Newbie needs your help in choosing a phone - Touch Dual, MDA Touch Plus General

hello,
first of all let me thank you for a brilliant forum. I was looking for a forum with loads of information on pocket pc phones and i guess i found you guys.
Okay I'm a total newbie and I need help with choosing between three phones and i'm extremely confused as to what i should choose.
I'm with orange and they are offering me:-
1. NOKIA N95 (Not the black edition, but does come with 8gb) - Has all the features, but i've heard these are very buggy and slow
2. TYTN II - Has all the features that i need, except the keypad is eithier virtual or i have to pull out the keyboard to make calls, which is a NO NO
3. TOUCH DUAL - Now this phone is the dream i was wishing for..i.e there is a keypad which exists, allowing me to quickly make calls, but then it has NO GPS and NO WI-FI .
My problem is that all phones have their advantages and disadvantages and therefore make it difficult for me to choose. Here is what i'm looking for:-
1. The phone must have a hard keypad (Not a keyboard or virtual keypad) to make immediate calls.
2. GPS is not immediately needed, but i hope that i can add it in the near future
3. WI-FI again is not urgently needed, but i hope that it can be added later in future
4. The phone software must be very adaptable software wise
5. Must be unlockable to all networks
6. Needs to have a decent battery life
I especially want to know about the Touch Dual..can this give me what i need?

2 & 3, u'd better assume a "no" in touch dual forever. if finally a brilliant brain solves it, it's a bonus. better not assume you can get it in "near future". meanwhile, you may have interest on this thread
4. Windows Mobile is an open platform that allows installation of the millions of programs in the market. meanwhile, pls be prepared that "soft reset" is unavoidable for the M$ product, just like reboot upon "blue screen" in win98.
5. see this
6. it's very dependent on personal habit. e.g. how many phone calls a day? how much data connection? how much online/offline content browsing? how much game playing? the word "decent" is very subjective as well. in general, if you work in office for most of time, it's not a worry at all, as you can easily recharge your WM devices from a pc using a standard usb cable.
hope this helps

many thanks pp18 your reply has been very helpful.
I use the phone 90% of the time to make outgoing calls..so battery life is fairly important
Regarding GPS...for the time being, can Touch dual work with a GPS receiver?

if you're very worried about the battery life, you can always bring a spare battery with you. can't share much on this, as it's always easy for me to find a usb cable to charge up my device even i forget to do it the night before.
re gps, yes you can use an external gps module and let it communicate with touch dual through bluetooth. you may have interest on this.

hi pp18.
I rang orange yesterday and after having a long chat with them, they backed off the n95 and tytn II as they said that the person who offered the mobiles made a mistake. I only had a choice between a nokia 6500 classic/slide or the Touch Dual II. Hope i made the right choice as i chose the Touch Dual II.
I thank you for helping me with all these questions and definately have interest in using an external gps receiver.
As a total newbie and after reading your links, can you clarify the following questions i have please? :-
1. If i use the recommended GPS receiver with the t-dual, is it as accurate and speedy & reliable as a general tomtom device would be? What i'm trying to say is that are there any known issues with GPS receivers and a phone? For example does the phone regularly lose signal and can't tell where i'm going.
2. Can i install tomtom software on it?
3. From your experience, has the guy who charges £5 to unlock this mobile, messed up anyone's phone?
4. I live in an urban area...Is it true that this phone has serious signal issues?
5. Lastly i have heard that the orange installed software is slow, drains the battery and unreliable. How difficult is it for a novice like myself to install a new rom that is faster and better than orange? Also what is the best/reliable rom going at the moment?
Many thanks for your very helpful info.
regards
newbiefone

in general, bluetooth communication between an external gps module and a WM device shouldn't be a problem. for details and specific to your area, i suggest you ask in the Niki Accessories forum so that your neighbours can offer better help.
for flashing cooked rom, i personally not recommend it to newbies, as the worst case for a wrong operation is "brick" the device. and, a device with cooked rom will void the warranty as well. you'd better find a friend to help. for choice of rom, suggest you read the great articles in the Niki Upgrading forum.

i had pretty much the same options as you. and i went with the touch dual. it kind of puts a dampner on it not having gps or wifi inbuilt like the other 2, but wifi isnt really that big of a deal, internet surfing on a phone screen is pretty worthless - if need be i just use gprs, its fine for my needs (i bearly ever used wifi on my old tornado). i already had a bluetooth gps reciver so gps isnt a problem, i just leave it in my car.
the touch dual is by far the most attractive out of the 3. the only thing i dislike is the camera, its not as good as the n95s. and i'd love tv out like the n95 has. i wouldnt want a tytn ii though. they're bulky and heavy and there is no need for all the extra weight just for gps and wifi.

thanks pp18 and ducamie.
From what you guys have told me so far, it sounds like i've made the right choice. Would you kindly help me with my remaining questions:-
2. Can i install tomtom software on it?
3. From your experience, has the guy who charges £5 to unlock this mobile, messed up anyone's phone?
4. I live in an urban area...Is it true that this phone has serious signal issues?
Thanks So Much!!!

tomtom installs great.. version 6 is pretty awesome with touch screen.
if you need it unlocking, i'd deffinatley use olipro's simunlock, its £5, its very safe, and your only other option is to pay £20 at imei check. with olipro's it cid unlocks your phone too. i wish he'd brought it out sooner.
ive never had problems with signal, its always been fine, if youre living in an urban area i wouldnt worry about it.

thanks so much ducamie!!! i look forward to seeing my phone.
Btw, do you have an orange dual? If so, have you updated it with another rom or have you left it as it is?

hey. yeah, got an orange branded niki.
i flashed tom_codon's rom after flashing the hardspl to get rid of the orange stuff on the phone more than anything but its a good rom generally, i'd upgrade it if i were you (once youre familiar with what youre doing ofcourse). might aswell.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=364335

Related

Thank You

I have been lurking around the forum for a while, after purchasing an o2 mini-s and being sorely disappointed with it.
It was slow and clunky and some bits of the interface seemed counter-intuitive. It got that bad that I retired it and reverted back to my old Nokia 6310i. At least the Nokia made phone calls properly...
However, with my employer implementing Exchange/Outlook properly, I decided to give it another go. With the help of this forum, I now have a properly working HTC Wizard (I don't think there's anything o2 left on it, apart from the front cover branding).
Specifically, this forum taught me to:
1. Jump-start a dead Wizard (cutting up a usb cable to flash the battery).
2. Get rid of all of the o2 ActiveUI rubbish
3. Implement Omapclock (to 240 Mhz)
4. Get a new dialer skin so my fingers could actually press the numbers
5. Sort out wifi (only use TKIP on your router)
6. Get a registry editor (TRE)
7. Get the shift/dot notifications
8. Get a good backup system (SBP)
9. Get BT audio
10. Use the all-in-one .cab to improve speed of lots of things
I now have a Wizard which:
A. Has good basic functionality (phone, blutooth, wifi, calendar) which turn on and off when I want
B. Syncs to exchange at work via USB and syncs to my home laptop via bluetooth
C. Picks up my home wifi with no problems
D. Implements GPRS for Internet Explorer / Messaging when wifi not available
I've probably forgotten a lot of things that I have done, but i wanted to say THANK YOU to all one this forum. Without you lot, the Wizard would still be gathering dust in a cupboard.
Sorry for the long-ish first post, but i wanted to encourage all newbies with problems. This forum will get things sorted if you search properly and persevere.
whats this.. a post from a newbie that isnt asking the same questions over and over... didnt know those newbs existed...
ha ha ha, i couldnt resist
I am glad that you got all the above from the forums..... I wish more people would read like you.
Hope you are happier with your phone now

Newbie on the move!

Good day to all!
First of all let me introduce myself. I'm David and I'm an executive in a transcription company in the Philippines. I recently bought a Dopod 838 Pro to aid me in organizing myself and to keep my productivity up. So far, it's doing a marvelous job! Totally worth the investment, I might add.
Now on to my issues (don't we all have them? ). I'm very keen on keeping myself updated with the latest software especially when it comes to bug fixes and patches. I've read through almost half the Hermes threads on the boards and I have several questions that the threads have not answered.
1. I'm very curious regarding WM6, my Dopod has WM5 on it and I'm wondering if its worth upgrading to 6. Would you experienced users recommend me upgrading?
2. I also heavily use my Dopod as a media center, I access the internet through wifi, hsdpa, edge and even 3g. I even play movies on it while I'm out of town on business using TCPMP. Oh, lets not forget MP3s. I also can't go through the day without using Word, Excel and Powerpoint. Will upgrading my phone's ROM and consequently its OS cause problems in this regard?
3. If you do recommend me updating my ROM, Which ROM would you choose for me knowing how I use my Dopod.
4. I've read through the warnings regarding flashing ROMs. I've flashed a few hardware before, DVD-writers, PC BIOS and even modems and routers, they were all successful. Now, since it represents a significant amount of cash, and I dont want to "brick" my Dopod, is the risk of changing ROMS worth it?
5. I am a control freak (if you did not already notice reading this exceptionally long intro to a thread), I want to be able to control all if not most of the aspects of my Dopod. Again, which ROM/program would you recommend.
That's just about it. I would really appreciate your answers guys. Thank you in advance and allow me to say that your work on this thread is highly appreciated! Blessings to all!
If you depend on your PDA for work then I'd recommend to play it safe and wait with the upgrade to WM6 until HTC/Dopod releases the official version.
I use my PDA at least fifty percent for work. I tried WM6 but had a few issues, the most serious one with Bluetooth and loosing connection to my headset and then the phone refusing to reconnect unless I soft reset it! (Not very nice when this happens in the middle of a phone call with a customer.)
1. yes
2.no
3.check the latest LVSW, or one of it's derivatives, like elf, sleuth or V3pg
4.as long as you follow MrVanx's guide you'll be fine.
5.Sleuth's LVSW derivative, but that's just my opninion. Any of the above ROMs would work
davidlleno said:
Good day to all!
1. I'm very curious regarding WM6, my Dopod has WM5 on it and I'm wondering if its worth upgrading to 6. Would you experienced users recommend me upgrading?
I have seen this question posted 2-3 times in the last couple weeks. You might wanna try saerching through the threads for more opinions.
2. I also heavily use my Dopod as a media center, I access the internet through wifi, hsdpa, edge and even 3g. I even play movies on it while I'm out of town on business using TCPMP. Oh, lets not forget MP3s. I also can't go through the day without using Word, Excel and Powerpoint. Will upgrading my phone's ROM and consequently its OS cause problems in this regard?
Media issues are generally uncommon in "these" (custom) ROM upgrades. Its usually communication bugs that you have to deal with.
3. If you do recommend me updating my ROM, Which ROM would you choose for me knowing how I use my Dopod.
Black2.5 is stable, so is Sleuths Derivative. If you new to flashing choose a rom that has already been around and has had the bugs worked out.
4. I've read through the warnings regarding flashing ROMs. I've flashed a few hardware before, DVD-writers, PC BIOS and even modems and routers, they were all successful. Now, since it represents a significant amount of cash, and I dont want to "brick" my Dopod, is the risk of changing ROMS worth it?
5 months ago, yes. Now, not as much. Make SURE you read up on HardSPL before you flash, and use the mrvanxguide
5. I am a control freak (if you did not already notice reading this exceptionally long intro to a thread), I want to be able to control all if not most of the aspects of my Dopod. Again, which ROM/program would you recommend.
Same as before. Theres lots of little cool customizations that you can do, but a ROM upgrade is not going to be more customizable than WM5.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hope that helps. Good Luck!
Great replies guys. Thanks.
I've already flashed my device with the ELF WM6 LVSW derivative. Works great. just has a few refresh problems. Today screen does not apply changes I've made without restarting the device, also contacts on the sim card remain visible even after checking the "show contacts only".

Any good reasons not to get an Atom Life?

I'm getting close do a desicion, and that will probably be to buy an Atom Life, not wait for the I-Mate Ultimate 7150. But is there anything that should make me rethink that? I have owned an original Atom for more than a year, so I know about the not so good screen, and I know that the battery time isn't all that great (but I have extra batteries). But the 3.5G, the fast CPU and the small form factor is what's winning me. Any suggestions?
y dnt u go for O2 Flame ??
i knw its a bit huge !! but its really good!!
No HSDPA. Slower CPU. And I prefer smaller form factor to bigger screen, basically.
man buy d flame
atom life will ruin your life
You should look at the date of threads... I have had the Life more than a month now, and I'm very satisfied with it. A few early problems turned out to be software that didn't want to play nice with WM6.
I have had my Atom Life for about 4 months now. I upgraded it to the latest WM6 ROM found on the O2 web site. My previous device was an I-Mate Jam.
I don't use a lot of the advanced features in the Atom Life, because of my current Telco provider (T-Mobile USA). So, I'm only using Edge, not 3G or 3.5G. I'm also not using VTCall or the FM radio. I do use WiFi and this seems to work well, although not as convenient as being on a PC. I do use Skype on occasion (under WiFi) and that has worked well too. I have a stereo blutooth earphone by Motorola that works great. I'm checking email (POP3) and going to the Internet, no problem. I bought Spb Mobile Shell for launching application and that's probably the smartest buy I've ever made for my device. I almost never use the stylus for most standard operations, thanks to this great application. I also use Microsoft Voice Command. With this, no need to ever look at your screen or fumble with searching for contacts: making phone calls and launching applications are a cinch. I also have a bunch of other applications (various databases, MetrO, PDF reader), all working flawlessly. The camera is adequate. It's never going to replace a real camera, but for quick shots it's actually pretty decent. I don't use my PDA as a major input device. Therefore, I mostly use the build-in keyboard for typing things in and that's fine for me. I do travel extensively overseas and the Atom Life has worked flawlessly on any network it's been connected to.
The only major issue I have with the Atom Life. It doesn't notify me when I have a voicemail waiting for me. Technical support was useless. They basically told me: "sorry, we don't support the Atom Life in the US". I do get notification for missed calls and SMS, but not for voicemail. I have searched the Internet every which way and found no solution, except for a recommendation to change my Radio ROM (I have no clue on how to do this and I don't want to brick my phone). If anyone has any ideas on how to solve this problem, let me know. I will be forever grateful!!
Otherwise, I am fairly pleased with the Atom life, as you may have guessed.

Good reasons not to get Atom Life

After hearing the news of O2 Atom Life being planned for release, I, like most of the users out there who bought it was restlessly waiting for its release.
Sadly, after getting my hand on the device, I am faced with the following problems (WM5 and WM6).
1. Video Call - The vtcall application requires 10mb of free ram to start. When in use, it only uses about 2-3mb of ram (confirmed by O2 support). The problem is, the average free ram of most users is around 8-10mb. When receiving video call, vtcall fails to start up.
2. Slow performance while scribing - Writing using the stylus is misery with this device. Each strokes appeared slowly and you are unable to write naturely. Instead you have to write very slowly, letter by letter. The excuse given by O2 Support is because of it using the rom as temporary memory for the touch screen and also because of the rom size (1gb). I was told that it is so because they can't foresee what will be effected when they decided to put in 1gb of rom. For me, it seems like it has a design flaw. I wonder if I can return the product and get back my money as this is the main reason why I regret getting Atom Life.
1. Windows Live - All features of Windows Live will try to connect via 3G/GPRS even though the device is already connected to the internet via wifi. Anyway, can't blame this on O2 as it seems to be the problem with WM6 but if they did a good testing, they should have known this and as Microsoft to fix it.
2. O2 Calendar - When tapped, it always open the native Calendar application even though the default calendar application has been set to other application (Pocket Informant, Pocket Agenda, ect).
3. O2 Filler - The filler has problem calculating the free space left with certain today plugins like the native Calendar plugin and Spb Mobile Shell (with auto-hide enabled).
4. O2 Connect - It has only 3 items. Support, Collection Points and News. Where's the updates, tips and ect as stated in www.seeo2.com? The O2 Connect at the site is also worthless. The service is far worse than the O2 Connect service for O2 Xda II mini. Further more, the News item has problem. After refreshing it, about 80% of the time, the content is corrupted. Can only see the first news followed by damaged text display. Anyway, the today plugin can display the news correctly.
5. Camera Templates (Photo Frame mode) - The template is placed in the hidden partition of the rom and users are stuck with only 5 templates. Unlike O2 Xda II mini, users can place additional templates in the My Documents\Templates folder and they are automatically accessible in the camera. Upon contacting O2 support, they asked me to look for 3rd party software to solve it.
6. Notification Queue - The WLMSchedule has mutiple duplication. Need to remove them or the duplicated events will grow in number over time. Again, this is more to Microsoft but as stated above, O2 should have known about it.
I have experienced the same problem but the most irritating for me is the problem with Video calling. How I wish the 1G ROM can share memory with the exhausted RAM like before with Windows 2003.
thanks for the info....how about flame???it hv the same problem??
Here an update from O2:
Prob 1:
After several phone conversation with O2, it is decided that O2 can't do anything with this. The 10mb start-up requirement for VTCall is for performance sake (used for buffer). O2 confirmed that they are aware that Atom Life does not have enough main memory after (extensive use) before it is released to the market.
From my point of view, the designers should be sacked. If they knew about it, why not just increase the main memory to 128mb? Sigh, too many fools working at O2.
...
1. I don't know why but I consistently get 12-15MB of free RAM. Like right now, I have 16MB. I can only seem to get less than 10MB when I play Windows Media Player in the background.
2. I use transcriber and I agree that it's quite slow but compared to the old way of writing on my Palm then it's like light speed.
Now the other part
1 and 6. I don't blame a device (or the maker) for Microsoft bugs. I mean seriously, look how many people go out to get Vista even though it's full of bugs. I got my Atom Life with WM6 and never even touched Windows Live (and don't understand what you mean by WLMSchedule <-- ignorance is bliss ). If I don't like a built-in function, I'll try to get 3rd-party stuff for it or not use it at all.
2. I use SPB Diary and it works with Pocket Informant.
3. After a long process of finding out what is "O2 Filler", I finally figure out what it is. I don't install O2 Themes so it doesn't show up and my SPB Diary is pretty good at calculating the correct space.
4. You actually installed O2 Connect? I heard it was responsible for the random turning on of Wifi so I did not even install it. Got this after intensive research on internet.
5. Ok, this is a problem and the O2 people should do something about it.
So ya, I still blame the O2 people for not getting more RAM (more RAM is always better) and the terrible quality of their softwares. But overall, I love my Atom Life. Just wanna provide a more balanced viewpoint for those interested in buying the Atom Life.
Part 1: It's O2 fault as the VTCall application is choosen by O2 for video call.
Part 2: If you have used Magician before (O2 Xda II mini), you'll be amazed that the old device outperform O2 Atom Live. When you scribe on it, it feels like you are using a real pen.
Part 3 & 4: Heh he, I don't use it actually... just pointing out that O2 are not planning very well with the applications they are providing
Part 5: The great part is, the O2 support ask me to buy a 3rd part application for it... like it does exists. Made me think that the support team is stupid or living in a remote area somewhere in.... dunno where.
Part 6: You can disable the damn WM Live thing using Memmaid... but since I'm using Messenger and Hotmail... sigh...
I have had my Atom Life for about 3 months now. I upgraded it to the latest WM6 ROM found on the O2 web site. My previous device was an I-Mate Jam.
I don't use a lot of the advanced features in the Atom Life, because of my current Telco provider (T-Mobile USA). So, I'm only using Edge, not 3G or 3.5G. I'm also not using VTCall or the FM radio. I do use WiFi and this seems to work well, although not as convenient as being on a PC. I do use Skype on occasion (under WiFi) and that has worked well too. I have a stereo blutooth earphone by Motorola that works great. I'm checking email (POP3) and going to the Internet, no problem. I bought Spb Mobile Shell for launching application and that's probably the smartest buy I've ever made for my device. I almost never use the stylus for most standard operations, thanks to this great application. I also use Microsoft Voice Command. With this, no need to ever look at your screen or fumble with searching for contacts: making phone calls and launching applications are a cinch. I also have a bunch of other applications (various databases, MetrO, PDF reader), all working flawlessly. The camera is adequate. It's never going to replace a real camera, but for quick shots it's actually pretty decent. I don't use my PDA as a major input device. Therefore, I mostly use the build-in keyboard for typing things in and that's fine for me. I do travel extensively overseas and the Atom Life has worked flawlessly on any network it's been connected to.
The only major issue I have with the Atom Life. It doesn't notify me when I have a voicemail waiting for me. Technical support was useless. They basically told me: "sorry, we don't support the Atom Life in the US". I do get notification for missed calls and SMS, but not for voicemail. I have searched the Internet every which way and found no solution, except for a recommendation to change my Radio ROM (I have no clue on how to do this and I don't want to brick my phone). If anyone has any ideas on how to solve this problem, let me know. I will be forever grateful!!
Otherwise, I am fairly pleased with the Atom life, as you may have guessed.
Radio Upgrading
frenchygeek said:
I have had my Atom Life for about 3 months now. I upgraded it to the latest WM6 ROM found on the O2 web site. My previous device was an I-Mate Jam.
I don't use a lot of the advanced features in the Atom Life, because of my current Telco provider (T-Mobile USA). So, I'm only using Edge, not 3G or 3.5G. I'm also not using VTCall or the FM radio. I do use WiFi and this seems to work well, although not as convenient as being on a PC. I do use Skype on occasion (under WiFi) and that has worked well too. I have a stereo blutooth earphone by Motorola that works great. I'm checking email (POP3) and going to the Internet, no problem. I bought Spb Mobile Shell for launching application and that's probably the smartest buy I've ever made for my device. I almost never use the stylus for most standard operations, thanks to this great application. I also use Microsoft Voice Command. With this, no need to ever look at your screen or fumble with searching for contacts: making phone calls and launching applications are a cinch. I also have a bunch of other applications (various databases, MetrO, PDF reader), all working flawlessly. The camera is adequate. It's never going to replace a real camera, but for quick shots it's actually pretty decent. I don't use my PDA as a major input device. Therefore, I mostly use the build-in keyboard for typing things in and that's fine for me. I do travel extensively overseas and the Atom Life has worked flawlessly on any network it's been connected to.
The only major issue I have with the Atom Life. It doesn't notify me when I have a voicemail waiting for me. Technical support was useless. They basically told me: "sorry, we don't support the Atom Life in the US". I do get notification for missed calls and SMS, but not for voicemail. I have searched the Internet every which way and found no solution, except for a recommendation to change my Radio ROM (I have no clue on how to do this and I don't want to brick my phone). If anyone has any ideas on how to solve this problem, let me know. I will be forever grateful!!
Otherwise, I am fairly pleased with the Atom life, as you may have guessed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can find how to upgrade the radio from the link below:
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=549804&page=100

No more BR roms - I sold my iPAQ

Hey people,
Yesterday I got fed up with my iPAQ 910c, put it on craigslist and sold it for not much less than what I originally paid for it.
Mainly, the lack of Cell-ID support from HP was really annoying: all kinds of times when I wanted a quick sense of where I was from Google Maps, I'd have to wait a long time for a GPS fix and make sure I held the phone out with a clear view of the sky. Not exactly convenient. And even though Rogers is selling the iPAQ 910c on contract, HP hasn't provided an rilgsm.dll with Name Display (CNAP) support. Stupid.
That, and WM6.5 brings with it (in my opinion) features that really prefer a higher-res screen. And a directional control more advanced than a scroll wheel. And a light sensor to automatically adjust brightness (as opposed to me having the 61x/91x brightness control on hotkey, lol). And more speed.
...so I'm getting an Xperia X1.
It was fun cooking with y'all, and so I leave you in the capable hands of monte & keyx. Adios amigos!
Wow!
Sorry to lose your development skills on the 910 - I always enjoyed your ROMs.
Happy trails!
many thanks to you..
i'm still running your WM6.5 on my ipaq.
but, i'm also wondering to replacing my ipaq with xperia. how does xperia compared to ipaq 912, i just want to know from your point of view.
thx
So far it is awesome - the 800x480 screen is amazing with WM6.5, and the device seems to get both better speed and battery life than the iPAQ. That, plus the Xperia has just enough less width than the iPAQ for me to wrap my hand around when I'm carrying it, running, etc. Not only does Cell-ID provide instant estimates of my location in Google Maps (which itself looks amazing at WVGA), but GPS fix seems to take a fraction of the time it did on the iPAQ.
I can't do one-handed QWERTY typing as quickly or easily as with the iPAQ, but with two hands I don't notice much difference. The screen doesn't pick up nearly as many fingerprint smudges as my iPAQ did. And the optical trackball functions more like the little "pearl" on Blackberries, something HP should have put in the middle of that giant D-PAD.
But basically the screen is the biggest improvement: I went from seeing like 3 titanium homescreen entries on the ipaq (with WM6.5) to now seeing all of them at once. That's huge. I nearly broke even on the upgrade too - bought the iPAQ on eBay this January for like $240, sold for $200 on craigslist, and just got the Xperia from Rogers on a 3-year contract for $225.
Thankfully, there is a large ROM cooking community already in place for the Xperia, so that takes some of the pressure off. My understanding is that cooking for the HP devices is relatively easy once the tools exist; the SD-Loader isn't checking for signed ROM images so no low-level device unlocking is required. HTC phones are a different story - even the ones sold "SIM unlocked" still come with a bootloader that won't accept custom ROMs, and certain XDA gurus have to make a "HardSPL" modified bootloader before custom ROMs can be flashed. Case in point: the poor suckers with the Palm Treo Pro are still without any custom ROMs whatsoever, because the phone isn't quite popular enough to have reached somebody who can make a HardSPL (they're working on that).
Once a HardSPL exists, though, HTC ROM development tends to explode because they keep using the same underlying hardware. Thus the Xperia light sensor is the same as the one on the Touch Diamond and Touch Pro; the radio hardware is interchangeable with those phones too. Moral of the story: check out the state of ROM development before you buy.
soory 2 hear u are out of ipaq roms u had good ones
anyway good luck with your new device and try 2 keep a look 4 plastic cracks
i 4 myself like the front KB like the 6900 900 i780...
i had the ipaq 800 (data messenger) with light sensor dpad sensor very fast gps...(device generl speed slower then the 900 and have no SR )
had some htc devices with sliding hard KB but on such devices i found myself using software KB (if u sms or need somthing short u will see it 2)
the screen must be a great thing
enjoy and tnx 4 all
Good look with the new toy.
Noooooooo....how dare you betray us front facing keyboard lovers!!!
It was good having your roms and knowledge...best of luck with the Xperia!!
I'm currently waiting for a replacement 910c from Rogers right now...my USB connector stopped working Maybe I'll just replace my phone altogether...but...I must have WM, front facing keyboard, gps, wifi, and 7.2mbps dl speed
We'll see what comes out...Samsung looks like it might have a good rival
Again, many thanks and good luck!
Well, congrats on the "upgrade" - I thought someone on Rogers would for sure go for a quad-band phone, but maybe the tri-band will work well enough for you where you are.
By the way - the "cell ID" thing is being worked on, and I thought I had a quick solution involving "cell broadcast" settings in the registry. It's probably only weeks away from being fixed. Keep checking back to see if we get it right.
gfinockio said:
Well, congrats on the "upgrade" - I thought someone on Rogers would for sure go for a quad-band phone, but maybe the tri-band will work well enough for you where you are.
By the way - the "cell ID" thing is being worked on, and I thought I had a quick solution involving "cell broadcast" settings in the registry. It's probably only weeks away from being fixed. Keep checking back to see if we get it right.
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Click to collapse
lol I'm in downtown Toronto, but the Xperia is actually quad-band GSM (850/900/1800/1900) and tri-band UMTS (850/1900/2100). Which is exactly the same as the iPAQ.
I wish you the best of luck getting the Cell-ID thing working. I'm mostly just pissed that after all this time Inventec hasn't made a few simple changes to their radio firmware, and HP has the nerve to blame the network carrier in their documentation!
Anyway EREZYAD is right, these past few days my text entry has been split about 50-50 between the software keyboard in portrait mode and the hardware keyboard in landscape. Neither are quite as good as the iPAQ 910c, but the combination is sufficient.
so long benjaminries, never used your rom's but always sad to lose a chef
gfinockio said:
Well, congrats on the "upgrade" - I thought someone on Rogers would for sure go for a quad-band phone, but maybe the tri-band will work well enough for you where you are.
By the way - the "cell ID" thing is being worked on, and I thought I had a quick solution involving "cell broadcast" settings in the registry. It's probably only weeks away from being fixed. Keep checking back to see if we get it right.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Whats up with the "cell ID" issue? Did you get fixed? Can you explain whats wrong with cell ID on HP iPAQ 910c?
zmadaric said:
Whats up with the "cell ID" issue? Did you get fixed? Can you explain whats wrong with cell ID on HP iPAQ 910c?
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Click to collapse
The fact that the 910c doesn't seem to work with Google Maps "My Location" function without using GPS.
gfinockio said:
The fact that the 910c doesn't seem to work with Google Maps "My Location" function without using GPS.
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Click to collapse
This is corroborated by other apps like Navizon that also don't work on the HP 91x/61x.
Basically, the RIL interface specified by Microsoft has several API functions that apps are supposed to be able to call which should return an ID code that identifies the cell tower to which the phone is currently connected. As far as I can tell, the OEM (HP) is supposed to adapt firmware and corresponding WinMo driver files like rilgsm.dll from the radio manufacturer (Qualcomm) to meet Microsoft's specification; however some OEMs like HP "choose" not to implement these APIs such that requests by apps for the Cell ID return a constant error code.
There appear to be two alternative methods of retrieving the cell ID that might have given us hope for HP: (1) broadcast channels and (2) serial requests. But the first option is unhelpful in North America where GSM carriers don't use broadcast channels, and the second option (when I tested it) didn't seem to work either - basically there are a number of direct modem commands that can be sent over COM ports to ask for the cell ID. The results of my testing suggested that the problem lies, at least in part, within the radio firmware itself - perhaps provided to HP by their main manufacturer, Inventec.
To me, the fact that HP/Inventec didn't fix these problems - despite mass outcry by users - suggests that while HP is still patching up what they can on the software side (releasing ROM updates for keyboard and sound issues), whoever created the radio firmware (Inventec?) has sort of walked away, or at least has no stake in keeping existing customers happy.
What the xda-developers community knows about and is able to do with actual HTC hardware, by comparison, is huge...
You did the best bro. It is nearly 2010 and I believe that any other phone after that time should have a BIG scren.

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