Palm m125 review

Palm's m100 series was designed to replace the III series as a low-end mono PDA aimed at consumers rather than corporates. As such, it's slightly more chunky and has a plastic rather than metal case in order to keep costs down. The m125 is the latest in this line and features several improvements over the m100, but also retains some of its limitations.

The first major improvement - besides the 8Mb of RAM - is the inclusion of a side-mounted MMC/SD card slot. This allows access to a wide range of add-ons including memory cards, backup cards and reference software as well as the sleds that fit onto the bottom connector. The other improvement is PalmOS 4.0.1, which tidies up the interface and supports the new hardware features.

One limitation of the m100 series is that the screen is slightly smaller than other Palms, which can mean information is more difficult to see, and tapping the scroll arrows requires more accuracy. In general use, this isn't too much of a problem, but some users may find it annoying.

The m125 draws power from two AAA batteries rather than an integrated rechargeable solution as used in the m500 series. Not only does this mean running out of battery power is less of an issue, but the batteries last around 50 per cent longer than the m500's, so you won't need to replace them too often. The Palm m125 is a good buy for those wanting a simple PDA, but if you don't need expandability shop around for the substantially cheaper m105.