Compaq C-Series 2010c review

Underlining Compaq's corporate take on the handheld PC, the 2010c features an encrypted password protection system. This will survive the removal of even the backup battery, and it can be set up to wipe your data if someone unauthorised attempts to access the device. The 2010c also ships with Pocket Carbon Copy (which lets you dial in to your home or work PC and access files remotely), Bsquare fax software and Mail on the Run to ensure compatibility with a wide range of email systems.

To round the package off there's a useful spell-check tool from CIC, which adds a word count facility and the equivalent of autotext function to Pocket Word. Since the 2010c boasts 20Mb of EDO RAM, adding even more software shouldn't prove too problematic.

There's no doubt that Compaq's first UK handheld offering is feature-packed. The 2010c takes full advantage of the power that Windows CE has to offer while adding some sensible and genuinely useful extra software. At £580, even the price isn't that unreasonable. The main trouble is that it doesn't do enough in terms of usability to make it really stand out from the crowd.

Author: Jonathan Bray