Tungsten E2 specs
By Peter Rojas 
posted March 27th 2005 10:44AM
posted March 27th 2005 10:44AM
There have been rumors about the Tungsten E2 pretty much since palmOne announced the original Tungsten E back in October of 2003 (can you believe it's been that long?), and while this isn't the first list of supposed specs we've happened upon (there was a leaked FCC filing about the E2 back in January), 1src says they've got the definitive dirt on palmOne's latest handheld. This is unconfirmed (of course), but they're reporting that the Tungsten E2 could be announced as early as tomorrow and will have a 200MHz processor, a brighter 320x320 LCD screen, better battery life, 32MB of RAM (yawn), Bluetooth, and run on Palm OS Garnet 5.4.
It's great how Palm survived the Microsoft attack.
I'm not a big palm fan myself but they sure would improve their image by adding more ram. Being the first company to offer 128mb standard in their handhelds would wow the market. With the LOW price of ram I'm surprised they don't do that. Also, Improving the screen to a full wide screan like the T5 would have been the thing to do. You couldn't keep them in the stores with all of that and a price point of say 250 or so? That gives plenty of room to upgrade to the t5 for users who want more memory, etc. This E2 would have been great if it was initially the Tungsten E, not it's follow up.
Ok, half the "uncofirmed" (yet definitive?) specs were listed in the FCC docs. 320x320 and Bluetooth were both in the documents, as well as that the sync port being different. Being that the processor and battery are less than what most new devices would have its easy to assume that it would have a 200 MHz processor and "better battery."
No huge surprise, I think that sound about right. This is PalmOne's baby - and yet they continue to lame out on the memory.
I will also expect huge improvements for the "T|T6". Otherwise, I will not see how someone will pay $200 more for 224MB of internal memory and a widescreen.
What? Do you hear that? "Free Wi-fi card now bundled with the T|T5?" Do you hear that?
Anyways. . .
Scratch that. . .
I wonder if it will have NVFS?
This isn't a troll, I'm really curious - why is it that Palm handhelds lag behind PocketPCs in terms of hardware specs? My new PocketPC (an Axim X50v, FWIW) has half this thing's memory on its video chip _alone_, plus 64MB RAM and 128MB ROM. I could appreciate having lower specs if it meant a lower price, but that doesn't really seem to be the case versus the PocketPC, particularly with the high-end machines. Likewise, I csn see the point of throttling down the processor for more battery life - I mean, I do that anyway with my Axim - but that shouldn't affect stuff like the amount of RAM.
So what's up, Palm? Why all these anemic handhelds?
they need to include internal wifi, that is why a pocket pc looks better, if palmone has internal wifi (which i hear the t6 will [unsure about the zire 73]) then they will be much better, the devices are smaller and more efficient than a pocket pc.
Zaphod, I just traded in my Treo 600 for a Pocket PC device (iMate JAM). I really liked both devices. I like the JAM better, but it's much newer, so I should hope so. The 650 would be a closer match, of course.
Anyway, I'd say the simple answer to your question (and I'm not trolling either!) is Microsoft bloat. As with all other Windows variants, its footprint is HUGE. I experience system lags (PocketPC owners know the little spinning rainbow thing that would be an hourglass on PC windows) FAR more often on the PPC than on any of my Palm devices.
The ROM image that comes on the JAM is something like 53MB. That's windows and a few applications (applications like contacts, email, media player).
So basically the windows devices NEED those specs to handle windows. PalmOS has a much smaller footprint and certainly feels more efficient.
Can the windows machines DO more with the extra hardware? I dunno. It seems that way to me, judging by the sophistication of the games, and the quality of the media applications. (aside: Betaplayer is VERY nice... play AAC files on your pocket PC. No more taking the big iPod jogging.)
One could argue that Palm should leverage their efficient OS by putting the same powerful hardware to better use than MS devices, but their stragegy seems to be use cheaper hardware to get about as much productivity at a lower price point. Maybe they'll go after both markets in the future.
Here's a question: aside from nerds who want to play Age of Empires, listen to AAC files, and watch 100MB pr0n files on their cell phone, why does anyone need this kind of power?
PalmOS doesn't require the same processor speed as PPC. Lower speeds don't equate to a slower device (with in reason, of course). Everything else, feel free to guess.
What the?
The Tungsten T5 was already the Tungsten E2. Now we're going to need to distinguish them somehow. I suggest calling the Tungsten T5 the Tungsten E2, and the Tungsten E2 can be called the Tungsten E2-II. ;-)
I'm split on this. On one hand, I can see not fixing what isn't broken, particularly on your top-selling model. So, on that front, a set of evolutionary improvements across the board makes sense. Better screen, better battery life, better connector, and it looks like it might be slightly thinner too.
The real useful feature that was proposed was the "thumb drive" emulation that lets a cabled-up PDA act like a generic USB removable storage device. Now that I'm using my E to play MP3s, that seems like it would be handy.
OTOH, the E was the PDA I settled for, not the PDA I wanted. Where's my clamshell keyboard model, Palm?
There is no point whatsoever in a silkscreen graffiti area on any handheld anymore. If you've got Garnet on there, and apps for Garnet can take advantage of the full screen, why would you still saddle this thing with a silkscreen graffiti area? What crap! That's the only reason I didn't buy the first E and now this? Maybe less screen area means lower price, but dang. That's sooo 2000 of them. And a bit of a body update might have been nice. Never liked that slightly hourglassed shape. Bad Feng Shui or something. Just never looked right or modern or cool. They need to attend Apple design courses, or maybe Sony. Hope the chromy housing isn't as disgusting-slimy-fingerprint-prone as the E1.