PDA Reviews

When was the last time you have seen a pure PDA in the market? Chances are, you have not, at least not in the recent few years.  There is an explanation for that as mobile phones have now evolved into a new avatar that bundle all features a PDA has, making a pure PDA worthless. However, HP has come up with a new model the HP iPAQ 111 - a classic handheld PDA meant to accompany your phone. With a Marvell PXA310 624Hz processor, a 64MB RAM and a 3.5” touch screen, the PDA sure sounds tempting.  Now, who would ever want a PDA alone? Right? Wrong.  While your mobile phone can do all the communication handling, PDAs are highly effective in organizing your data and tasks, making it perfect to complement your phone. If Business matters most, you would not mind carrying another device in your pocket. How good is the iPAQ 111 at it? Read the following review and find out.

Design:

Old-school style:
Kudos to HP, the HP iPAQ 111 Classic PDA is designed old school style. The design reminds you of a bygone era when people used to depend on PDAs and mobile phones were bulky. This is yet another phone in the HP series to have the same form factor (Note : This design was bought from HTC in early 2002 and has been used in HP models ever since).  The iPAQ 111 is about 2.7 inches wide, 0.6 inches thick and 4.6 inches tall. At 4.1oz it is a reasonably light phone and is bulkier than its predecessor the iPAQ 110 Classic.  The phone’s casing is built of Plastic, but has been textured to convey the impression of a brushed metal surface. On the left side of the body is present the SD card slot and on the right are present the power and audio note button.  Like all the other models in the 110 series, the PDA has a telescopic stylus which is hard to get used to initially.

Keypad:
The keypad is delicate and the buttons feel light and wayward. There is the start and OK buttons in the innermost of the keypad buttons. This odd design and its lack of dedicated soft keys for one handed use, make it difficult to use the keypad. But once you get used to it, the Directional keypad and the buttons are great to use.  There are dedicated buttons for Calendar and Messaging which can be re-tasked for other purposes. Since it is a PDA phone, the keypad has been designed keeping in mind the business users. Hence, if you are into hard core gaming on your phone, the 111 Classic’s keypad would not really appeal much to you as the buttons are not conveniently located for gaming.

Display:
PDAs usually have a big screen and the iPAQ 111 is no exception. At 3.5″ the screen is large and is astounding. Unlike the 110 which was available whose screen was available in QVGA resolution, the HP iPAQ 111 Classic uses a Color TFT Active Matrix. It has excellent contrasts and brightness, but when it comes to resolution, it is a disappointment. The PDA has a one of the lowest resolutions in the market at 320 x 240 pixels.  The problem with low resolutions is that reading long text would cause one’s eyes to turn sour. Aligning the touch screen would take some time. But once, you are ready, the touch screen is great to use. The screen is sensitive and responds to touch well. The phone suffers from polarization problems which gets annoying especially when you watch videos with insufficient lighting.
Overall, the resolution could have been much higher and the display could have been better than a QVGA.

Features:

Microsoft Mobile Office 6.1:
The iPAQ 111 Classic Handheld PDA has Windows Mobile 6.1 and hence the latest version of all Microsoft Office applications such as Word, Excel etc. are provided. Apart from all this, there is a PDF viewer and a Photo application package provided by HP. There is the Mobile Windows Media player on it, which is pretty much adequate for listening to music.  Who says all this is classic? This is advanced features on your PDA and the presence of Windows Live is another bonus. To keep updating your Windows, you can get it done automatically or manually. If you would want Microsoft Outlook, you will need to shell out separately for a third party application that would enable you to sync with your PC.

Synchronization:
There is the Active Sync 4.5 provided on the OS which allows simultaneous Wi-Fi and Active Sync connections making syncing painless.  Syncing between Outlook and the PC is pretty simple too.

Wi-Fi:
Compared to the last gen PDAs, the 111 Classic is more connected and has loads of options for you to connect : Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.  It has 802.11 b/g Wi-Fi whose range is great. Not only was it able to detect most routers, it managed to connect to the network quick as well. The browsing was fast and data transfer was easy. Like the 110, the PDA reports that it has connected to the Internet when it actually has not.

Bluetooth:
The 111 Classic iPAQ has Bluetooth 2.0/EDR which uses the Widcomm stack. The Bluetooth enables you to discover services on other devices and allows you to access Internet using a LAN connected to a PC. Though Wi-Fi worked without a hitch when Bluetooth headphones were activated, the browsing speed fell down drastically.

Internet Browsing:
This HP iPAQ 111 Classic PDA Pocket PC device is pretty good enough for Internet browsing.  Its low resolution does not really worse things here. The Internet Explorer provided has pretty decent options that would allow you to browse Internet easily.  Did we mention that one could download other browsers as well? Opera ran best in the 111 iPAQ. The rate browsing on the device is sufficient for rare browsing. Browsing Internet through Wi-Fi is easy and the inbuilt Bluetooth would allow you to browse Internet as well.

Gaming:
A huge screen and a great processor, gaming does not get any better on the phone. There are tons of games that are available that you can play on your PDA. While most games run smooth, the problem arises because of the keypad. The rectangular D pad is good to use, but if there are other buttons you would like to play with, it gets a bit annoying and confusing .However, the PDA is good for chess, card games and even some more graphically more intense games. If you are into some serious gaming, the PDA is great. It could have been better if there were some improvements in the key design.

Software Bundle:
Aimed at the Business oriented users, the PDA offers a variety of apps similar to the fare offered by Windows 5. It has its share of improvements – more innovative ways to organize data.  Features like full HTML display with images puts it way ahead of its league. However, Mobile Windows is still inferior to its desktop companion. There are the Windows Office applications such as Word and Excel that allow you to edit/view your documents, making it perfect for users on the go. There is the Windows Live Messenger client, Internet Explorer and Windows Media Player 10 which is simply marvelous.  WMP 10 has the capability to play WMA,WAV and PlaysForSure files. There is tremendous improvement is sound quality yet the sound is still pretty average.  HP has provided software to view PDF and TXT files with the ClearVue PDF viewer to view PDF files.  The Microsoft Picture and Video viewer lets you view pictures and videos. In terms of interface, all these applications are standard.  You can install other applications on to your PDA, such as Mozilla and Opera for mobile. Third party applications seem to run smooth on this PDA.

Performance:

The HP iPAQ 111 runs on the Marvell XScale PX310 processor at a clock speed of 624MHz, faster than the PX270. Performance wise, Marvel claims that 310 is about twice more efficient than the 270. Another feature of the processor is its low power consumption. It requires much lesser energy to run on than its predecessor the PX270.

If you have long text files, reading could have a bad impact on your eyes, the low resolution just adds to the problem. The resolution of the PDA is horribly low, even by most standards. But perhaps, that explains its long battery life. Nonetheless, the resolution could have been much better.  When it comes to playing video, the PX310 was able to play MPEG4 files with ease. It had no problem with DivX and XViD files either. Performance wise, the Phone simply tramples out competition. It can handle high quality videos without a synch.

Accessories:

The package includes a 1200mAH Lithium Ion battery, a Mini USB sync cable, a slip case, an AC adapter and a HP iPAQ companion CD. So, basically pretty much a stripped down package. The battery is replaceable and the USB sync cable lets you sync your PDA to a PC. The Power Adapter provided does tend to get heated up after a while, but that is not much of a problem either.  The CD provided has some basic software that would boost up the functionality of your PDA.

Battery Life of iPAQ 111:

A standard 3.7c Lithium 1200mAh battery is provided in the device and in terms of battery life, the PDA is amazing.  It lasted a solid 3 and half hours in spite of having to power up the large screen, the processor and Wi-Fi. When power intensive applications such as videos were played, the battery lasted a solid 3 hours better than most PDAs in the market. The battery lasts about 3 days with moderate usage. That is great even by reasonable standards. Consider this with the iPod Touch which lasts half the time this PDA does.

Warranty:

There is a guaranteed warranty of one year on parts and labor of the HP 111 iPAQ Classic and apart from that the technical support is available for 90 days from the date of purchase.

Verdict:

The trend now is to have a PDA with a phone, however not many phones can claim to successfully combine the best of both. The iPAQ 111 Classic handheld is a pure PDA and is great at what PDAs do the best – Organizing data.  It’s amazing display, integrated Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and an amazing software bundle overshadow most other PDAs in the market. Of course, the PX210 processor is faster than the 111’s PX110, but that would not make much of a difference. The Battery Life and the speaker are average and if been better could have made this phone a must buy.  So, if you are looking for a PDA that complements your Phone, this is recommended.

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HP iPAQ 111 Classic PDA - Specification Details

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