The Palmone(now known as Palm) Lifedrive has been offically out in the market place for over a week. Ever since the item just happened to slip on to the amazon.com ahead of release it seems no one has stopped talking about it ever since. Here is a list of reviews.
NY Times
“If you have the patience for those little six-second lapses, then this device could replace a laptop during many of your out-of-office experiences. Otherwise, though, try before you buy. If you’re a busy person who hates to be put on hold, you’ll be tempted to rename this palmtop the Life’sTooShortDrive.”
PocketFactory
“So far I’m pretty impressed with this product. It’s certainly the most innovative product to come from palmOne since…well, the Treo 650!”
CNET
“The PalmOne LifeDrive is a versatile handheld packed with productivity and multimedia features–but it’s too expensive.“
Score 7.2/10
PC Magazine
“Nearly-endless storage makes this a great device for toting and viewing lots of files.”
Score 4/5
palminfocenter
“palmOne new flagship handheld is a handsome PDA. It is loaded with features and has massive amounts of storage to spare making it an exceptional portable media solution with a huge base of applications to choose from. With the addition of the hard drive and dual wireless, this model may be the best laptop replacement PDA’s out there. “
brighthand
“After my first 12 hours, I can say that I’m impressed and eager to explore more of what the LifeDrive offers. As palmOne’s most expensive PDA, I think it’s worth a closer look before you plunk down all that cash.”
the gadgeteer
“To sum things up, I have mixed feelings about the LifeDrive. It’s most definitely a step in the right direction for palmOne. Who can scoff at 4gb of built in storage on a PDA? Finally adding WiFi is also a real plus. But then there’s the dim screen, sluggish performance when accessing files and the biggest faux pas of all (in my opinion), the lack of a user replaceable battery. Should you buy this PDA? It really depends on how many files, music, photos, and videos that you need to carry around with you. I have a 1gb card on my Treo and it is still half empty, so that should tell you that I don’t carry around THAT much stuff on my PDA. But that’s just me. If you need the storage, can deal with the deficiencies, then this just might be your dream device. ”
Others
Chicago Tribune
pdabuzz
BargainPDA
MobileTechReview
MSNBC
palmaddict
Pro’s
- Vast storage (Built in 4gb microdrive)
- Built in WiFi
- Big screen
- Screen rotation button
- excellent desktop and handheld software suite
Con’s
- Battery not swappable
- Poor battery life
- Slow soft reset
- osccasional crashes
- no support for DRM media
- Pricey
Spec’s
Wireless features
- Bluetooth® 1.1 wireless
- Wi-Fi® 802.11b wireless
Processor
- Intel® 416MHz XScale™ processor
Memory
- 4GB hard drive (3.85GB accessible to user)
- 16MB ROM
Battery
- Rechargeable Lithium Ion
Operating system
- Palm OS® 5.4 (Garnet)
- size
- 4.76h x 2.87w x 0.74t in.
- 121h x 73w x 19t mm.
Weight
- 6.8 oz. / 190 grams
Display
- 320×480 Transflective TFT color touchscreen
16 bit color / 65,000+ colors - portrait and landscape orientation
Expansion
- Supports SD, SDIO and MultiMediaCards via built-in expansion card slot
Supports peripherals (sold separately) via the multi-connector
Audio
- Stereo audio headset compatible via 3.5mm stereo audio jack - headset sold separately.
Offical Site
www.palmone.com/us/products/mobilemanagers/lifedrive/
If you have used the product or purchased one yourself let us know what you think in the comments section.
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7 responses
Shawn
Jun 7, 2005 at 2:41 pm
Excellent Roundup of reviews, I appreciate all the work.
Anonymous
Jul 16, 2005 at 10:37 am
I just bought one and I am wondering why no one in any on the many reviews I have read mentions the problems with the way the hard keys are not functioning correctly. Anyone who has any and I mean any games that use hard keys are completely useless. I don’t know if this is a life drive problem or a 5.4 os problem, but you cannot use more than one hard key at a time. I have all of the classic sega and atari games as well as a few driving games and none of them work. You cannot use more than one hard key at any given moment, which means for instance on a driving dame such as GTS racing or 6th Gear you can either move forward or steer, but not both. Its a real pity. Everything else is great,but if you want to play games when you aren’t being productive I would pass the life drive by. I will be sending mine back per their 30 day return policy.
Anonymous
Jul 21, 2005 at 8:13 pm
Frequent crashes with third party software. Seems like I have to soft reset at least 3x a day.
Disappointed
Anonymous
Aug 11, 2005 at 2:02 pm
Can you actually view movies on this device? Thanks!
Anonymous
Jan 25, 2006 at 12:17 pm
I don`t mind the 2 to 6 second lag time between applications. I don`t play games either. How can you beat the storage space? I have lots of songs,photos,and song home video clips with plenty of space to spare. After shopping around and talking to the right people I got mine for $360.
Feb 17, 2007 at 12:13 am
6 months old and the battery quit. WhaT a piece of crap!
Aug 21, 2008 at 6:55 pm
I have one my friend traded me for some work. I was in love with it, though realized when I went online and began typing in a website address, a long, long list of every website my friend has visited would pop up. I didn’t need my girl asking me about onionbooty.com, so I tried to see what I could do to erase the cache… I ended up erasing something called HTTP Library (or something like that), which I gambled had to mean the HTTP address storage. Mother@%#&@*! Now, my PalmOne turns on, shows a ‘loading’ display, goes to a second screen with, I think (haven’t turned it on in a while) PalmOne on it, then switched off. Then it turns itself on again, goes through the same steps and turns off, and repeats this until the battery dies. Can anyone suggest anything? Thank you.
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