So what's your opinion of the Life Drive?

[Ezra4no1]

My question is more directed to those people who actually own one. I am assuming you may have owned other Palm devices and am wondering now that you have had some time with your life drive, do you like it? Why and why not?

I know there are some people who don't like the Life Drive for this or that, but I am less interested in how they have been reviewed and more interested in people using them in real life if it is holding up as well as your older Palm devices or is it lacking some how.

Personally I think the LF is one of the coolest PDAs to come out would love to own one. I have persoanlly been waiting for a PDA to have an intergrated HDD that would allow me watch videos, mp3s, and hold other data as well.


I appreciate your thoughts..
Thanks

[RevGeoff]

Love it after about a week.

MASSIVE capabilities that serve my needs well: word processing, email response & lite web surfing, occasional research in a bible library, devotional resources out of another library, outlook sync, ability to use my full repertoire of Palm software, mobile mp3's, task coordination, etc - all on a first rate screen with tons of extra memory.

Plenty of capabilities to explore: video, bluetooth, etc.

"6 sec delay" is rare, 1-2 secs is the pattern and very managable once I learned to use the built in contact program for my "need it quick" contact info (1600 records in it), as are resets (after a little troubleshooting). As I learn how this thing uses memory, my guess is that locating most frequently used (or urgently needed) programs in the most accessable memory will solve any unnecessary delays. But I don't find them frustrating at this current level.

Would I like a slimmer form factor? Yes, but this is workable, not much different than my TC

[ShadoPanther]

I must agree. Had mine for the same amount of time, and I am loving it. It's multimedia capabilities suit my needs perfectly with the free TCPMP download, and the Docs To Go allows me to carry all my work files in native format. There have been quite a few resets, but as the previous post stated, getting used to the way memory is accessed will probably take care of this as well as learning which programs are not Lifedrive ready. Overall, love it love it love it

[Kitten]

I've had mine for 6 days (I think) now and I love it. It's really quite speedy and the screen is large and bright. I keep the brightness around 10% and it's still really bright. I've haven't required a reset, other than while testing SharkCache which is just amazing. The form factor doesn't bother me, I have small hands and it still feels very nice. Not quite as nice as the Zodiac, but still very comfortable. I'm very happy with my LifeDrive and really recommend it.

[Michael Quach]

I also own a Clie NX80... In terms of multimedia, the NX80 smokes the LifeDrive by far. Watching videos on the LifeDrive can be painful at times, cause you have to view it at just the right angle, otherwise the video colors are off. The 4GB drive is awesome, though, as well as the autoconversion through the LD Manager. And the integrated Wifi AND BT is indespensible... so in terms of pure functionality, I think the LD wins hands down.

[LD, baby]

Overall I like mine.

1) Excellent build quality. Feature rich
2) Huge storage space.
3) Good quality speakers; I use it to listen to talk shows at night when I go to sleep; it's like having a radio.


CONS: (some I think will be rectified with updates)

1) takes FOREVER to soft reset; (like 2+ minutes), and you don't even know if it's frozen or not; it's frozen on me a couple of times.

2) graffiti 2 sucks. and it's poorly implemented. i reverted to using the keyboard because i was so frustrated having to delete and re-enter data

3) poor implementation of HD; there is definitely a lag and yes, it's annoying, but it's not as bad as people think and hopefully they can improve upon it with updates. But yes, it's noticeable, and yes, it's annoying.

4) average battery life

[HunterHawk]

I've had mine for 13 days now, and so far, I like it, although it's far from perfect,
e.g. blazer can crash the device leading to a 3 minute soft reset, restoring from my T3 didn't go too smoothly either, but for the most part it works ok.

I do things with my LD that I would never have considered trying with my trusty old T3. For example, I downloaded about 300MB of mp3 physics lectures directly onto the device. Sure, I could have copied the individual files to memory on a t3 with a wifi card [I used to have one until it broke], but doing something like this on the LD is almost effortless. Web browsing and email [snapper mail] are similarly easy.

I upgraded WiFile and Pocket tunes, so now I also listen to internet radio - mostly over wifi, and move large files directly onto the device from a webdav server on my workstation.

The hardware is ok, so hopefully palm will release an update for blazer and
maybe some cache optimizations soon. Some stability improvements would also be nice.

[timepilot84]

I've had one from the beginning, the second day they were available. I'm not going back to the T5.

It is bigger. The battery life isn't as good as the T5 was. The Wi-Fi is better than the SDIO Wi-Fi Card (except there is an issue with the Wi-Fi and the particular router that I own, the Linksys WRT54G). The HD is making me think about using the device in ways that I'd not conceived of in the past. For me, it's truly a laptop replacement device.

[mareuter]

I switched from a TC, and I'm very impressed (had it for almost a week). I have yet to have a hard reset (knock on wood) and have only had a couple of soft resets (once in PDAMill's Asia, once after a hotsync, and once I can't remember). The vast majority of the 'early adopter' complaints are unfounded:
1. So far battery life is as good as my TC, which is great;
2. The only lag I've seen longer than 2-3 seconds was in eReader when I switched from portrait to landscape, and that was because it had to reflow the 3800 page book I was reading;
3. It seems to be much faster than my TC at most tasks, especially the Photos and Media application and eReader.

It is bigger than any other device I've owned except for a Dell Axim I had for a while, but the design makes it comfortable to hold and I still carry it around in my pockets (cargo pants, mind you).

I'm definitely not going back, so my TC will be looking for a new home soon.

peace,

Mike

[Jomo]

Previous PDAs were: Zaurus SL-C860 Clamshell and Clie NX-60 prior to that. I bought the Zaurus because Clie battery life basically stunk. Battery life for the LD is comparable to the Z, when used in typical fashion. A few hours of MP3's here and there, mostly used for jotting notes in meetings, tracking my personal schedule and task-list, etc. I can get a solid day out of the LD this way vs. less than half that for the Clie (unless I dim the screen almost to nothing.

For me, size wasn't as big an issue as it seems to be for some people. Compared to both the Z and the Clie, the Life-drive is petite. After using the Zaurus for seven months (it fried in the seventh month and is still with the distributor for repairs), the niggling little delays for the LD seem small to me, as the Z could take several seconds for nearly any task unless you basically stuck everything into RAM. Comparitively, the LD is snappy, even when things aren't cached. Haven't tried movies, but I have to say I was never really impressed with Sony's movie capability, and the Zaurus really STUNK at movies. I liked Sony's MP3 player, but Pocket Tunes works just fine as a replacement. My only issue with Pocket Tunes is that it has a few issues with some of the Japanese-language tracks I listen to.

All in all, the LD has been very satisfying for me. It packs a lot of the versatility of the Zaurus. It uses standard Palm apps, so a lot of the bugginess I 'put-up-with' with the Zaurus are gone. Having gotten Graffiti 1 installed, I really don't have any complaints about it. It's the Palm I always wanted.

[Gekko]

>Having gotten Graffiti 1 installed,

JOMO - How'd you get G1 on an LD??????

[miked1541]

Grafitti 1 works with this device? How did you install it? I've been playing around with Grafitti 2 on this device and it's buggin' me. I'm coming from the Sony Clie NZ-90, which uses Grafitti 1. Can I just beam it over or something? Have you had any issues?

As far as the LifeDrive goes, so far, I'm diggin' it. I just bought it last night at Staples and spent the evening and morning with it. I listened to last week's 1src podcast this morning on the drive in to work (I'm a week behind).

First impressions...so far, a nice upgrade from the NZ-90. Faster, for the most part, ~416mhz vs. 200mhz. Much faster sync, slower soft resets, larger capacity storage, better battery so far...then again, it's a new unit. The NZ-90 had battery issues from the get-go. Better default gui, better default security, louder speaker.

There are some things that I think I will miss from the NZ-90...Sony spoiled me. Removable battery, built in thumb keyboard, camera with flash (somewhat useless depending on current charge state), jog wheel, cool swivel screen, which was also a good screen protector.

The LifeDrive doesn't have any kind of screen protector, except for the leather case. It kinda freaks me out because all the past handhelds I've used had some kind of screen cover, whether they were clamshell (Omnigo 100) or had a detachable plastic visor (PalmIIIc). One of the first things I did was put one of the left over transparent screen overlays from my NZ-90 on the LifeDrive. A perfect fit, for the most part. The leather case that came with it seems to protect the screen ok when you put it in there but the fit is quite snug and kept pushing buttons when I inserted it so I have to switch the power to hold so it doesn't turn on.

The 64 megs of memory for applications is a world of difference compared to the skimpy usable 11 megs that the NZ-90 came with. I overcame that on the NZ via PowerRun and executing apps from my Memory Stick or storing certain apps in flash via JackFlash. That started to be a real pain when I ran big apps, like games, which required 3 or 4 megs of the usable 11 megs to run off of Memory Stick. So to run those, I would have to transfer a large app to MS and then run the game. When I was done I'd have to transfer the app in MS back to the usable 11 megs. Man, such a pain! Also, these apps would have to be in the 11 megs if they needed to be hotsync'd. I don't think I'll have these kinds of problems in the near future with the LifeDrive.

One of the other things I'll miss from the NZ is the external audio controller clip. This was very handy, especially when commuting via bus or train. I could just put my NZ in my pocket, case, or bag, and clip the audio controller to my shirt and have control of my mp3s. I wish they had something like that for the LifeDrive.

At first, I thought the headphone jack was strange to be placed at the bottom of the LifeDrive but actually, I found out this morning that it is good placement for when I use it in my car. I have a cellphone holder mounted on my dash and the LD fits perfectly in the holder. I plug a cassette adapter to the headphone jack and since the jack is on the bottom of the LifeDrive, I don't have cable mess coming from the top of the unit down the side.

I know that some people think the lanyard on some Sony devices are lame but I actually used mine. I would slip the lanyard around my wrist whenever I would use the NZ, for fear of dropping the $799.99US unit. It probably served more to comfort me from dropping than anything. There was one time, though, where I was reading an ebook on the bus and somebody bumped into it. It fell out of my hands but not on the floor. The lanyard around my wrist caught it from falling. It would be nice if the LifeDrive had this. Right now, my wrist feels naked when I use the LD.

The look of the LifeDrive is nice. I love the brushed metal look...quite sexy. The holes on the back of the unit worry me a little. What if I put the unit on a surface that has some water on it, like in the kitchen or bathroom? I think it would be easy for water to get in the internals. Perhaps I'm just paranoid.

Those are my initial thoughts on the LD. I need to use it more to get a better assessment.

Mike

Sorry for the lengthy post, just doing a mind dump.

[DGalvin]

... The Wi-Fi is better than the SDIO Wi-Fi Card (except there is an issue with the Wi-Fi and the particular router that I own, the Linksys WRT54G).

What is the issue with the WRT54G? I have a WRT54GS and would like to make sure the LD Wi-Fi is compatible.

[peterh]

@miked1541 - Thanks for this post. I'm also moving on from my Sony NZ90 ... my lifedrive should arrive tomorrow with a bit of luck ...
I've had an NZ since it first came out ... the black paint is peeling, the camera has just stopped working, the screen isn't as responsive ... i think anyone who complains about the size of a LifeDrive should carry a NZ in the jeans pocket for a couple of years ...

I'm really looking forward to using the LD though ... the huge amount of space will totally change what I can use it for ... the thing i will miss is the audio-remote ... and of course the flip and swivel screen which always gets a response when i whip it out

[Adrenochrome]

My wife is already making fun of the fact that it's aptly named my "lifedrive." I use it for everything - even things I wouldn't have expected. I've had it a little over a week now, and today my bluetooth keyboard and cradle should arrive, making my setup complete. I've been thinking that after the rumored ROM update is released at the end of the month, I'd write up a full review of how it works for me in the real world, but here's a taste:

I use it as an alarm clock. I use Palmary Clock (should be included with every palm) to wake up to music. The speaker sounds clearer and louder than my T2.

I use Sheet To Go to chart my morning workouts. It’s faster than my T2, and with landscape mode, I can finally see all the fields at once.

During my cardio workout, I use it to listen to music. I used my T2 for this as well, but there’s a world of difference. I had a 1Gb card in the T2, now I have 5Gb (the card is now in the LD). The sound is a world better than the T2. I had to use a boosteroo to get the volume up on the T2, but with the LD the volume rarely gets past 85%, and it’s richer and punchier. I loved having over 1,000 songs on demand for once, but I discovered Shoutcasts a few days ago and it blew my socks off. Pocket Tunes does a great job of linking to various types of internet radio, so it’s a breeze to flip through channels from around the world to suit whatever mood I’m in at the moment. Let’s see an iPod do that. And here’s a joke – one of my favorite local radio stations doesn’t come in very well in my basement where I work out, but it comes in clear as day over Pocket Tunes. And just to show how geeked-out things could be, I’ve got one of those little FM transmitters that I can plug into the LD, so I can broadcast the station from my treadmill to the radio – which couldn’t receive the station via the air in the first place. Okay, getting silly, but music over wifi has been a blast.

On the way into work, I plug the LD into my car stereo, and have my 1,000 songs, plus a number of audio books on tap. I thought the headphone jack on the bottom would annoy me, but it turns out to work better there than on the side or top, so I have to remove that complaint. I also have Mapopolis, and may purchase a Bluetooth GPS receiver someday. Nothing like having those maps handy.

At work, I’ve got all my usual contacts, calendar, tasks, etc., synced up to Outlook. The new LD manager software is pretty impressive, too. I have documents synced up so that I can reference them at home, if need be. Versamail, which I still don’t have set up properly yet, saved my butt earlier this week when I had to do some work from home and found that the document I needed was automatically saved onto my LD, and I could open it and discuss it on the phone with a client instantly. Very cool. Very geeky. Saved my butt.

At work, I also use the voice recorder a lot. It seems clearer than my T2 – and the T2s had a problem with the voice recorder. When certain pieces of software access the card, like Pocket Tunes, the microphone would cease to function. I talked to lots of service people at both PalmOne and Normsoft, but all they could figure was that it was a hardware problem inherent in the T2s. It’s nice that that’s gone now, and I can rely on the VR again. And I work on a university campus, so I have wifi connections anywhere I am. Once I get email working, I’ll be able to stay connected to email while I’m roaming around campus.

Now that I have so much more storage on hand, I have loaded up my LD with Wikipedia (500mb), Webster’s full dictionary (37mb), and a host of other reference materials for my job.

Other uses are tons of photos and family video clips; playing lullabies on the internal speaker to lull a baby to sleep while I read an ebook in the dark; organizing lists of everything with Handyshopper; guitar tuner (Aerotuner, which finally works with internal mike); 2sky astronomy program (much faster than the T2, bigger screen, and Kevin Polk is working on a new version that will take advantage of the LD’s ability to remove the white border); accessing the web at a moment’s notice from anywhere; and I’ve only had the thing just over a week. I plan to get Omniremote up and running (to replace the DVD remote my one-year-old hid two months ago), using the camera companion, and who knows what else?

There are some negatives: The battery lasts about one day of normal usage, which isn’t a problem since it sits in a cradle at work all day, but I do miss the T2’s lifespan. It crashes a lot, due to memory management problems. This is a major issue that PalmOne is supposedly working on. Normsoft says they’re working on their own fix. Once those fixes are in, and assuming they work, this thing will fly. The size doesn’t bother me at all, but the stupid power slider does. The form factor is first-rate – it looks dang cool, and feels very solid in the hand. The landscape button on the side is very useful, and I often flip it back and forth depending on how I might be holding it for reading, or to display information better.

As people have said, the hard drive makes you use this in ways you wouldn’t have thought of before. I’m just scratching the surface of this thing, and having a blast with it.

[kwajkat]

The LifeDrive doesn't have any kind of screen protector, except for the leather case. It kinda freaks me out because all the past handhelds I've used had some kind of screen cover, whether they were clamshell (Omnigo 100) or had a detachable plastic visor (PalmIIIc). One of the first things I did was put one of the left over transparent screen overlays from my NZ-90 on the LifeDrive. A perfect fit, for the most part. The leather case that came with it seems to protect the screen ok when you put it in there but the fit is quite snug and kept pushing buttons when I inserted it so I have to switch the power to hold so it doesn't turn on.



Check your box, Palmone did enclose one screen saver which on the backside you can cut it to fit the LifeDrive. I am still using the protective overlay they had on it until it gets bad then I will switch to a regular screen saver. I didn't notice the screen saver at first.

The case it came with I will agree with you, it turns on everytime you put in or out. And I like the other styles better.

I also had the NZ90 and have the same opinions as you regarding it. However I never did have any battery issues. The Life Drive is a featherweight in size and weight compared to the NZ90 but I did like it. I would probably still be using it but it craped out on me three days after the warrenty expired and to add injury to insult Sony made the move to eliminate the CLie line from the US. **@*@*#*&^#%@%$%@* on Sony for doing that!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[miked1541]

peterh: The NZ-90 was a nice unit but it was a "brick." I carried it in a holster-style belt clip since I don't want such a bulky device in my pocket. Even though it was big, I overlooked that for the functionality. I feel your pain about the size. The LifeDrive is definitely more portable than the NZ.

Adrenochrome: are you a Sisters fan?

[Kevin Flansburg]

yeah Timepilot, what is wrong w/ the wifi, I have that router and was planing on using the device to do mantinence

[Adrenochrome]

Just had to write in - my new bluetooth keyboard just arrived, and it's too dang cool. I'm writing with it now. Wifi and Bluetooth working together seamlessly. No interference that I can see.

[Adrenochrome]

Adrenochrome: are you a Sisters fan?
First and Last and Always.

[SoS]

Just had to write in - my new bluetooth keyboard just arrived, and it's too dang cool. I'm writing with it now. Wifi and Bluetooth working together seamlessly. No interference that I can see.

Sounds great, can you give us some idea of battery life with both radios blowing at full steam!!

[Adrenochrome]

Sounds great, can you give us some idea of battery life with both radios blowing at full steam!!
I'll test it out today. I'll have to be out around the campus taking notes, so I'll post the results.

[Adrenochrome]

I'm using the keyboard now, while connected to the net via wifi. I'm not only typing this, but I'm listening to a shoutcast as well. I probably have at least half an hour of typing to do in this time, so I'll post a redout of my battery life. I started with a full charge, but as soon as I turned on the wifi, the battery meter read 87%. Will report later.

One slightly annoying thing about this BT keyboard, though, is that it seems to miss letters every now and then. Usually if I haven't typed anything for several seconds. Might just be a fluke. Will report on that as well.

[Adrenochrome]

One hour later: Using the both radios constantly, plus Pocket Tunes and Wordsmith, all at the same time, the battery meter says 38%.

But now it says 39%. In fact, it's been climbing as I write this. 41%

Seems to have steadied around 40%. So roughly two hours, at a guess, of maximum usage of everything.

[SoS]

One hour later: Using the both radios constantly, plus Pocket Tunes and Wordsmith, all at the same time, the battery meter says 38%.

But now it says 39%. In fact, it's been climbing as I write this. 41%

Seems to have steadied around 40%. So roughly two hours, at a guess, of maximum usage of everything.


That sounds pretty good to me so far....keep going!! :D

[miked1541]

Doktor Avalanche..err..Adrenochrome, what kind of bluetooth keyboard are you using? I thought about picking up one of those but thought further and I think I might have some problems with it. I use bluetooth via my work PC to access the net for my PDA and also through GPRS on my cellphone. Can you use two bluetooth devices at once? I would need the keyboard for IRC, IM, blogging, and UNIX shell access (BTW, both pssh v.2004-01-03 and TuSSH v.B0.73 cause soft resets. I'll have to check if they're the latest versions (probably not) but I need to find an ssh client that is stable for the LifeDrive.)

[Adrenochrome]

I have to admit that I'm underwhelmed with the Stowaway BT keyboard (I'm sure the good Doktor would have done a better job for me).

Pros: It's cool. It's portable. I can type in landscape. I can set the LD on a stack of books so the screen is at eye-level while the keyboard is still at a comfortable wrist-level.

Cons: You have to run through a few menus every time you want to hook it up. I liked the old direct-connection boards because you just plug them in and go. It has batteries that you have to consider, unlike the older boards. But the real annoyance is that maybe one in a hundred letters gets dropped. That's not cool when you're typing fast because it means you have to stop at about every twentieth word to backspace and fix it. And, there is a weird bug that others have had with the shift key. If you hit shift+letter, you get a capital; but if you release the letter before you release the shift, the shift carries over to the next letter. When typing fast, shift key timing moves around a lot, so I get a lot of words that start with DOuble CApitals.

That said - supposedly, you can use up to seven BT devices at once, but I don't know how that's implemented in Palm OS.

Hope that helps.

[timepilot84]

yeah Timepilot, what is wrong w/ the wifi, I have that router and was planing on using the device to do mantinence

The problem seems to be only with the negotiation for DHCP. I set the device to use a static IP and it works awesome. Just use a static IP for your LD.

[timepilot84]

The first LD I had had issues. It garbled a couple of db's so I exchanged it. When I got the second one, I saved my data and completely uninstalled my old versions of the Palm software, docs 2 go, avantgo, etc. and created a new profile for my new device. I created another profile which I loaded with all my old data, and copied it from one profile to the next. I then installed all the latest versions of the software that I use.

Having done this, I don't have the issues of resets like I did in the past. I'm starting to think that the munging of the dbs was probably because of the resetting that was going on. Right now, I'm super happy with the device (with the first LD I had, I was seriously considering returning to the T5). It's solid. Just don't try to do a straight up upgrade to it.

[ld, biatches]

for those who are annoyed with graffiti 2 or the lack of graffiti 1, try tealscript, it's great; fully ld compatible, works just like g1, and you can fully customize and tweak each letter; no longer any 2 stroke delays, etc.

[Ezra4no1]

I
Cons: You have to run through a few menus every time you want to hook it up. I liked the old direct-connection boards because you just plug them in and go. It has batteries that you have to consider, unlike the older boards.

I know where you are comming... As odd as it is I had to go out of my way to find an old fellow / stowaway keyboard for my PDA. I really thought about getting a bluetooth keyboard, but after much thought, I didn't want to have to worry abouthaving another device that i need to worry about battery life or wear down my batter on my PDA since most of the time I will have my PDA set up for hours while at work with the keyboard ready to type through out the day and didn't want to leave my bluetooth running or going through the hassel of turning on and off the wireless. With my old serial keyboard I can just plop my PDA on the keyboard and start typing away.

[JohnT]

Lifedrive excels at most things especially bluetooth/wifi but is slow. Mine has just died and has gone back for repair. I tried to install a keyboard, it reset after installation then came back with the write area of the screen missing. Trid to hard reset bt went totally dead. MicroAnvika have now sent it back to PalmOne.