help- Sony CLie UX50 or Zod 2 ??

[RevJB]

Hi all -- cool to see so many people with the Bible as a main prog on their units <grin.> Consider Bible+ it's all interactive and free.

Anyway - I have a used UX50 on the way, but, I've been looking at a Zod 2... I knoe thr Zod doesnt have a camera or Voice Recorder (only the Voice R minus bothers me.)

Now, I'm not using it for gaming, but the stereo sound and big screen , battery life and dual card interests me.

The use is simple --

1. Electronic Bible Study (I'm a preacher.)
2. Article Editing (I'm a writer.)
3. Movie PLaying (I'm a nerd)
4. Online Chatting in bed (somehow connected to my PC modem - it's my missionary time).

Any thoughts anyone ???

I was also considering an Ipaq H5450 at one point.

James

jimmyb@chebucto.ns.ca

[kennyd]

The ux50 will have better web browsing than the Zod, but everything else I would say that the Zod is going to come out ahead on speed, screen, battery, two sd slots, slimmer size. All of the bible apps that I am using are fully supported on the Zod. BibleThumper, MyBible, Palm BiblePlus, BWY. chatopus is a great messenger client. It's based on the Jabber interface, so it plays well with multiple IM clients. The arm processor on the Zod should handle movies better than the ux50 but I haven't compared. Article editing, the Zod comes with WordSmith which actually is a nice Word editor, though it doesn't handle native format. I am using it and DTG for all of my document needs.

[pruss]

The keyboard on the UX50 should be rather useful for text editing.

[Jingo]

I had a UX50 for a while but I found the screen too small, the battery life terrible and the docking station is nonsense, apart from that it is a great PDA. The movie support is better on the UX50 because the software makes use of it's special graphics chip. The Zodiac movie software doesn't make use of it's enhanced video hardware chip yet although this is supposed to be supported soon.
You can get the Palm wireless keyboard which works great with the Zodiac. You could use the bluetooth on the Zodiac for connecting to a PC or modem for chatting or buy a WIFI card. The UX50 of course has WIFI.
The Zodiac has great battery life and is very cheap. Unless you need the built in keyboard for the UX50 I can't see any point choosing the UX50 over the Zodiac.
I was initially dubious about the Zodiac but since owning one for a while it's just a great PDA.

[jetro]

while ive no experience with ux50's wifi capability, I think the zod + wifi card will can hold its own againts the UX. I've been using the zod with the sandisk wifi card for quite some time. Using version 1.x of the tapwave provided driver, web browsing used to suck big time...Then just a few days ago, tapwave came up with an updated driver (v 2.1) and wow.... its just a huge improvement.

One thing that the UX doesnt have (at least in the US) is the bluetooth. In the absense of a hotspot I pair the zodiac to a t68i bluetooth phone and connect to the net via gprs. If being online all the time is important to you, the zod is a good choice.

..and as what the others are saying, the screen is just gorgeous :)

[Karim]

UX50 definitely has bluetooth. It also has that incredibly handy thumbpad, which is most certainly an immense plus for writers/editors and chatters. The UX50 has built-in wireless, bluetooth, that damn keyboard, and it folds up and flips around and crap. As soon as he said he wouldn't use the Zodiac for games, I knew what he needed was the UX50. Everyone that owns a UX50 loves the friggin thing. I don't even have one and I love it. :p

[jetro]

oh yeah, silly me I was thinking of the TH55. you could be right, and i agree, the UX best fits his requirement.

I guess the only advantage left for the zod are

1) bigger screen
2) faster processor and
3) 2 SD card slot

which to me, especially 1 and 3, is a lot. but that's me :)

[Elfyn]

I have both a UX50 and a Zodiac2 and I love each of them. Either one would be well suited to your needs. The only one who can really decide which suits you best is you. You may need to try both of them out to see which one you like the best. You can then sell which ever one comes in second. ;)

My problem is I still can't decide which one I like the most so I still have both of mine. :rolleyes:

P.S. Battery life in the Zodiac is far superior to the UX50 especially when you're doing a lot of wi-fi stuff.

[kennyd]

The keyboard on the UX50 should be rather useful for text editing.
Yah, that could be a big difference. I've never used a thumb type (smaller) keyboard. I definately get best text input with a full size qwerty, but I've never used a smaller one. When I've been in stores with a display model I've played around with it some but never got so familiar that I could watch the text and type. But if smaller keyboards are more effective than G2 then that could be a rollover for the ux for a lot of users that emphasize a lot of text entry. I am so proficient at Graffiti and G2 input that it really hasn't been that much of a need. I can enter G2 at a fast speed and still watch my text.

[Nimiety]

I think the ux-50 is the better device, however, Sony is stopping production of it, so it doesn't make sense to buy one now - they will stop supporting it in ~a year, IIRC.
N...

[Luckygold6]

I loved my UX-50 until I realized there was nothing else to upgrade to... Sony stopped their Clie line... I'm thinkin about getting a Zodiac to replace my Sony 4 now...