Is 770 a good alternative to an PDA?
 

Hello, i was looking for an PDA, and now i've seen the Nokia 770.

Do you think an Nokia 770 can substitue an Windows Mobile 5.0 PDA like the Dell Axim?

I would like to have an easy to access Calendar, E-Mail Software and Adressbook, which should be easily synced with Thunderbird/Lightning under Ubuntu Linux and Windows XP.

Is that possible?
And would you overall suggest to use it instead of an normal PDA?

Honestly ? Those are not its strong points at all. It's not marketed that way, and most people use for other things.

I'm an enthusiastic 770-user and would recommend this device to everyone - except to those who look for a PDA. A PDA is a specialized device that can do only a few things. This allows for speed and a high level of software integration.

The 770, on the other hand, is an all purpose PC. It is smaller than your desktop PC and lacks a HD and a keyboard, but actually I think it has more in common with my GNU/Linux desktop PC than with PDAs or smartphones. This means its more powerful, more flexible - but less suited for your needs.

So while you probably can use it as a PDA (depending on your needs and your willingness to experiment with new cutting-edge software), I would not recommend it.

I have had a 770 for a year now, and I never take it out of the house; in the house, it is now the primary device for web browsing and email, with a few games being played.

Two of my friends have got one after playing with mine; one so that he can use it as a SIP phone now he's gone off to Australia (from UK) and another so that he can use it as a remote control for his Slimplayer.

To be honest I've never had a PDA; I DO use my Nokia E50 as my calendar device and that synchronises nicely with outlook (which we have to use for work).

What you say above could be done probably. The 770 fits in my trouser pocket, but I only ever really put it there when I'm going from upstairs to downstairs...

The person who got a 770 for Slimserver remote's wife said she didn't like the 770 because the handwriting recognition wasn't anywhere near as good as on the iPaq; that would affect your ability to do email responses. They are going to try the full screen keyboard to see if that is any better.

(perhaps that person would like to comment directly?)

Not yet, if you are a long-time PDA user the functionality isn't there yet. check back in a couple years

I don't think the 770 is a PDA yet. Don't buy it if you're coming from a Windows background. The only way you could make a 770 into a PDA with those features you want would be programming/porting them yourself. If you can do that and think it would be fun to port applications to a handheld device, on the other hand, go ahead. That's what I did. But the 770 won't do any of what you require out of the box. Well, technically it does E-Mail, but in all honesty, you don't even want to look at the client that comes with it. Technically also, you can install third party software to give you a calendar etc. Just don't expect anything that works right from the start as a PDA - that's not what the 770 was designed for.

The software community could have it act as a full-fledged PDA in far, far less time.

It could, but probably won't. Ever owned a Zaurus ?...

And so we come back to the real reason the 770 didn't gain mass market appeal. If Nokia had put some simple, easy to use PIM apps in the 770, they would have dominated both the PDA and UMPC markets with the sheer number of customers.

There's installable PIM apps available, but if you're used to the "Palm" way of doing things, they probably won't suit your needs anyway.

Heh! Basically, you're asking for interoperability with MS products... and I don't think the boys in Redmond would be offering any niceties to a Linux based tablet.

I agree that Nokia could dominate the PDA market with the 770 if it would just include some comparable PIM apps out of the box. Not so much with UMPCs, Windows interoperability and laptop replacement are the attractions there, and it's really not much of a market right now.

Possibly incorrectly, but I am trying to work my 770 toward my needs as a PDA. It might be useful to understand my goals, which are possibly over simplistic. Please understand that I am a relatively new user with less than 2 months of use, and it took me one month to find this web site.

1) Adress Book Function

My wife has a Palm, and uses it primarily as an adress book, with limited calendar use, and never the to - do functions.

In this mode, the main concern she has is that there is a way to not lose her hard work of entering all the info. (backup) The 770 appears to be very close or able to do this.

In my own use, I have around 4,000 contacts in an ACT database. My minimum goal for an adr. book in the 770 is that I can export Vcards from ACT to the 770, and use the info while on the road to find customers and call them from my cell phone. There is a voice over IP function in the 770, but I have not used it.

While the built in "contacts" software is useless for this task, it appears that the open source GPE adr. book can do this, or is close. I have downloaded it, but have not yet had a chance to try it out. Even if it turns out to have a few bugs, there is a community of people with an interest in making it work. I am fairly confident that given the resources on it, it will work to this level. I also suspect that even Nokia cannot ignore this need for much longer.

I originally thought that the 770 used Opera for both email and web browsing instead of just as the web browser, so I switched my Win XP laptop to Opera for desktop so to have a more common user experience.

Opera is a great product, and I use it every day now, but it would be really handy if there was a way to synch the contacts in there to the 770, but there is not. Instead, I use the very simple POP email browser in ACT to capture new contacts as needed, and plan to export them via VCARD to the 770. In other words, I am using ACT as my "center of gravity", and export information from there to other programs or needs. This was not my intention, but it has worked out that way.

I am not using Outlook because of some historical experiences, but if you are, there is a program called deja pim which allows imports. It is supposed to be pretty good, but true sync capability requires you to use a pay service, which is a bit of a turn off for many users. I ASSUME that outlook can export Vcards, but I am not sure.

2) Calendar function.

I have tried in the past to use electronic calendars, and gave up because they assumed my computer was open, and it took too long to find the info I wanted. Now I use a paper calendar again, and I am usually ok. There is an open source calendar software, probably it is ok, no idea.

If a date / time is really important, I put an alarm in my cell phone, and I always have my cell phone with me, unlike my computer or 770.

3) Games

Ok, everything has games, including the 770. I don't really play them, but it is handy to have some to entertain the kids while driving or in boring situations, waiting rooms, etc.

4) Spread sheets

I am kind of a spread sheet maniac and put all kinds of info in them. There is an open source spread sheet that is available to run on the 770. I have not had time to play with it yet.

I think of the 770 or any other PDA as a spreadsheet "editor", not a "creator". Let's face it, even a 15 in laptop is marginal for many spreadsheets.

5) Word Processing

Similar answer to the spread sheet. I have used at least 10 different word processors over the past 25 years, so changing from one to another is not a big deal. Of course, I don't use the really fancy functions either.

6) Web browsing

There is no other PDA or cell phone / PDA out there that is even close for looking things up on the internet, and as far as I can tell, nothing in the near term horizon.

7) Email.

While the 770 email client is somewhat basic, it does support both IMAP and POP, which is pretty good, and better than many desktop setups. It also can deal with multiple email adr. from a reception side, but it has some limits which need improvement.

Nokia appears to regularly upgrade the s/w for free with significant improvements, so I am not too concerned.

I often use the 770 email client as a way to see if I have any emails that are just someone confirming / changing a meeting, or to see if I really need to fire up the laptop. It is fine for short replies, but I still go back to a laptop for a longer answer.

8) Screen

There are some who consider this high resolution, 4 inch screen to be a luxury - I am not one of them. If I were 25, I might not care, but I am 47, and there is a dramatic change in everyone's eyesight after age 40. Small, low res. screens are just not an option for me.

Even if some of the s/w is not perfect yet, I can at least see the screen, which is a lot better than most PDAs.

9) Price

In the end, it is not really much of a premium to pay over any other large screen PDA with even less capability.

10) WiFi reception

I use an XP laptop with a card wifi G based setup. 90% of them are marginal, and I have a pretty decent one. It still pales in comparison to my daughter's new Mac book for speed, range, and ability to pick up distant signals.

The 770 is almost as good as the mac for reception / range, and slower than either for transfering data, but still very acceptable.

11) Memory expansion

There are lots of discussions about which memory card type is better, cheaper, etc. In the end, the Nokia went for a card type that is increasingly common, has reasonable transfer rates, and a price point competitive with most others. I just added a 1 Gig card (the current officially supported standard) so I have lots of room to put on MP3 music, etc.

It also supports videos, but I am not that far yet.

12) Writing your own software

Unlike many of the others on this forum, I am a user, not a software writer, and am not using Linux. (sorry everyone, my last software work was in FORTRAN) I don't hack it with non supported upgrades, speed boosters, or memory expanders. I do like that it is being done though, as Nokia seems to adapt these improvements into the standard software over time.

13) Pictures

Almost forgot, my cell phone has very little memory, so I routinely blue tooth transfer the pics to the 770 mem card. Also started doing this for other pics. Now my wife doesn't complain that I don't carry a picture of her and the kids in my wallet.

14) Presentations

I am almost to the point that I can use the 770 to give one - on - one PDF based customer presentations. It is a push, but works in a pinch.

So, after that long winded post (sorry), I am in fact planning to use it as my PDA, and would recommend it IF you are willing to accept its uses and limits.

Every PDA / portable device has limits and will take time to learn, and this is no exception.

770 as a PDA
 

I had a pocket loox 720 for a while. This was the cream of MS$ pdas at the time, cost me 470 UK pounds. Ive swapped it at computer xchange for a nokia N91 phone so I can have 3G access permanently for my 770. Have not missed the Loox at all. In fact pocket PC drove me with frustration with all its hyped up promises:-

- Bluetooth built in. If you can make it work good luck to you. I'm pretty technical and I can assure you I never got it to sync over bluetooth.
-Built in WIFI , what a croc. Range was useless, speed was useless, and having wifi and bluetooth on drained the battery in no time. A PDA is only good if it has power.

-Built in camera, pictures were so crap I never used it once.
-Built in Web browser (IE). Screen resolution, speed and functionality made it next to useless. got bored after a couple of days. Even the PSP does better

-Built in spreadsheet. Try Gnumeric, much better, even has the ability to deal with multple worksheets, and screen resolution makes it useable.

-Built in Sync. Good concept, but what about sync with my laptop at home, and my moby phone. Go with the holy grail of sync, which uses web standards, its called Scheduleworld. Now I dont even worry about if I remembered to sync my calendar, contacts, todo's, from outlook before i left the office. I set Sync4J up on my laptop to sync once an hour. When I'm out and about I just log onto scheduleworld, and there's all my information.Want a local version of your contacts, no prob. export vcard from schedule world and import into GPE Contacts, its all there.

-Email client, never used it on the Loox, screen was too small. on 770 I VPN over 3g to my work network and using Outlook web access just works, much better than imap or pop

-loads of games, where?

-Media playback. would not play files from my Exilim which are MP4s. 770 just does it. Infact it access the 4GB storage on my Nokia N91 phone so I can see photos and music using bluetoth. Speaker on the nokia 770 is pretty good, so I know I can use it as an Internet radio or juke box when I'm at a hotel, dont need to worry about headphones.

-Photos, Loox too slow. Nokia 770 :-log onto flcker, now I have unlimited photo storage available to me

-Promised firmware upgrade to latest windows mobile version. They canned it. Nokia released IT2006 FOC.


Dont get me wrong, 770 is not perfect, but pda's are over hyped
b4 the Loox I had a plam, b4 that i had a psion, b4 that i had a newton
the 770 is the first device that i have found that seems to get better the longe r you have it, cause it just keeps growing with the community, and is not dependant on the whims of the maufacturer, and every week there seems to be a new app that gets my interest all over again.

If all you want is a calendar, address book, and todo list, get yourself a Filofax
and take backups on the photcopier.

Mike C


Mike C

The real reason the 770 didn't gain mass market appeal is because it was an enthusiast product out of the box. As long as Nokia is willing to accept that niche market they will maintain a hardcore cadre of devotees far past the device's "usable life". Witness the Commodore 64 and similar communities that refused to die.

The user community was somewhat slow in porting serious business apps but that changed. I expect the nextgen device, when released, will fire the Linux developers up even more.

But the concept has mass market potential, to be sure, and I'm certain Nokia prefers that. Unfortunately for the 770, even though similar products have been floated before, it's still the victim of a chicken-and-egg scenario, where the infrastructure isn't quite there but won't really be until there are devices to use it (and thus generate service revenue... somehow).

If Nokia sticks out the market-building, and slowly enhances the "razor handle", the "razor blades" will follow. This is still more or less uncharted territory so it remains to be seen how stubborn the Finns will be in creating the brave, new ecosphere of handheld internet tablets.

I hope they succeed.

Nicely put, both Harry & Mike !

I also had 4 PDAs before the 770 (three Psions and a Sharp Zaurus).

About the only PIM-related app I ever really used on those was the agenda/schedule.

Nowadays I don't even bother anymore, I just synch my Outlook to my phone, easier and works just as well...

And despite this, the tablet is by far the device I've used most often and most durably of all. Most gadgets you fawn over for days, weeks or months before you tire of them and their limitations and put them aside ; if anything, my tablet usage has increased steadily since last December.

Maybe this "not a PDA" thing was a good idea after all :-)

Time ...
 

Things arrive at her time.

Actually lot's of PDA features can be found in GSM.

Nokia 770 is a new class of product which aimed to be "always connected"
3 years ago: it was not possible,
data was only available from place to place, @home or in travel.

Now: how much of you have a special GSM data contract ?
surf can be done at 20KB/s .. waouh ... 5 years ago: 4.5KB was usual ...

At your place I will wait just a view month,
I guess google "calendar/mail/and so on" will be your answer for pda use !

(actually: Google Calendar is not compatible with Nokia 770 Opera 8.02)


Good day,
Laurent.

Very interesting points everyone. It seemed to me that when the 770 was first launched, a lot of people were hesitant to get it because there wasn't any PIM apps built in and there wasn't many other apps for the platform. Then Open Source fans jumped on it and punched out a ton of ported apps as well as a lot of original apps. In such a short time, the 770 became so much more than a PDA alternative. At this point in the timeline, the 770 is more like a computer than many invisioned, probably including Nokia. Essentially, Nokia pulled off what Palm and Sony could have never pulled off by only putting out one device and upgrading through software. Over the length of about a year the 770 has evolved into a very different device from where it began. Now Nokia is ready to push out the next version of hardware to extend the room to allow even more development of the platform. It's a perfect cycle in my opinion.

At least here, I don't believe in the "always connected world". We don't even have cell phone coverage from all of the carriers combined which covers even 75 % of California, GSM or not.

The Nokia 9300i / 9500 are not even sold in the US because the carriers don't want WiFi on the same device as a SIM card - might be competition to their slow data services, including 3G.

Google apps - I don't have anything against them, but I don't trust anyone with my data. No way would I rely on them to take care of my adr. book and important files. Just imagine telling a customer that you have an NDA with that you store their critical info on Yahoo or Google - the day the get hacked.

As noted above, sync is not easy with any s/w, but exporting a simple data file like a vcard is - even I can do it. You just click - export - data file - vcard format. No idea how, it just works.

I already use BT to move camera pics between 2 phones and my 770 (one Nokia, one Moto). My 11 year old can do it just fine, and no one reads a manual to either of us.

I still use a Palm OS PDA and wouldn't replace it with software on the 770. The main reason is resposiveness (others being size and ease of syncing).

I just added something to a todo list - turn on, two finger taps (on big icons) and I'm in the app. Less than a second. The palm doesn't load apps from one memory area into another, it just runs them where they are.

I can browsing the web and use vnc on my palm too, but thats exactly why I got a 770 - the palm is barely useable for those tasks.

I'll admit, I tried... I tried to put dates of shows, meetings, appointments, etc in there. I forced myself. I tried keeping phone numbers instead of scrawling them on scrap pieces of paper. I couldn't do it. I found the PIM suites to be more time consuming than the old fashioned way. I can see how one would get addicted to this medium but it didn't work for me.

I remember when I first got my 770, my catch phrase was "See? I just justified dropping $500 (CDN) on this thing" every time I'd use it for something useful. (Changing a tire on my sister's car, then hopping online to find the nearest garage for a replacement, looking up a recipe for naan bread outside of the grocery store so we knew what ingredients to get, finding peoples' phone numbers on the fly, etc).

If the 770 could sync with MS Outlook, where I already have tons of contacts stored and managed, I wouldn't have to do anymore work. I'd just have it occasionally auto sync when I'm near the PC as it does with my N80 phone. Then all I'd need would be an app that automatically routes phone calls placed to those contacts from the tablet over the proper VOIP/POTS networks...