Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Texan in Calgary for a while
Posts: 1361

Post your comments from the news item here.

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Modesto, CA USA
Posts: 599

I think we might have a color Visor by summer. This is cool news and long overdue. I'll wait to see the actual hardware before purchasing this time.

Let's see what HipHop has to say about this....probably something along the lines of WinCE has had this capability for over a year before Palm etc.....

Is that the UPS truck I hear pulling up?

Registered: Oct 1999
Location:
Posts: 31

I agree with RSGMOOSE, I'll have to see the color hardware and check out the battery requirements before I even consider a color Visor/Palm. One of the things I liked about the Palm was the philosophy of doing the things people *need* in a handheld and doing them efficiently. Adding color isn't something I can see as very useful, except maybe for calculator graphs or something like that. Any other ideas about actually useful uses of color in a Visor/Palm?

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Pittsford,NY,USA
Posts: 223

That's great news, twice as fast plus color support ... very nice. I'm disappointed that it is limited to 256 colors, but it is still an improvement.

(As long as the battery life is still good.)

-Eric

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: St. Augustine, FL
Posts: 12

As for a color display, that's all well and good, but color LCD eats lots of power. And I like having a palm device that runs on AAA batteries. Personally, I think it'd be nice if we could set the display to greyscale, then reset it to color if we need color for something (like looking at pretty pictures Opinions?

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Orlando, FL
Posts: 29

I think that a color LCD for the visor would be a nice addition if we would not have to sacrifice other aspects, such as battery life and memory space.

Of course not much in the way of apps need color. I could be wrong but colorizing of must apps would increase their size many times. The only useful use would probably be for distinguishing text or maybe for color photos/graphs which themselves would take quite a large space.

[This message has been edited by handsprung (edited 10-18-1999).]

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Dayton, TN, USA
Posts: 66

I am still anxiously awaiting my B&W Visor, which should be here any day now! A color Visor/Palm would be nice to have _IF_ it does not significantly affect battery life, screen readability in various light conditions, etc. I still maintain that for the primary functionality of a PDA, color is superfluous. I think others agree.

But if these conditions can be accomodated, the I'm all for it. Maybe my wife will have her own Visor Dx when I upgrade to a color version next year. We'll wait and see!

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Thousand Oaks, CA, USA
Posts: 49

Cool! It sounds as if we'll get (sooner rather than later):

1) A color Visor (that doesn't eat batteries)
2) Machines designed first (hopefully) by the originators of the Palm/Palm OS
3) Speed that might allow Carmack to port Quake to Palm OS!!! ;-)

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Midland, TX USA
Posts: 95

I still find it hard to believe they can go to color without sacrificing the battery time. Color screens, whether 256 or 64,000, are going to draw heavily on the battery. More power to Handspring/Palm (pun intended), but that's one of the major reasons many of us have side-stepped Wince.

Registered: Oct 1999
Location: Cincinnati, OH
Posts: 109

I believe color would be a fantastic addition, even if it were only 16 colors. Just imagine looking through a list of tasks and rather than looking for a flag, you could just see red tasks that were important.

Regarding the battery life: what about all these new technologies being announced? Trans-reflective LCD (paper-like contrast and low battery usage), LEP (light emitting polymers that are flexible and use less power), etc.? Surely they are expensive, but they'll never get cheap if people don't start using them. What better chance than to offer a color option for those who wanted it?

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Modesto, CA USA
Posts: 599

Interesting addtion on the new article regarding Yahoo stating that Handspring is reviewing two of the new chips!

PalmVx is using the 20mhz Dragonball which is color capable with some additional components.

I'll take bets that Palm will introduce a color Palm that will be coordinated with the IPO.

Oops, here's a thought. Would Handspring try and buy up the majority of the Palm stock to take back control of the company they once started?

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Hong Kong
Posts: 200

Moose,

my comment? I had a look at a Casio running a videoclip. Very impressive. I go along the other comments and complain about batteries etc. The Casio 105 runs for only 6 hours max. (http://www.casio.com/hpc/detail.cfm?PID=1425&FeatureType_ID=5). I never used a WinCE, too many trouble stories.

The new CPU is also capeable running MP3 files and full backwards compatible to older Palm systems.

...but it will be good to have the option. It would be nice for applications such as GPS (color maps). Or, or, or.... (sorry, it's the only one I can think of right now)

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Pittsford,NY,USA
Posts: 223

RGSMOOSE,

The Visor also uses the DragonBall EZ CPU.

There are also apps that allow overclocking and underclocking the CPU (don't know if they will work with the Visor). If I remember right they will go as high as 23mhz (but are prone to lockups at that speed). Search for AfterBurner or CruiseControl over in Palm Gear.

Note: Be sure to read the authors warnings concerning overclocking and the need to backup first, etc.

The reasons to overclock are pretty obvious, but why underclock? The answer ... Battery Life! The faster you run the faster you burn the batteries and the slower the run the longer the batteries will last.

-Eric

Note: I am not recommending that you use those apps. The standard speed (16mhz) is plenty fast for me and I don't want to risk my hardware by overclocking. I just wanted show what was possible. Use them at your own risk.

[This message has been edited by emeyer (edited 10-19-1999).]

Registered: Sep 1999
Location: Hong Kong
Posts: 200

Overclocking?

Does the CPU has temp control? Or is there no risk of overheating? The only risk you face is usually CPU heatstroke.

Does make sense to overclock if you use the normal office applications (memo, dates etc.)? Or - who needs to overclock?

Registered: Sep 1999
Location:
Posts: 179

Actually the Visor uses the older or more current DragonBall EZ processor that runs at 16MHz (I'm not sure about the overclocking stuff) and not the new DragonBall EZ processor that runs at 20MHz. The article states :

"Motorola (NYSE:MOT) also bumped up the speed of its DragonBall EZ processor to 20MHz. The EZ chip can support color as well, but requires additional external components. The chip is available now.

Handspring officials said the company is evaluating the new chips for use in its products."

Registered: Oct 1999
Location:
Posts: 2

to be frank, i agree with the majority when they say that color is not that vital in a palm device but after some thought i realized that color is actually quite useful. consider for example a calendar that is loaded with events. wouldn't it be nice if we could color code activities in terms of priority so that in one glance we can instantly see if a really important event is coming up? this is just one example. if you really think about it, color IS exxential.

Registered: Sep 1999
Location:
Posts: 46

I'm going to reveal my age by making this post, but here goes...

I remember saying "color isn't that important" back when it first started showing up on Apple II's and 8086 PC's.

My point is that when color is available, the software changes to take advantage of it. It would not be all that useful on current apps because they are designed for B/W.

I agree, though, that the added features of color are not worth the trade-off in battery drain.