47 out of 47 people found this review helpful.
The TUNGSTEN E has quickly become an essential part of my life!
Date of Review: Nov 13, 2004
The Bottom Line: Rated E for everyone!! It is easy to use, and can be expanded to fit many needs. This PDA is loved by my husband, myself, and our kids!
When my husband and I decided to upgrade to color PDA's, we stopped here at Epinions FIRST. We picked out a few models that might be within our price range, and went to do hands on shopping. We ended up at Best Buy, where we were able to look at and play with a few of the models on our list. We opted to purchase 2 Tungsten E PDA's, since we liked what we had read here and it fit our budget rather nicely.
Before actually purchasing the PDA's, we made certain that if we found them cheaper than the $199.00 price tag, that Best Buy would do a price match. They said yes as long as it was within a 30-day period, so off to the registers we went. Once we had purchased the PDA's, we drove home rather excitedly, we had new toys to play with!! We opened them up immediately, and skimmed over the instruction manual before actually doing anything with the new Tungsten E's, or "E's". The first thing we noticed was that the battery on the new PDA's needed to be charged for 3 to 4 hours for it to hold a charge and run properly. During this time they did work after being plugged in for a few minutes, as long as the power supply cord was still plugged in. I was happy with this, since I did not have to wait 320 minutes to PLAY!!
Once we had the E's plugged in, we installed the software onto my computer. I have a Toshiba laptop with Windows XP, and the software installed and ran with no problems. However, my husband tried it on his E-Machines PC with Windows ME, and it would not install, let alone run. We blame it on the Windows ME and NOT the Palm OS Software, but that is probably best left for another review. So, I have both E's syncing off my laptop.
Installing the software onto a computer is very simple. You merely open the C.D. compartment, and launch the C.D. drive. The C.D. does it all, it even holds your hand through it all, giving you an option of trusting it or, if you are so inclined, to pick and choose which components you actually want installed. I am not so inclined to do it myself, so I opted to allow the C.D. to do its thing. It did eventually ask me which features I wanted added to my E, so I chose all of them. I will list and describe these features as this Epinion is built.
My favorite feature of the E is "Photos". This feature allows me to store my favorite photos in my E, so I can share them with ease. However, with only 28.8 MB of memory available, if I don't make the pictures fairly small, they fill up my E's available memory VERY quickly! Making the pictures smaller is easily done with any photo altering software, which can be easily and cheaply attained. When I first added pictures to my E, I ran out of room with only 20 pictures. When I went back and made them smaller, I was able to more than double that amount.
Since I REALLY like the photos feature, I took advantage of the card slot on the top of my E. This slot allows me to add a Secure Data Card, or SD card, to expand my E's memory. The E comes with a dummy card, just to fill the card slot and help insure it doesn't get dirt or grime into the slot. I have purchased 3 additional card for my E. One is 64MB, which I use to store my photos and books, and some of my documents. I have another card that is 512MB, which I use to store music that I can play on my E's MP3 player feature. I also have a 1.0G card, that I share with my Husband's E. This card is used to store movies, and turn our E's into portable DVD players!
As mentioned above, I can store BOOKS on my PDA. This feature is very important to me as an avid reader. With my old Smart Phone PDA, I never knew this feature was available. A limited copy of Palm Reader is included with the E's software, and actually includes 2 classic books to get you started. I have found great joy in being able to buy books off the Internet and download them into my PDA. GONE are my days of carrying a big heavy book with me everywhere I go. Now I just whip out my E and read!! I can also have MANY books with me at once without having to carry a large bag or box to accommodate them all! I even have children's books for reading to my younger children and young reader books for my 10 year to enjoy. This helps curb everyone's boredom in situations where we find ourselves waiting for long periods of time. I enjoy the fact that since the E has a color screen, the picture books have very detailed color pictures for my children to enjoy.
Oh, and for my $199.00 investment, I also got an MP3 player! This feature ONLY works if you purchase an expansion SD card, AND download both the software and the music. I chose Pocket Tunes for our E's, but there are MANY options available. I have also found many websites that allow me to download songs for 99 cents or less. I can also take any of my CD's and copy my favorite songs to MP3 format to enjoy on my E. To convert songs from the CD to MP3, I did have to download yet another program but it is very worth it in my opinion. The E has a headphone jack on the top, and accommodates just about any pair of headphones, which makes listening to music not only easy but enjoyable!
Another feature that is AVAILABLE BUT NOT INCLUDED with the E is the ability to play DVD movies! Do you remember me telling you that the kids enjoy the books? Well you can just imagine the joy with the movies! With a simple download of MM Player, I can convert any DVD to a very small file to add to that 1.0G card I mentioned above. We have converted and enjoyed several "Veggie Tale" videos, as well as "Saving Nemo", so far. The only "complaint" I might have is that the screen is small, so therefore the video is small as well! The card can have movies added and deleted at will, so we rotate the movies often! I did also purchase an SD card reader for use in copying the movie files. The length of time required to send the movies using hotsync with the card installed in the PDA is pretty outrageous. Even with the card reader, copying to the card as if it were a disk on the computer, a full-length movie compressed to less than 200MB, takes about 5 minutes to copy.
The features on my E that were also on my Smart Phone include "Contacts", "Calendar", and "Memos". All of my information from my Smart Phone was EASILY moved and stored into my E! The contacts option is relatively simple. It allows me to store names, numbers, addresses, email addresses, important dates and any notes on people. The calendar feature allows me to not only have my date book without having to carry a big bulky book, but it also has an alarm to tell me I need to LOOK at it! I frequently would forget to even look at my date book before I got my first PDA, so this is a feature I enjoy very much! With the E, the calendar feature also allows me to not only categorize the listing, but I can also color code them according to the category I file it under. The Memos feature is a very nice feature, since I am able to write notes and file them easily. I am a bit disenchanted with the fact that I can not store the memos on my expansion card, so they take up space in my E's memory. I can however take a memo and classify it as private. A private memo needs my personal password to be viewed. This gives my E a level of security if I pass it to someone to look at my wonderful pictures, since they can not view any of my private memos.
The E also has the lock out feature with password usage, meaning you need my personal password to even turn on my E! With this feature, I can leave it on a table nearby and not have to worry about someone getting my private information. HOWEVER, if a hard reset is performed on the E, it will operate. It will not retain my private information if reset without using the password.
Twisting the top off of the stylus, and poking the small tip into a hole in the back of the PDA performs a hard reset. The stylus is the small pen that fits into a slot on the side of the E. It is used to write on and operate the E. I personally find this pen hard to use since it is very slim. I opted to purchase a PhD Multi pen from Paper Mate. This pen is a rather fat pen with a comfort grip that includes a ballpoint pen, a mechanical pencil, AND A STYLUS! My husband noticed that when he was using the E own stylus, that his screen protector scratched more easily, and needed to be replaced more often than when he is using the Paper Mate pen.
The screen protector is a plastic film that comes with the E, and additional protectors can be purchased. The screen protector comes ready to be cut for the E or any one of the other 5 PDA screens it can be cut to fit. On the backing of the protector is a diagram that outlines the screen and you cut to size by cutting on the line. The E also comes with a plastic flip cover that protects the screen. This cover is flimsy, and it seems to be more in the way than useful. The flip cover folds over from the left side to cover the screen, and across the back when the E is in use. Because it flips back when open, it doesn't ever close and stay closed, SO it never fully protects the E! It would be more useful if there was a way to secure it shut. Both my husband and myself removed these covers after they began to rip where they bend!
There are MANY programs to be downloaded from the Internet that expand the use of the E. I think I find a new one every time I look! I like Avantgo, since it allows me to use MapQuest.com to install driving directions and a small map into my E. This makes driving to new destinations a breeze, since I no longer have to rely on how well a person can give me directions! My husband also uses Avantgo to download news and weather forecasts with each hotsync. I also found a PDA playground at dataviz.com. The playground makes my E child friendly, so my poor bored children can use it as well. It has games for children to play, as well as locks out everything important, so my children can not accidentally erase it! Playground needs a password to get out of, and back to the actual PDA functions.
My husband likes his E bright, so he feels the battery life is not adequate. I do not agree with this. I use my E in the dimmest brightness, unless I am outside in daylight. My battery lasts a very long time, unless I play one of my many downloaded games. If the battery life is not sufficient for your needs, there is a car charger available for the E.
