Card Reader review – transform your Palm into an USB stick

Productivity, System tools 6 Responses »
May 212007

Use the code READMYCARDS to get 20% off Card Reader in the TamsShop

Microsoft’s PocketPC devices allowed direct memory card access for ages via a program called ActiveSync. Palm users traditionally were limited to sending files somewhere onto the memory card via Hotsync. Mobile Stream’s Card Reader now tops the Microsoft solution by promising to transform a Palm OS handheld into a generic USB disk that can be accessed without any additional software – can it keep its promise?

Card Reader’s main interface is very tidy – the toggle button allows you to turn card reader functionality on and off:
reader Card Reader review transform your Palm into an USB stick

MobileStream integrated a few power saving options that basically turn the Treo’s screen off when no access takes place.

CardReader’s background mode allows you to use the handheld while USB stick mode is enabled. Indeed, running programs in ‘parallel’ works well – if the programs don’t need to access the connected memory card(it gets unmounted). When a call is received, background mode shows its true strength. Taking a voice call is no problem for CardReader…

Last but not least, the program offers some sort of ‘Bluetooth FTP’ service…

I tested CardReader v1.06 on a Treo 680, The program needs approximately 150k of RAM and was exceptionally stable in the testing period. Various Windows 2000 and Windows XP machines accepted the virtual USB stick flawlessly…

Overall, MobileStream does it again – CardReader finally allows you to dismiss the ‘stupid’ USB stick and replace it with a smart one that allows you to edit data on the go. For me, the time saved is well worth the 12$ admission fee at the TamsPalm shop – a 14day trial is available to find out if the program suits you!

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 1:29 pm

Treo 680 bluetooth headset support – Treo 680 vs Logitech Mobile Freedom headset

Wireless 5 Responses »
May 172007

One of the most-discussed weak points of the Palm Treo 700p is its miserable bluetooth headset support. Palm’s Treo 680 is said to have an improved bluetooth system, and should theoretically work well with headsets. Logitech provided TamsPalm with a loaner of their Mobile Freedom Headset – a bluetooth headset with volume buttons and a single multifunction knob.

After pairing the Treo 680 with the bluetooth headset, connecting the headset to the Treo was a matter of pressing the button(if the bluetooth radio of the Treo was turned on). The Treo’s bluetooth stack then showed a small “headset enabled” icon instead of the regular bluetooth one:
0a Treo 680 bluetooth headset support Treo 680 vs Logitech Mobile Freedom headset 0b Treo 680 bluetooth headset support Treo 680 vs Logitech Mobile Freedom headset

Accepting and rejecting calls with the Mobile Freedom headset worked well. A single press of the multifunction button, and the Treo 680 went to work. Interestingly, the Treo played its own ringtone via its speaker system. The headset has its own jingle, leading to two jingles hitting my ear at the same time. Adjusting call volume with the buttons worked well, too.

Call quality was very clear on a range of up to 3 meters – once a bigger wall was in between or the distance got bigger, call quality began to degrade a bit, but remained on Treo 600 niveau for up to 5 to 7 meters.

However, this is where the Treo 680′s bluetooth headset support ends. PocketTunes stubbornly played its tunes via the loudspeaker and Voice Memo ignored the headset’s microphone, too. Apparently, the bluetooth headset is not available to the sound manager but is rather only used by the Phone app.

Overall, the Treo 680 supports bluetooth headsets. I used the Mobile Freedom Headset for about 30 minutes and experienced no crashes or serious lags. Of course, more integration and a higher range would have been cool to have – but a person who usually is close to his Treo shouldn’t have any problems!

What did you experience? Which headset do you use with your Treo?

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 9:13 pm

On the Treo 755p

Hardware, Licensees No Responses »
May 172007

After the PalmInfoCenter published its Palm Treo 755p review, the commentators there began to comment about how they didn’t see a real reason to update from their Treo 650 or (some of them) 700p. The camera was slightly improved, and the EVDO feature is a nice addon(albeit raising cost) for more speed.

IMHO, the Treo 755p is not a device intended to get many upgrade sales for Palm(other than from Treo 700p users who are unhappy) – it instead is what the Palm Treo 680 is for the GSM market…a machine to eradicate machines like the Treo 600(or older) and get users to move away from Symbian S60 or Microsoft Smartphone devices.

The Treo 680 costs less than the average Symbian S60 phone in Austria, but can do so much more due to the touchscreen and Palm OS software. For a customer who doesn’t do much with his phone but wants a few extra features, such a device is great. A Treo 600 is a rather weak machine for us – but my girlfriend is very happy with it(she was on a Siemens “semi-dumbphone” before). Doing PIM is so easy on it due to the big touchscreen…w00t…and email/SMS is so comfortable due to the QUERTY keyboard.

The Treo 755p now brings this feeling over to the US CDMA networks. Of course, a Windows CE box with Opera can surf the web a bit better and probably can do a few things the Palm can’t – but it usually costs much more(Austrian price: 500€+). So, instead of choosing a dumbphone, customers now choose the Palm Treo 755p(anyone wonder why there’s so much software in the ROM???)…

Overall, the Treo 755p is not a machine targeted at happy Treo 650/700p users. It rather targets new users in the mid-end arena and IMHO has a strong mass appeal, increasing the amount of “available” Palm OS software customers. I, as a developer, welcome the Palm Treo 755p very much and look forward to increasing sales and Tamspalm readership…

What do you think?

P.s. Yes, I would still love to see a Treo 700p patch!

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 12:04 pm

The Treo 680 review – Phone software

Hardware Reviews No Responses »
May 162007

When the Palm Treo 680 first shipped, analysts were all bonkers about the ‘new UI’ of the built-in apps. And indeed, the applications look different – but how do they fare in everyday use?

Launcher
The first thing one notices about the Treo 680 are slight changes to the launcher – one can no longer assign it a background, and the card now appears on the top of the category pick list:
0a The Treo 680 review Phone software 0b The Treo 680 review Phone software

Phone app
Analysts put high expectations into Palm’s new phone application – and indeed, the five-tabbed program looks very nice at first glance. The tabs at the bottom stand for the various ‘modes’:
1a The Treo 680 review Phone software

However, in daily use, the application shows a few weaknesses. For example, the list of last calls can be popped up only over the background, but not over the dial pad. When calling, the Treo no longer displays a end call button. Also, opening dial pad view makes disabling speaker phone,… difficult:
2a The Treo 680 review Phone software

The favorites panel was overdone – good bye, beloved tabs and buttons. Instead, you get a list of items that are hard to tap with a finger.
3a The Treo 680 review Phone software

The call list view is well-done and allows you to sort calls easily with the toggle at the top(answered, missed,..):
4a The Treo 680 review Phone software

Palm stayed true to Handspring’s concept of integrating the Contacts application into the phone program. Searching for contacts works very well, although the screen layout wastes a lot of space:
5a The Treo 680 review Phone software

PIM suite
The Treo 680 ships with Palm’s enhanced PIM suite. However, Note Pad is missing from my Treos ROM – a very annoying omission!

SMS/MMS
Palm unified the SMS and MMS services into one application. Threaded SMS display works well, although opening large conversations takes a bit of time. As for MMS…since I never use this feature(email for the win), I can’t really say anything about it…

Voice memo
Palm finally added a voice recorder program to the Treo 680. The program produces .asf files and can no longer record to a memory card…
6a The Treo 680 review Phone software

Overall, Palm’s new core software works well, although getting used to it takes a bit of time for a Treo 600 user – after all, a few things did change. While the programs still have the one or the other quirk(recent call list, no Note Pad), I am happy overall.

Tune in soon for a look at the Treo’s web software(email/web browser)!

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 4:53 pm

On Treo 755p memory

Uncategorized No Responses »
May 162007

Many reviewers recently posted about how the Treo 755p has 128MB of memory. Indeed, the machine contains a 128MB flash chip – but the user accessible area is around 62MB. The rest of the chip is used for the Palm OS and the included applications…

So, the Treo 755p does not give you 128MB RAM but rather just 64 like the other current Palm OS Treos do.

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 11:48 am

PalmInfoCenter Treo 755p review online

Miscellaneous No Responses »
May 162007

The PalmInfoCenter has just published a Palm Treo 755p review:
http://www.palminfocenter.com/news/9414/palm-treo-755p-review/

Interestingly, Palm decided to stick to the 700p’s call management application instead of the Treo 680′s “improved” version. I never really liked the new version due to a variety of small quirks in the UI. A review of the phone application will come online soon…

To cut a long story short, here is your 700p without antenna. Will you buy it?

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 7:46 am

JezzBall for Palm OS – BallZ beta 3

Palm News No Responses »
May 152007

After having received a first round of feedback from a lot of users(thank you, guys and gals!), I am proud to present you BallZ Beta 3 aka version 0.9c. Here are a few photos that show how BallZ looks:
1a JezzBall for Palm OS BallZ beta 3 1b JezzBall for Palm OS BallZ beta 3 1c JezzBall for Palm OS BallZ beta 3 1d JezzBall for Palm OS BallZ beta 3

You can download the beta here – just delete the old version off your handheld before installing a new one.

To address a few common questions:
Is this a playable demo?
Yes, the file above contains 5 playable levels of BallZ. They work like the regular version would!

Where can I get BallZ
BallZ is available for 9.95$ in the TamsShop. Purchase the beta and get the full version when it ships along with a free complimentary license of BinaryClock!

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 6:07 pm

Saturn reaction to Apple TV disaster – the End of the story

Miscellaneous No Responses »
May 142007

A few minutes ago, the AppleTV(with accompanying and extra-purchased cables) was returned to the Saturn store where it came from. The department manager of the store took the unit and cables into custody, apologized for the problems and mistakes made by his employees – and finally signed a cashback order for 100% of the paid sum.

The cashback order executed flawlessly at the cashiers(into cash, not a coupon) – so, the final balance of our AppleTV experiment is:

No cash lost
10h lifetime lost

To be perfectly honest, I had hoped that the AppleTV would work. The machine looks really really cool and is pretty affordable for what it does…but, well, some things don’t work out…

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 2:35 pm

The Treo 680 review – System

Hardware Reviews 2 Responses »
May 142007

The Palm Treo 600 was often ridiculed for its rather weak 144MhZ OMAP processor – and indeed, opening large 8MP files took quite some time. The Treo 680′s 312MhZ PXA27x processor promises more power…but don’t forget NVFS. Is the Treo 680 the powerhouse we want it to be?

Processor
The chart below shows Speedy benchmark values for Treo 680 and 600:
0a The Treo 680 review System 0b The Treo 680 review System

The detailed results are here:
1a The Treo 680 review System 1b The Treo 680 review System

A PalmPi benchmark run takes about 4.17 seconds on a Treo 680, a Treo 600 takes 8.18. Visit our PalmPi review for more comparison numbers…

Expansion memory
The two Treos scored very identical in CardSpeed’s writing speed tests. The reading speed was far higher on the Treo 680 – it probably has a faster CPU and system bus(Treo 680 writes about 3MB/sec, while the 600 maxes out at about 600k/sec):

Treo 680:Good
Write32bits:76
Write32k:113482
Read32k:2912711

Treo 600:Good
Write32bits:72
Write32k:91980
Read32k:582542

-all values in bps

RAM layout
The Treo 600 has a classic memory system consisting of volatile RAM. A Resco Explorer “memory map” for the Treo 600 is shown below:
2a The Treo 680 review System

The Treo 680, on the other hand, has a NVFS flash system. This means that no data is lost when the battery gets removed(soft reset), but leads to a slight speed penalty when opening applications or files for the first time. Palm beefed up the size of the caches, leading to the impressive numbers shown below:
3a The Treo 680 review System

Overall, the Treo 680 is fast enough for all tasks thrown at it so far. I can ‘t say that it lagged on me yet. The increased dynamic memory allows you to run apps like PalmPDF or Doom without UDMH, the bigger DB cache speeds up launching applications…

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 8:27 am

How to fix .php page download problems with Blazer

Basics, Wireless 5 Responses »
May 132007

When I originally got my Treo 680, its Blazer browser refused to open many web sites and instead showed a window like the one below:
0a How to fix .php page download problems with Blazer

Most pages which were dynamically generated via php and thus ended in .php were impossible to render on my Treo 680…this severely limited usability.

If this happens, a fix is easy and readily available. Download Resco Explorer(trial is enough), and open Control Panel -> Associations. Look for an association to .php(like the one shown below) and delete it:
1a How to fix .php page download problems with Blazer

Blazer now no longer feels the urge to ‘pass on’ the file to another application as there is no handler available in the Palm Os’ses registry. Instead, it proceeds to render and show the page normally…

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 11:27 pm

The Proporta TamsShop raffle – winners

Giveaways No Responses »
May 132007

Dear Readers,
you can probably still recall the Proporta TamsShop raffle hosted at TamsPalm’s a few days ago. Anyways, the winners are chosen now – drum rolls for the winners, please:

Samuel P from the United States has won a Mobile Device Charger with his purchase of Resco Explorer.

Dennis H from the United States has won a Gadget Bag with his purchase of Card Reader.

The winners will soon be contacted by Proporta for the fulfillment of the order!

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 8:10 am

Apple TV Scart – or – how to spoil a couple’s week

Miscellaneous 11 Responses »
May 122007

Yours truly recently ventured out to purchase an Apple TV. Yep, I really wanted to – I wanted to buy a product of the oh-so-hated, evil and bad Cupertino-based company(:)) and move away from the good and health-bringing ways of the M$ :) . But jokes aside -the fun with the 300€ box ended as soon as it was carried home from the local austrian Saturn superstore(it will work allright, blah).

Step 1: no video cables included
After unpacking our AppleTV; we had our first shock. The 300€ box we just purchased didn’t contain a video cable for connecting the box to the TV – even though the shop clerk told us (sic) that a cable is contained and that it will work immediately!

Going to Saturn ended in me having to wait about 20 minutes for a cable, which another clerk finally produced. But our woes weren’t over!

Step 2: weird composite outputs
The cable we were given didn’t fit the AppleTV mechanically… . Cutting the plastic cover on the connector away finally made the cable fit. We were delighted and hoped for the best…but on to Step 3.

Step 3: no real Scart support
After having modified the cable to fit into the AppleTV and having established an electrical connection, the TV screen still stayed black. The reason for this was that the cable we were given simply COULDN’T work in this situation – our TV expected RGB signals, but received the regular composite output sent from the AppleTV. So, the clerk basically gave us wrong information yet again – and Apple apparently doesn’t care about customers who have a 2year old(it was very expensive) TV…

Overall, this “flirt” with Apple technology left both me and my girlfriend in a very dissatisfied state. Having lost about 10h of lifetime and probably the cost of the Hama cable(not much, but annoying as hell); the Cupertinians have thoroughly pi**ed us off and will not see any more business from us for a long time. Not including TV cables into a 300€ device AND not giving a warning about Scart incompatibility is simply too much idiocy in one place…

P.s. We will return the box to Saturn on Tuesday…stay tuned for what happens next!

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 7:56 pm

JezzBall for Palm OS – BallZ public beta 2

Palm News 2 Responses »
May 102007

Hi Guys,
Beta 1 was a slight bork-up, as I uploaded the wrong file(happens). It contains the old maths engine which doesn’t quite work…

Anyways, here is the link for beta 2 of BallZ. Please delete the old version off your handheld before installing the new one:
BallZ Beta 2

What do you think?

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 10:18 am

JezzBall for Palm OS – BallZ public beta test started

Palm News No Responses »
May 092007

Dear Readers and Friends,
a long time has passed since a new Tamoggemon app saw the light of day. However, it is now time to release a new program – give a warm welcome to BallZ!

BallZ is a JezzBall clone for Palm OS 5 handhelds(312MhZ processor recommended). It needs about 100k of RAM and will contain 30 levels when done. The game’s graphics are retro-styled, here are a few screenshots:
1a JezzBall for Palm OS BallZ public beta test started 1b JezzBall for Palm OS BallZ public beta test started 1c JezzBall for Palm OS BallZ public beta test started 1d JezzBall for Palm OS BallZ public beta test started

A beta of BallZ is available for download here. It contains 5 playable levels and will expire in 14 days after the first installation! Please send in feedback!

BallZ will cost 14.95$ when ready and will be released by the end of this month! The trial license can currently be registered at the TamsShop for 9.95$; you will then receive a beta with all 30 levels in place! In addition, you shall receive a free complimentary license to BinaryClock!

Posted by Tam Hanna, Site Founder at 1:21 pm
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