I blame the company. I never had any interest in all these new-fangled mobile devices before - what Bluetooth, PalmOne, Wi-Fi, whatever. None of them can match the power of a real desktop, with a smooth operating CPU processor and the kewlest graphics processing card on the block, after all. All those laymen can pride themselves as being 'techies' cos they use a cell phone with a camera and mp3 player and surf on a little itty bitty screen - but face it, they're working with pathetic resolutions of what? 320x200? What kind of file sizes? RAM?
I'm a geek. A real geek. I can actually assemble my own computer from parts now. I'm never gonna be as well versed in hardware as the real hardware nuts, but hey, I'm not helpless at the hands of some tech guy somewhere and having to bring my computer to a "computer shop" for them to pull open and unscrew the case just to "upgrade" a part. You're playing with pocket calculators really, if you call yourself a techie just cos you own a PDA and can poke it with a stylus. Or download a few third-party programs from the internet for it.
So yea, I wasn't really into the PDA thing. And I hate cell phones. Makes you too accessible.
HOWEVER, the company has somehow decided in its infinite wisdom to offer a one-time lifetime of your service deal - a money subsidy for a PDA to encourage the use of technology. OMGWTFBBQ!!!one!11 You giving me $$$$$ to buy a computer? A toy computer, sure, but you paying for it?!
So suddenly PDAs become a whole heck of a lot more attractive when you can minus a certain sum from the listed price. Essentially half price for low mid-range models, free for the really low range ones, or a bit off the top for the new fangled ones.
But I don't want a new fangled one. I don't want functions barely tried out that don't really work, but just makes techies happy to say, I have this function, I have GPS, GSM or whatever. I don't want a free clunker of a white elephant either.
So that means...RESEARCH! That means making a list of criteria!
And suddenly I know a bit more about PDAs than I originally wanted to:
Do I want some Windows Mobile O/S or Palm O/S? Compare the list of advantages. Yep, looks good. No more turning to the dark side. Gimme Palm O/S.
Do I want to limit myself to a stylus and poking at a screen? No way, jose. I need a keyboard. I don't care how small it is, but I'm a geek, I need a keyboard. I see there are wireless options too, that's good for future upgrades if need be. And the stylus would come in handy for an option if I ever wanted to use it.
I MUST have a bright screen. I'll go blind without it.
No, I'm not gonna use a PDA to play music, that's what my desktop or high-fi system is for, I don't care how cruddy the audio sounds. I want a glorified notepad that I can type on instead of scrawling my lousy handwriting all over post-it notes or an exercise book.
And now I've found one that looks cool.
And Now I Wants It. The Palm Tungsten C. Good reviews in 2003. 2 years to cheapen in price, with perfectly usable utilities.
Except I don't even know whether it's still available here. I must actually go out on foot and look for the damn thing in shops. I can see the price still available on amazon and other US websites, but to order an electronic product from America is almost like asking me to order frozen durian from American, I should think.
It has to be cheaper here. I see an Apr 15 forum post offering a one week old Palm Tungtsen C for sale at $380. That's a good baseline to go from.
But I'm stuck here. Work has to end. Then I can go and hunt it down.
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