Eat My Words!!!

[wellsjs]

OK! Humble pie time. :D About four days ago I posted that I would hold out with my T665c until OS6 devices arrive. Well . . . last Saturday I got the "gotta have a new Clie bug," the very worst and cruelest of the "gotta have" bugs there is :D and I bought a NX80V!

I tried out the UX50, but didn't care for it and thought about all the program problems with landscape mode, so passed for the NX80V.

All I can say after a couple of days of configuring and playing with it is WOW! This is a laptop in my pocket for sure! :eek: One PLUS that I don't think I've heard anyone else mention is that the display (which is spectacular) not only is readable in sunlight (which has been mentioned) but in flourescent lighting it is bright and beautiful. That was a bad point with my T665c. Working in my office all day long and using my Clie all the time, this is huge!

Just got back from my walk with mp3 music player and the sound is noticably exceptionally better than my old one, which I thought was quite good. I also got the WL110 Wi-Fi card since my home is wireless, and it works great too. Netfront is pretty good but hopefully better will come along. I may give WebToGo a try soon.

I love the extra 15M of ROM that Jackflash gives me. I've put everything that will work in ROM there and still have 2M+ left. The best was putting my Mapopolis maps there. Now the three "contiguous" maps (counties) that loaded in about 15 seconds from the MS pop up instantly. :eek: Fantastic!

Haven't finished reloading all my favorite photos in 320x480 (vs. 320x320) rendition yet, but what a difference with the ones I have, which takes me back to my comments about the screen. On several occasions I went to show photos to someone in my office, and practically had to turn out the flourescent lights for them to see them. With this baby and the lights on, they are clear, bright, and bigger . . . almost regular photo size! OK, I'm calming down. Time to sleep . . . it'll still be here when I wake up tomorrow! It better be! :eek:

[Shrink]

Cool, Good Luck with it.
Any problems going from one unit to the other?
alan

[riversen]

Originally posted by wellsjs
I love the extra 15M of ROM that Jackflash gives me. I've put everything that will work in ROM there and still have 2M+ left. The best was putting my Mapopolis maps there. Now the three "contiguous" maps (counties) that loaded in about 15 seconds from the MS pop up instantly. :eek: Fantastic!


Did you say that you had 15 Meg's of space in the ROM??? Will that be totally consumed when OS6 comes out? Will that mean that you will have to move everything out of ROM and back to your RAM? Also, am I understanding you correctly that you have almost 30 Meg's of RAM/ROM together? Did you have to delete any programs before you had access to the 15 Meg's of ROM? Is there 15 free Meg's of ROM right now???

That is cool and thanks.

[r0b456]

Yes, the NX80 is quite easily the best PDA I have ever owned. I made the transition over from the Pocket PC camp. It took me a little bit longer to try out all the features of my NX80V as I had to re-learn the Palm OS.

Unfortunately, it's features and design kinda leave me with nothing to look forward to. My checkbook leaps for joy, but still ... It's large screen has made it impossible for me to go to the UX50, and it's built in 1.3mp camera, CF slot, and QWERTY keyboard make it impossible to settle for great devices like the Zodiac or T3. It's odd because those devices could be considered a major upgrade in some areas (on board RAM, processor speed, etc). But because it's lacking several aspects of the NX80 that I really love, they only look like a compromise to me. So I'm simply waiting for the next NX/NZ. Probably an OS 6 device with more than 16mb of RAM.

Congrats on the new Clie.



Oh, and yes -- that 15mb of extra ROM space is just waiting there for you once you install JackFlash. No removing programs necessary. As far as OS 6, PalmSource has stated several times that they are doing whatever they can to make sure OS 6 can fit into the ROM of devices that have the hardware to support it. However, that does not guarantee that the NX80 will even get an OS6 upgrade. PalmSource has also stated several times that the OS upgrade will be made available to the OEMs, but it will be up to the OEMs to modify the OS to their own hardware. Knowing Sony, it is highly unlikely that they will release any kind of OS upgrade. I'm simply going under the assumption that if I like OS 6 when it comes out, I will be buying a new OS 6 device.

[riversen]

I have a question about the RAM memory. What does this mean from the Sony website:

5 Actual available space is 16 MB. (A portion is used for data management functions.)

Thanks for your help.

[rob_squared]

Originally posted by riversen


Did you say that you had 15 Meg's of space in the ROM??? Will that be totally consumed when OS6 comes out? Will that mean that you will have to move everything out of ROM and back to your RAM? Also, am I understanding you correctly that you have almost 30 Meg's of RAM/ROM together? Did you have to delete any programs before you had access to the 15 Meg's of ROM? Is there 15 free Meg's of ROM right now???

That is cool and thanks.

You won't have to worry about an OS upgrade, Sony'll never do that again.

And 15 megs is there by default.

[rob_squared]

Originally posted by riversen
I have a question about the RAM memory. What does this mean from the Sony website:

5 Actual available space is 16 MB. (A portion is used for data management functions.)

Thanks for your help.

The clie has 32MB of physical ram. 16MB is used as heap memory to load apps that need fast ram access to run. The other 16 is the ram that all the programs go.

[riversen]

Originally posted by rob_squared


The clie has 32MB of physical ram. 16MB is used as heap memory to load apps that need fast ram access to run. The other 16 is the ram that all the programs go.

What apps are you referring to "that need fast ram access to run?" I thought that the apps were already in the RAM, so why is this faster? Also, what does "all the programs go" mean? I am a bit confused by these terms. My understanding of RAM does not seem to mesh with this use of RAM. Finally, my T665 run many of my apps in the ROM. Granted, I cannot put my databases there, but the apps do work in my ROM. Also, all of my apps work in my RAM just fine. I guess I don't understand this heap thing. Is there some technical information on this that will help me understand how they do this?

[rob_squared]

I answered you in another thread, but apps like Power48 and ScummVM load stuff like rom images such as games and calculator roms into that space. Netfront also uses heap memory if I'm correct.

[wellsjs]

Sorry to take so long getting back. Looks like others have answered most questions directed at me. Thanks! :)

Jackflash unleashes 31M total of RAM to load anything that will run from flash. See other threads as to what will and won't run from flash. A couple I have discovered that won't are SplashPhoto (crashes when exiting the app) and HanDBase which will not sync its databases properly if loaded to flash.

Last night I followed the instructions from a Wireless Forum thread and did a wireless hotsync! Way cool! :D My family considers me a geek already . . . now I'm WonderGeek! :D

[elf]

I was always curious about people who absolutely love the NX series-- how do you carry it around?

Those units don't fit in a normal shirt pocket. Do you have a bag with you always?

[riversen]

Originally posted by wellsjs
Sorry to take so long getting back. Looks like others have answered most questions directed at me. Thanks! :)

Jackflash unleashes 31M total of RAM to load anything that will run from flash. See other threads as to what will and won't run from flash. A couple I have discovered that won't are SplashPhoto (crashes when exiting the app) and HanDBase which will not sync its databases properly if loaded to flash.

Last night I followed the instructions from a Wireless Forum thread and did a wireless hotsync! Way cool! :D My family considers me a geek already . . . now I'm WonderGeek! :D

I have a question for you. You said that JackFlash unleashed 31M of total RAM? Is it able to overwrite the heap memory or are you referring to the ROM and RAM together?

Thank you.

[polimedia]

Well when I am at work I always have a backpack with a pocket for Clie, when I do not have it I bring it in a jacket or in summer in a belt case (ugly I know, but I would not carry a smaller unit in my pocket anyway). If I do not want to carry anything, in my Siemens phone, which is ALWAYS with me I carry all of my addresses and appointments synced with my Clie, more or less what my first Us robotics plilot did.
Before NX73 I used to carry my notebook with me all the times, now I do not uses it since months.
The only wish for next clie Nx is built-in BT and Wifi and landscape/portrait orientation like Tungsten. But this can wait with no problem, I have the Euro NX with built-in BT and use the card for WIFI, so it's OK :)

[wellsjs]

Very important for me is that my PDA form factor be convenient, i.e. my preferred method of carrying it is in my front pants pocket. The NX80V is a little larger and heavier than the T665C was, but I am not finding it a bother to carry in my front pants pocket! ;)

I do have a heavy duty Targus leather case that I bought when I had a Handspring Visor, and I have used it occasionally with T665C, and I wouldn't have believed it until I tried it on my walk last night, but the NX80V just barely fits in it also, with just a little bit of velcro catching! I typically only case my PDA when I go on walks with mp3 music! :)

[n2ifp]

Originally posted by wellsjs
OK! Humble pie time. :D About four days ago I posted that I would hold out with my T665c until OS6 devices arrive. Well . . . last Saturday I got the "gotta have a new Clie bug," the very worst and cruelest of the "gotta have" bugs there is :D and I bought a NX80V!

I tried out the UX50, but didn't care for it and thought about all the program problems with landscape mode, so passed for the NX80V.

All I can say after a couple of days of configuring and playing with it is WOW! This is a laptop in my pocket for sure! :eek: One PLUS that I don't think I've heard anyone else mention is that the display (which is spectacular) not only is readable in sunlight (which has been mentioned) but in flourescent lighting it is bright and beautiful. That was a bad point with my T665c. Working in my office all day long and using my Clie all the time, this is huge!

Just got back from my walk with mp3 music player and the sound is noticably exceptionally better than my old one, which I thought was quite good. I also got the WL110 Wi-Fi card since my home is wireless, and it works great too. Netfront is pretty good but hopefully better will come along. I may give WebToGo a try soon.

I love the extra 15M of ROM that Jackflash gives me. I've put everything that will work in ROM there and still have 2M+ left. The best was putting my Mapopolis maps there. Now the three "contiguous" maps (counties) that loaded in about 15 seconds from the MS pop up instantly. :eek: Fantastic!

Haven't finished reloading all my favorite photos in 320x480 (vs. 320x320) rendition yet, but what a difference with the ones I have, which takes me back to my comments about the screen. On several occasions I went to show photos to someone in my office, and practically had to turn out the flourescent lights for them to see them. With this baby and the lights on, they are clear, bright, and bigger . . . almost regular photo size! OK, I'm calming down. Time to sleep . . . it'll still be here when I wake up tomorrow! It better be! :eek:

The more you get to know it, the more awesome you will realize how the NX80 is!!!

I was a holdout too and at first I thought I was throwing away money. The more I got into it, the more I said wow!

Enjoy and good luck with it!!!:)

BTW, the KB100 makes a nice addition and I used my 25% coupy to get it!;)

 

[Unregistered]

Lust can be so powerful ;).

[wellsjs]

Originally posted by Shrink
Cool, Good Luck with it.
Any problems going from one unit to the other?
alan I wanted a very clean "new Clie," so I'm sure I didn't do it the fastest way. I renamed my user folder and synced to get all the PIM stuff, which it did fine. Then I loaded Uninstall Manager so it would monitor everything else being installed. Then I loaded Agendus and copied my icons file from the backup folder on my MS, which worked flawlessly.

Then I loaded one app at a time new and did what was needed to restore that app's data. There were a couple of programs that require new unlock codes when you change to a new device (MSDict, , even though you keep the same user ID. I emailed the developers and got quick responses back with new unlock codes. One unusable program, EasyLock that doesn't work on OS5 (note on the developer's website saying he has no plans to update the product :( ). So I'm testing a new PDA security app.

The change over was tedious and very time consuming the way I went about it, but it was worth it to know that I have a very clean machine without leftovers from uninstalled stuff from the previous one. ;)

[n2ifp]

Originally posted by wellsjs
The change over was tedious and very time consuming the way I went about it, but it was worth it to know that I have a very clean machine without leftovers from uninstalled stuff from the previous one. ;)

Good man! I did the same, and it definitely was worth the effort!:)

[dimensiondvdrob]

Originally posted by wellsjs
I wanted a very clean "new Clie," so I'm sure I didn't do it the fastest way.

Originally posted by wellsjs
Then I loaded one app at a time new and did what was needed to restore that app's data.

Originally posted by wellsjs
The change over was tedious and very time consuming the way I went about it, but it was worth it to know that I have a very clean machine without leftovers from uninstalled stuff from the previous one. ;)

YES! I have always been anal about having a 'clean' device and always do this, even in the event of a hard reset. Once I discovered Uninstall Manager, I won't have a CLIE without it on there. This program is the best for keeping a clean CLIE.

Enjoy your new toy. I briefly had one before getting a UX. I love my UX!

[dimensiondvdrob]

Wow! I hit the 400 post milestone!

[r0b456]

Originally posted by riversen


I have a question for you. You said that JackFlash unleashed 31M of total RAM? Is it able to overwrite the heap memory or are you referring to the ROM and RAM together?

Thank you.



You cannot access the Heap memory. JackFlash frees 15mb of Flash ROM, so that you can store your apps in ROM.

Here is how the Palm OS works:

Palm OS uses what's called eXecute In Place (XIP) Technology. If you have ever used a Pocket PC, you will see that the OS splits the onboard RAM in Half. A 64mb device will have 32mb devoted to storing apps and 32mb to Running them. This means that whenever you open an application, it moves the program from one place in memory to another. It's not the most efficient, but Microsoft is adament that it is necessary for true Multi-tasking. That having several applications Running at the same time requires you to have separate Storage and Program memory. We'll see if Palm OS 6 requires this as well.

What this means for Palm: Say you have a 16mb device. You have an app that is 1mb in size. It takes up 1mb of your 16. However, that does not mean that it needs another 1mb to run. The Palm OS simply executes it where it resides. Here is the catch, however: That method does not work for applications that use compressed data (A good example of this would be GTS Racing from Astraware) that needs to be expanded before executing, applications stored in ROM, and applications stored on storage cards. These apps all need to be transfered to RAM before than can be run. So if you fill up your 16mb of RAM with applications, you might not be able to run many different programs. It is best to keep as much RAM available as possible.

There is one more thing about the Palm OS, however. Heap memory. Heap memory is always used by the OS and is always removed from view of the user. Example: The NX73 has 16mb of RAM. However, 5mb is dedicated to the Heap, and as such only 11 is available the moment you first turn on your NX73. Previous devices -- models before OS 5 mainly, had very little (a few kilobytes) of Heap memory. This was only really meant for a few extra bits here and there. However, this heap memory has become increasingly crucial to Palms since they have started using multimedia and browsing the web. It is RAM that is physically no different than your system RAM, but is controlled by the OS to function as Cache. Basically, it is highly volatile -- it is cleared out whenever you close the app using it, or reset your machine, etc. The system Heap is most used by applications that were written recently -- basically those apps designed for OS 5. One of those apps, as mentioned above, is the Power48 graphing calculator. That app was designed specifically for High Res + OS 5 devices. Basically, Sony NX and NZ series. These devices also contain a rather large cache when compared to other devices. The original Tungsten, for example, only had about 1mb system heap. The NX units have about 4 to 5mb, while the NX80 and UX50 both have 16mb of system heap memory -- more than 3x the amount of any other Palm OS device. This allows these units to do many things that other devices really cannot. If you have ever used Netfront to browse the web on the NX70, you will get many "Page too large" errors. It's not about formatting, it's about size. The page's size (in MB) is too much for the unit. Because it's more than the system heap in the unit. This happens very rarely in devices like the NX80 and UX50 because not many pages are larger than 16mb (Some are, though, so web browsing isn't going to be 100% perfect on any device at the moment).


So you have several types of memory in the NX80:

Flash ROM
System RAM
Heap Memory
External Storage (CF & MS)


Each one has it's purpose, Pro's, and Con's. Each is meant to be used for it's own specific purpose. The most simple advice is to conserve your RAM. Guard it carefully. Use it only when necessary -- to keep only those apps and files that absolutely Must reside in RAM. Keep only those critical apps that 1.) work and 2.) you really can never be without in ROM. Keep everything else on external storage media. ROM and MS/CF are for storing apps. RAM is for running them. Think of it that way, and you will be OK.

Oh, and don't resent your Heap memory. When larger, flashier, more involved OS5-specific apps start emerging, you'll be glad you have it.



-Rob