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I wrote these reviews in the Spring of 2001.
The
Handspring Visor series of palmtop computers use the same operating system as
the Palm Pilot range, which I’ve written about before. This means that they are easy to use and can run the same wide range of
software that is available on the Internet as their Palm siblings. They differentiate themselves primarily by having the ability to take
plug-in hardware modules called Springboard Modules. I played with two of these: the SoundsGood Audio Player, which is an MP3
music player and the eyemodule, which is a plug in digital camera. They are both pretty cool and the camera could be very
useful, for example to take pictures of property or people at a meeting. Both modules are very compact and fit snugly into the Handspring.
The Handspring Prism has a colour screen and is especially useful in
conjunction with the camera, whereas the slimline Visor Edge can only display
black and white pictures but is much smaller and more stylish. Other modules, including a cellular phone and GPS navigation tool are
available. The Visor Edge typically
costs £320 (incl. VAT), and the Prism costs just under £400. The eyemodule costs £140 and the MP3 player costs £229 – both
available from Widget. If I
didn’t already have a Palm Vx, I’d be very tempted to get one of these
instead.
The
Predator is an external CD-RW drive which costs about £185 (incl. VAT). The CD part of the name correctly suggests that it will read CD-ROMs and
play music CDs. The RW bit is more
interesting. This means that it
will can record CDs using cheap CD-R disks or the more versatile, re-writable
CD-RW disks. Each blank disk can
hold up to 650mb of data and can be used for almost anything: data backup and
archiving, photo storage, mixing your own music CDs, creating presentations to
give to people, or storing digital video and pictures. The Predator comes with a USB interface and will connect to a Mac or PC
and it comes with software for both machines that will do backups, make music
CDs and the rest. I used
RealJukebox to make a music CD for my girlfriend from my MP3 collection. The only drawback is that it is mains power only – no battery option
– so you need to carry around a power supply as well as the player and you
can’t use it on the road. If,
like mine, your laptop doesn’t have a CD player or you need to be make your
own CDs, then this is a very good piece of kit to have.
The
Hip Zip is an interesting variation on a standard MP3 music player. Instead of using solid state memory to store music files it uses very
small, removable magnetic disks called ‘PocketZip’ or ‘Clik!’ disks.
They are like little floppy disks, about an inch and a half square, and
can store forty megabytes of data. This
is enough for a CD’s worth of compressed MP3 music and these disks can also be
used in certain digital cameras and in a special PC Card drive. The player itself is the size of a cigarette packet and weighs a little
more than other players. However,
the extra weight is compensated for by the fact that you can change the music
selection by changing the disk. On
a conventional player you have to go back to a PC and download a different set
of songs. On the Hip Zip you just
pop one disk out and put in another. The
other neat thing about it is that you can use the disks to store any data and
this might make it useful for transferring files or presentations on the road
and potentially as a portable backup device. When you plug the Hip Zip into a USB port, Windows recognises it as a
removable hard disk and you can copy files over using Explorer. I use RealJukebox (which is available free from www.real.com)
as my MP3 player and this has a free plug in which lets you transfer files
easily to the Hip Zip from within the program. The gadget comes with a selection of player software which you can use
instead. My only regret is that it
doesn’t have a microphone socket and the ability to record so that I could use
it as a Dictaphone as well.
This mouse is
especially useful for people doing presentations. Unlike a conventional mouse it doesn’t have a tail and communicates
with the computer via an infrared link. This
means you can put a laptop at one end of the table and use the mouse as a remote
slide changer. The receiver box
plugs into a mouse socket or USB port, on a Mac or PC like any other mouse and
receives signals from the mouse up to a distance – measured unscientifically
in my sitting room – of about five or six feet. The mouse itself is a good shape and size and uses the latest optical
technology which means it has no moving parts to get clogged up. Installation is very easy.
In fact, on my Toshiba laptop, all I did was plug it into the USB port
and that was it. It has a street
price of around £38 including VAT.
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