Palm Tungsten C

In the past, Palm's approach to PDA design has been clear: keep things simple and produce slick devices with adequate specifications for note taking, appointment tracking and contact organisation. But the Tungsten C marks a departure from this prosaic outlook. Just a brief glance at the spec sheet reveals that this is less of a pure PDA and more of a palmtop computer to compete with Pocket PC.

The primary evidence is the amount of memory leaping skywards. From a maximum of 16MB in previous Palms, the Tungsten C comes with an iPAQ-style 64MB, with 51MB free for applications and storage.

But that's not the only change. Abandoning its loyalty to chips with low power consumption but adequate speed - chiefly Motorola's 33MHz DragonBall CPU - Palm has loaded the Tungsten C with Intel's XScale processor, the most powerful handheld processor currently available. The PXA255 variant in the C runs at its maximum 400MHz too, as opposed to Sony's latest Palm-powered CLIs, which are fitted with 200MHz parts. Third on the list of the C's big hardware inclusions is wireless networking, with an integrated 802.11b adaptor.

While those who get upset about such things might feel that Palm is selling out under pressure from Microsoft, the fact is that with the new souped-up hardware under the bonnet the Tungsten C flies along. However, the combination of the wireless networking and fast processor means that the battery life isn't fantastic. Using it as an everyday PDA for appointment and contact management, plus checking email over the wireless link, I managed to get just shy of three hours from the non-removable lithium ion battery.

But despite all the new hardware, the C isn't targeted as a consumer entertainment device. This is indicated by the lack of a standard 3.5mm headphone jack; instead, there's a 2.5mm socket for a hands-free headset, while expansion is catered for with a single SD/MMC card slot. Perhaps more importantly, though, this is the first Palm we've seen with a keyboard.

This ousts the usual dedicated area for Graffiti handwriting recognition. Instead, you need to write directly on the screen over the top of the GUI, which takes some getting used to if you're a long-term Palm aficionado. It's an awkward compromise that often leads to the Tungsten thinking you're trying to write when you're actually attempting to drag a scroll bar. To offset the problem, there's an omnipresent blue box, which you can tap to turn recognition off, but it's a hindrance to the usual flow of working.

Compounding the sense of unfamiliarity even further is the Graffiti 2 handwriting-recognition software, which arrives in the wake of legal wrangles with Xerox over the original version. Palm claims the new system is better, but anyone used to the original is likely to find their speed of text entry slows to a crawl as they attempt to adjust to the changes.

The old Graffiti allowed all letters to be formed with a single stroke, while several of Graffiti 2's require two. The letter 'T', for instance, which was previously formed in one stroke with an upside-down 'L', now has to be formed by writing a downstroke and then crossing it.

Among further frustrations, while Caps Shift was previously activated by an upstroke, the stroke now puts the unit into punctuation mode; to get uppercase letters, you need to write characters so they overlap both the letter and number recognition areas. In practice, this was difficult, though, as there's no visible on-screen delineation of the zones.