about were in the Pre-fab Four.

I don't know if Peter Tosh was a true rasta but he was one of the greatest reggae singers of all time. Spent many years with Bob Marley and founded the Wailers with him.

__________________
Jonathan

Registered: Sep 2001
Location: Singapore
Posts: 174

Erm, here's my 2 cents:

I think Handspring's engineers have already thought of that long before you did. It's the big bosses at the top who still have the final say. T_T

LONG LIVE THE PRISM!!!!!!

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my little webby
I still love my Visor Prism

Registered: Aug 2001
Location: ILLINOIS
Posts: 227

We're getting thinner and thinner units throughout PDA(s) manufacture-- The SD slot could have easily been incorperated into the Edge--
But they didn't--
They may come up with a better Treo type unit -- who knows--
Somebody will--

We aren't going to be losing pda(s) --

They'll improve and get slimmer and with better slots (mmc/sd etc) which now reach 256meg--(CF anyway)

It will take time and who knows who will lead--

With the economy like it is and tech buying slow--the R&D money is scarce--

Registered: May 2001
Location: San Francisco, California, USA
Posts: 90

I too would *love* to see a new Visor. I disagree, however, with some assumptions made.

I don't mind the thickness of my Prism. I like the thickness of the Deluxe better, but I don't care about it being wafer thin -- especially not if it means losing the (built-in) springboard slot. I don't like the trend of smaller-is-better, with phones soon to fit on a fingernail. I carry a Motorola StarTac phone and T900 Talkabout pager -- both are as small as I would want to get, and I like the size of the Treo -- for a phone.

I *do* keep a springboard in my visor at all times -- I've got 10 megs of programs, over 4 megs of photos, 8 megs of dictionaries and databases, and so on, on a 128MB CF card in a FlashPlus. Given the opportunity, there are one or two other modules I'd have loaded at all times.

Personally, the main upgrades I'd like in a Prism II (thinking bare minimums, here) are a daylight-readable screen, higher resolution, more internal memory (16MB), and a faster processor.

My fantasy prism would have all that, dual springboard slots, an aluminum or titanium case, built-in 802.11b networking, serial or USB connectivity, and built-in two-way paging. Dual springboards would be handy for situations where you have your maps on one memory card and also a GPS springboard, etc.

I don't need or want a built-in keyboard -- I have a snap-on (and a thumbboard, which is better, but doesn't fit the prism) and a stowaway. If I'm poking at the screen with a stylus anyway, I'll use grafitti, thank you very much. I don't really want to clutter up my PDA with a cellphone, though I like the idea of an add-on phone (i.e., the visorphone) so I can use the address book to dial the phone.

As for convergence in general, I have a Nikon 5700 digital camera -- I don't need a cheapie camera in my visor. (Though I do have a couple of eyemodules -- they were cheap.) I don't want an MP3 player in my visor -- I have several that do a much better job, and I'm eyeing either the Rio Riot or the Archos Jukebox. I do have a Minijam (it was cheap, no MMC, though) but why waste a springboard slot for that? And for the ones with MP3 functionality built-in, why would I want to waste PDA memory on MP3's? I could go on all day...

Unfortunately, I think HS completely abandoned the Springboard some time ago, and the vendors followed suit. Even if someone came up with an improved Visor, there would not be any modules available for it.

P.S., for reasons unfathomable to ordinary mortals, I realized that I posted mostly the same specs previously on a topic about what should a new visor have.

Registered: Aug 2002
Location:
Posts: 67

prism II/Hand Spring no more

I love my Prism and like all of you I am sad Handspring dropped a great product line as the Visor family. It will probably be the last PDA I purchase until the I get something similar to what "oqo.com" is coming out with... a mini computer (not much larger than a PDA) that has a touch sensitive screen, 20G hard drive, XP os, usb and firewire ports, wireless bluetooth, and a port to conect to a monitor and keyboard when at home. Maybe these new miniature computers will be the demise of all PDA's??
for now though I still think the Prism is one of the best PDA's running Palm OS out there.
-eric

Registered: Sep 2002
Location:
Posts: 4

BlueTooh removable Springboard

I dont know if anything came of it but some one was working on a self contained bluetooth system where you could use modules with none handspring devices what about that ?

Registered: Aug 2002
Location: St. Louis
Posts: 108

April Fools!

It was an April Fools joke done by a staffer of VisorCentral. It was called the "Springtooth" and was supposed to allow any Bluetooth enabled PDA (Palm, Sony, Treo, etc. if they ever get THAT functional!) to control Springboard devices.

The idea was that, should Visors ever someday become totally unavailable or prohibitively expensive (museum pieces?) or you decide to upgrade(?) to another PDA, you could still use your Springboard modules, wirelessly! You could even say, place an eyemodule2 in the Springtooth in one location, while remotely taking pictures or viewing its video in another place on your Bluetooth PDA. Or create your own portable wireless internet access point by inserting a Springboard modem into the Springtooth, and then connecting the modem to a landline. Then roam with your PDA within the Bluetooth range.

Had a lot of people fooled, postings were made requesting information, how to order, etc.

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The Prismer

"I am not a number, I am a person!"

Registered: Sep 2002
Location:
Posts: 17

I myself am very disappointed that HS would actually dump the springboard. It's the only PDA series that I know that actually allowed a change of functionality by using different modules. Sure they're a bit bulky, but since when you see something that's basically a first generation device (I have a Visor Deluxe) running something like Palm 3.1 could become a mp3 player? Or turn it into a digital camera? record voice? or become a phone?
I thinik as a way to reduce bulk, HS should've offered their software only springboard in MMC cards, and supply Visors with an adaptor or at least offer in a very cheap prices. These MMC cards now are holding quite a bit of memory with very little bulk, and definately work well to reduce bulk. Then it still allow the visor to retain its ability to add functionality.
I'm still contemplating about getting the minijam because I know HS is likely not going to offer any PDAs with springboards again, and tell you the truth, this really sucks.

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Politics can turn best friends into worse foes.

Registered: Sep 2002
Location:
Posts: 17

Well the customer rep says that they haven't abandoned the visor line (yet) bu thinks that the combination of PDA and cell phone is what the company see as focus....
Well I personally don't mind the merging of the two except for the price and at the sacrifice of the springboard.

__________________
Politics can turn best friends into worse foes.

Registered: Jun 2002
Location: By the toilet.
Posts: 174

quote:

---

Originally posted by Uncle Roger
I too would *love* to see a new Visor. I disagree, however, with some assumptions made.

I don't mind the thickness of my Prism. I like the thickness of the Deluxe better, but I don't care about it being wafer thin -- especially not if it means losing the (built-in) springboard slot. I don't like the trend of smaller-is-better, with phones soon to fit on a fingernail. I carry a Motorola StarTac phone and T900 Talkabout pager -- both are as small as I would want to get, and I like the size of the Treo -- for a phone.

I *do* keep a springboard in my visor at all times -- I've got 10 megs of programs, over 4 megs of photos, 8 megs of dictionaries and databases, and so on, on a 128MB CF card in a FlashPlus. Given the opportunity, there are one or two other modules I'd have loaded at all times.

Personally, the main upgrades I'd like in a Prism II (thinking bare minimums, here) are a daylight-readable screen, higher resolution, more internal memory (16MB), and a faster processor.

My fantasy prism would have all that, dual springboard slots, an aluminum or titanium case, built-in 802.11b networking, serial or USB connectivity, and built-in two-way paging. Dual springboards would be handy for situations where you have your maps on one memory card and also a GPS springboard, etc.

I don't need or want a built-in keyboard -- I have a snap-on (and a thumbboard, which is better, but doesn't fit the prism) and a stowaway. If I'm poking at the screen with a stylus anyway, I'll use grafitti, thank you very much. I don't really want to clutter up my PDA with a cellphone, though I like the idea of an add-on phone (i.e., the visorphone) so I can use the address book to dial the phone.

As for convergence in general, I have a Nikon 5700 digital camera -- I don't need a cheapie camera in my visor. (Though I do have a couple of eyemodules -- they were cheap.) I don't want an MP3 player in my visor -- I have several that do a much better job, and I'm eyeing either the Rio Riot or the Archos Jukebox. I do have a Minijam (it was cheap, no MMC, though) but why waste a springboard slot for that? And for the ones with MP3 functionality built-in, why would I want to waste PDA memory on MP3's? I could go on all day...

Unfortunately, I think HS completely abandoned the Springboard some time ago, and the vendors followed suit. Even if someone came up with an improved Visor, there would not be any modules available for it.

P.S., for reasons unfathomable to ordinary mortals, I realized that I posted mostly the same specs previously on a topic about what should a new visor have.

---

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I'm just a dreamer..

Registered: Jun 2002
Location: By the toilet.
Posts: 174

It's happened TWICE!

Pressing submit brings me to server not found message and I accidentaly re-submitted the quoted text and I don't feel like typing what i intended in the first place.

(See my previous msg)

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I'm just a dreamer..

Registered: Apr 2001
Location: Lexington, Ma
Posts: 138

what if Handspring went into the consumer cell phone market, not the high-tech gadget guru's like us Treo users. Make a phone with a simple OS, no big Palm OS type thing, but something that works with the Palm OS directly, for wireless support, syncing information such as phone numbers and dates. If they came out with a sleek one, and made it 100-150 bucks, and a low cost one, maybe 40 or 60, im sure they would sell. Make them for Voice Stream and Sprint, along with ATT and Cingular, we already know they can.

If i wanted a Treo, but didnt have 350 bucks to eat, ide definatly get the next best thing, a Handspring cell phone...i think they would be great.

Registered: Sep 2002
Location:
Posts: 17

I don't think that a combined PDA and cell phone is that bad of an idea (like the Treo). Both have an address book (the PDA could store more information than just numbers and names) and both can dial a number and get calls and stuff. I would like to be rid of my cell phone if I'm carrying something that's duplicating is functions and doing the functions on the cell much better anyways. My main gripe is that they have got rid of the springboard on the Treo and the fact that it's so damn expensive. Also I don't mind graffiti, and I hate tiny keys.

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Politics can turn best friends into worse foes.

Registered: Aug 2002
Location: St. Louis
Posts: 108

quote:

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Originally posted by calyth
... My main gripe is that they have got rid of the springboard on the Treo and the fact that it's so damn expensive. Also I don't mind graffiti, and I hate tiny keys.

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The Prismer

"I am not a number, I am a person!"