Sony Takes 10% of U.S. Retail Market

thanks ed. keep it up.

What an ignorant thing to write... Sure, some high-end Palms are over-priced, but not all. The Clie N610C is a damn good buy. For $320 (street price), you get:

- 320x320, 16-bit screen
- bright backlighting... image is excellent under all lighting conditions
- expansion slot
- small and lightweight (5.6 oz)
- excellent battery life
- form factor that makes one-handed operation comfortable
- thoughtful details like a cradle power supply that can be used as portable charger and a well designed cover

> Ha! Ed's afraid to post anything regarding PocketPC. He doesn't want his readers to know PocketPC is kicking the Palm platform's ass!

That's FUD. PocketPC is doing well (finally), but Palm is still outselling it. It doesn't really matter... both platforms have strengths and weaknesses. Figure out your needs and choose accordingly. Immature, whiny, exaggeratory posts like yours are useless (whether they come from CE zealots or Palm fanatics).

At any rate, I think this entire Palm vs PPC debate is being driven by a slice of current Palm owners who have been waiting to upgrade and are undecided about what their next step will be: Palm again or a leap (of faith?) to PPC?

My Palm is half-dead. About two weeks ago, it took a plunge out of my shirt pocket -- unlike past times, this time the screen cracked. It is now equivalent to a Casio Pocket Viewer. I can read what's in it, but I can't add to it. And the screen is so badly cracked, only parts of it work.

Obviously, I need a new machine. Will I go with a CLIE? Or how about the Toshiba GENIO? Or maybe that new HP 56x? None of these choices existed at the start of this year. We Palm owners could ignore the iPaqers, just based on size arguments alone.

But now there's a PPC that is no larger than a Palm III. And now there's also a Palm (CLIE) that is smaller than a Palm III (yes, I know the Vs were around -- but I loathed those). Great color screens. Very appealing form factors. Both (GENIO and CLIE) more powerful than past Palm devices.

I think many other people are struggling with a similar decision. Hence the heightened debate recently.

http://www.networksolutions.com/

It's all yours, Ed!

That's what I paid at dell.com (it was on sale).

> Perhaps he means Net price.

I use the terms interchangeably (most people I know consider street price and net price to be the same). However, to be more specific, I paid $320 "net price".

On a related topic, I went to dinner Saturday night with a large group of people (mostly programmers) who were friends of a friend (so I only knew a few of them).

I pulled my Clie N610C out of my pocket to write down a phone number and they were all mucho impressed. As it turns out, some of them owned IPAQs (purchased by their companies), but none of them had their IPAQ with them because they said they're too bulky to carry around. They loved holding the Clie and said it was significantly smaller then the IPAQ (even without the exapnsion sleeve).

I've used the IPAQ too and don't think it's *that much* larger than the Clie, but for some people it's bigger enough to make the difference between carrying it in your pocket or leaving it at home (obviously, other people don't mind carrying a larger unit).

So, dimensions and weight don't tell the whole story... despite being only 1/2 oz lighter, the Clie's shape is much more ergonomic than the IPAQ and the Clie fits in a pocket a lot more comfortably.

Anyway, like I wrote, both platforms have advantages and disadvantages... figure out your needs and choose what's appropriate. Enough of this silly holy war.