The Other Handhelds-1998-05-19-Windows CE 2.0 HPCs continue to dribble out-Mike HOgan

Anyone who bakes knows that every cookie doesn't come out of the oven at the same time. But gee whiz, the second generation of Windows CE 2.0 handhelds sure have been cooking a long time. Most were announced at Comdex: no, not Spring Comdex in Chicago-Fall 1997 Comdex in Las Vegas.

We checked out the first pair to debut: the Hewlett-Packard 620LX and Casio Cassiopeia A20 (see "Whole World In Your Hand?" at www.currents.net/magazine/national/1606/mobo1606.html). In this column you'll find most of the rest; they hit the streets just in time to keep from getting lapped by another trade show.

In Traveling Color

The first choice you're likely to make is between the new high-end color models and the budget-priced monochrome units. The Sharp Mobilon HC-4500 (800/237-4277, www.sharp-usa.com), NEC MobilePro 750 (888/863-2669, www.necnow.com), Compaq 2210 (800/345-1518, www.compaq.com), and Hewlett-Packard 620LX (800/863-2669, www.hp.com/handheld) belong in the former category; they all range in price from $900 to $1,000. You can save $300 to $400 if you opt for a handheld with a monochrome display (they're all backlit), such as the Philips Velo 500 (888/367-8356, www.velo.philips.com), Compaq 810, Sharp Mobilon HC-4100, or Casio Cassiopeia A-20 (800/204-7765, www.casiohpc.com).

Which color display is the best? I've seen all but the Compaq C-series 2010c. At 640 pixel-by-240 pixel resolution, they all do the job for me, even in dim mode. And the smallest, the LCD on Sharp's Mobilon HC-4500, still displays a color photo just fine. But most folks will prefer the NEC 750C, the largest display of the bunch. It's almost on par with the $2,000 miniportables I reviewed in "Portables to Jog With" (see currents.net/magazine/national/1604/mobo1604.html).

Handheld Haves and Have-nots

If display quality was the only difference, your choice would be an easy one. Give them your money, thank you very much, have a nice day. But portability is all about trade-offs; you give up this to get that. All of the handhelds have a serial port, but some lack a VGA or a compact memory slot. All but one have a Type II PC Card slot; not all have built-in fax-modems.

The good and bad news about NEC's MobilePro 750C is that you get a little more computer-literally. At 9.6 inches long and 5.4 inches deep, it's the largest Windows CE ever made. The generous (for a handheld) dimensions make possible both the easy-on-the-eyes 7.6 inch-by-2.8 inch LCD and the keyboard on which I can actually touch-type. I could go a long time before bumping into the ceiling of this portable. The MobilePro is rated to run for eight hours on a single charge of its lithium-ion battery. That remarkable stamina could see you through a transoceanic flight.

Unfortunately, the extra size buys you, well, extra size. Unlike all the other Windows CEs, the MobilePro 750C won't fit into a pocket. It could be wedged into a purse, maybe, and certainly a briefcase. At 28 ounces, it's pushing right up against the mininotebook form factor.

Rather than a design flaw, consider it the first shot across the bow of minis like Toshiba's Libretto. The MobilePro is a prototype for the next generation of larger, more powerful Windows CE HPCs that analysts like Dataquest's Mike McGuire expect to show up by year's end. He says this new class will use the upcoming Jupiter version of Windows CE and provide a winning combination of typeable keyboards, good color screens, and relatively long battery lives for about half the price of mininotebooks.

With its quality display, VGA-out port, bundled VGA cable, and Microsoft Pocket PowerPoint, the MobilePro makes almost as good a desktop presentation tool as a mini. Microsoft's Pocket software suite sacrifices a few features from its desktop versions. But the MobilePro sure beats lugging those slide carousels.

You Oughta Be in Pictures

Traveling presentations are just as important to the other color HPCs, but they fit comfortably in a coat pocket. One of these compact HPCs is the Sharp Mobilon HC-4500, which costs the same as the NEC. Sharp envisions its first entry into this category as a mobile multimedia studio. You use an optional $399 Color Digital Camera Card to take photos and its built-in microphone to record voice-overs. Then you can send multimedia e-mail to your friends and business associates with the Mobilon's built-in 33.6Kbps fax-modem. It can also work with third-party applications to capture a doctor's signature electronically or photograph houses and office buildings for real estate agents or insurance adjusters.

The camera works great. But the Mobilon lacks a VGA-out port, which would come in handy. You can buy an optional VGA-out PC Card, but you might need that slot for storage: The Mobilon's RAM maxes out at 16MB, and it lacks a compact RAM storage slot like its color competitors.

The Mobilon's advantages include a relatively large keyboard and smaller size and weight than other color HPCs. But its storage and bandwidth are a little lacking for the demands of multimedia e-mail and presentations.

Likewise, Compaq's C-Series 2010c doesn't seem to have the features for mobile presentations. By virtue of its $899 price tag and business-oriented software bundle, the 2010c is better positioned as a volume purchase choice for corporate sales forces. On the plus side, the 2010c has a built-in modem and 20MB of memory standard, upgradeable to 32MB. In addition to productivity programs like Odyssey's Pocket BizCalc, it includes Pocket Asset Manager, which lets your company's IT director keep track of the make, model, and serial number of your machine. Its biggest flaw is that its rated battery life is only three hours.

If your presentation device absolutely has to fit into your coat pocket, the HP 620LX I reviewed in "Whole World in Your Hand?" is $100 cheaper than the NEC MobilePro 750C or Sharp Mobilon HC-4500, in part because it lacks a modem. But it has the second-largest display, a pretty good keyboard, a compact RAM slot, and a VGA-out port. But sheer size makes the NEC MobilePro 750C the best color presentation choice.

Shades of Gray

That advantage doesn't transfer to the MobilePro 750C's nearly identical monochrome version, the MobilePro 700. The extra size, weight, and monochrome display just don't seem worth its $699 price, which is at the high end of the scale. If you're content with a grayscale display, you are probably more concerned with portability than presentations.

The Philips Velo 500 seems to occupy the sweet spot among monochrome units. Its predecessor was the first system to include a voice recorder, a feature so popular that it eventually wound up in all Windows CE 2.0 devices. For the Velo 500, Philips added more of everything.

It has 16 shades of gray and twice the memory of other units in its class. It's also slightly faster than the others. Battery life from its nickel-metal-hydride battery is middling, probably because of that 16-shade display and software fax-modem. But it's small and light, and its case just looks and feels better than the others. Its major defect is that instead of a PC Card expansion slot, it has a PC Card port for an optional expansion module. That's funky.

If you're thinking about one of the color HPCs, you're either flying first class, making a lot of presentations, or both. Color is great to have, but it's probably an executive option or a sales presentation necessity. For regular PC companion duty, one of the 16-shades-of-gray models should do nicely.

Mike Hogan, whose first PC was a 20-pound Osborne I "portable," has been a business journalist for 20 years and a computer writer for 15 years. You can reach him at 72241.1632@juno.com or care of Computer Currents.

Windows CE 2.0 Color Handhelds, Feature by Feature

Product name

Compaq C-Series 2010c

HP 620LX Palmtop PC

NEC MobilePro 750C

Sharp Mobilon HC-4500

Price

$899

$999

Processor

75MHz MIPS

75MHz Hitachi SH3

80MHz NEC Vr4111

75MHz MIPS

W by H by D in inches

7.32 by 3.93 by 1.61

7.8 by 4.1 by 1.4

9.6 by 5.4 by 1.25

7.3 by 3.7 by 1.2

Display W x H in inches

6.1 x 2.3

6.5 x 2.5

7.6 x 2.8

6.5 x 2.3

Colors or gray shades

256 colors

Installed/maximum RAM

20MB/32MB

16MB/26MB

16MB/32MB

16MB/16MB

Weight with batteries

17.5 ounces

20.6 ounces

28.8 ounces

17.3 ounces

Battery number/type

1/NiMH

1/lithium-ion

1/NiMH

Rated battery life

3 hours

5.5 hours

8 hours

6 hours

Built-in PC Card slots

1 Type II

VGA out/Compact memory slot

no/no

yes/yes

no/no

Fax-modem type

hardware

none

hardware

software

Data/fax speed

33.6Kbps/14.4Kbps

n/a

33.6Kbps/9.6Kbps

Windows CE 2.0 Monochrome Handhelds, Feature by Feature

Product name

Casio Cassiopeia A-20

Compaq C-Series 810

NEC MobilePro 700

Philips Velo 500

Sharp Mobilon HC-4100

Price

$599

$699

$639

$699

Processor

80MHz Hitachi SH3

75MHz MIPS

54MHz NEC Vr4102

75MHz MIPS

W by H by D in inches

7.3 by 3.1 by 1.0

7.32 by 3.93 by 1.34

9.6 by 4.8 by 1.2

6.75 by 3.75 by 1.25

7.3 by 3.7 by 1.0

Display W by H in inches

6.2 by 2.5

6.1 by 2.3

6.9 by 2.6

5.4 by 2.4

6.5 by 2.3

Colors or gray shades

4 shades

16 shades

Installed/maximum RAM

8MB/8MB

8MB/20MB

8MB/32MB

16MB/24MB

8MB/12MB

Weight with batteries

15.2 ounces

15.5 ounces

24.0 ounces

15.3 ounces

14.5 ounces

Battery number/type

2/AA

1/NiMH

2/AA

Rated battery life

25 hours

20 hours

30 hours

15 hours

24 hours

Built-in PC Card slots

1 Type II

optional

1 Type II

VGA out/Compact memory slot

no/yes

no/no

yes/yes

no/yes

no/no

Fax-modem type

none

hardware

software

Data/fax speed

n/a

33.6Kbps/14.4Kbps

28.8Kbps/9.6Kbps

33.6Kbps/9.6Kbps

Where to Buy

Casio Inc.
888/204-7765
www.casiohpc.com

Compaq Computer Corporation
800/345-1518
www.compaq.com

Hewlett-Packard
800/752-0900
www.hp.com/handheld

NEC Corporation
888/863-2669
www.necnow.com

Philips
888/367-8356
www.velo.philips.com

Sharp Electronics
800/237-4277
www.sharp-usa.com