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HP iPAQ rx5900 Travel Companion reviewed
The folks at LAPTOP Magazine have come out with some pretty high praise for HP's iPAQ rx5900 Travel Companion (a slight variation of the rx5915), calling it the best GPS/PDA hybrid yet and bestowing its Editors' Choice award on the shiny little handheld. The iPAQ scored the most points for its top-end navigation software, courtesy of TomTom, which they say worked like a charm in conjunction with the SiRFstar III antenna. And, being based on Windows Mobile 5.0, the iPAQ also provided all the PDA functionality you'd expect from a regular handheld, with built-in WiFi and Bluetooth to round out the connectivity options. The biggest downside, not surprisingly, is that the battery will run down pretty quickly when you have the GPS turned on, lasting just 90 minutes with the backlight on as well. Although it does come with a car dock and charger, which will come in handy if you don't want to have to worry about getting stranded on your next cross-country trip.
HP's iPAQ rx4000 gets a big brother: the rx5915
This new line of consumer-oriented HP iPAQ devices is growing into a family right quick. We just saw the rx4000 a couple of days ago, and now we're catching wind of at least a couple rx5000 devices. The rx5000 types go with the "Travel Companion" moniker, since they include a SiRF Star III GPS receiver for a bit of navigation action. WiFi seems to be optional for the rx5000 units, but the rx5915 has it, along with a 3.5-inch QVGA touchscreen, 2GB of flash memory, 64MB RAM, Bluetooth 2.0, SDIO slot, standard 3.5mm headphone jack and a 400MHz Samsung processor. Hopefully these specs give us a better indication of what HP is packing in the rx4000 units, and the flash memory size does appear to be a variable, so we're guessing we'll at least get a 2GB option in rx4000 land. The Travel Companion iPAQs feature a traditional 9-way direction pad, along with 2 Windows Mobile buttons, but none of the rx4000's jog dial action. As for price, the rx5915 weighs in at a hefty, if almost reasonable, $600. We've been hearing some rumblings about whether or not these new iPAQs were going to make it to the States, but we can at least say that the documentation we've seen shows off the rx5000 nav features gallivanting around North America, so we've got that going for us.
