Windows Mobile 5.0 Upgrade for iPAQ hx4700 Significantly Delayed

[Ed Hardy]

HP has announced that the Windows Mobile 5.0 upgrade for its flagship handheld, the iPAQ hx4700, has been delayed by many months.

Read more at http://www.brighthand.com/article/hx...layed?site=PPC

[pcboy]

I bet it's the Ati driver.

[neuron]

It may be the touchpad driver.

Good news. I never like hx4700. Monster device with a TOUCHPAD, nothing exciting. Worst PPC I ever saw.

[PlasticMan]

what software driver could take 9 months to write? hp is really loosing it. they once led the ppc market but now cant get their act together. its sad.

[NewtonDKC]

My guess is also the Touchpad, which I hate anyway. Too bad they won't giveus the option of getting the upgrade with no Touchpad driver (If that actually is it) since I disable mine anyway!

Something about this just sounds super fishy. I mean it's a driver. It's not like LCD Screens where they can't ramp up production of them fast enough to meet demand and they give an estimate based on known factors of how long it takes the manufacturing plant to ramp up prodcution, etc. This is software. How can they know it won't be available until 2006? Did the 3rd party tell HP that "Sorry, we aren't devoting any resources on writing this until 2006" and HP spinelessly says "Oh, Ok sure, we'll take the hit in sales on our top of the line device while we wait for you to write this."

Sorry, this is BS. I bet though that we'll see NEW 4700's shipping with OS 5 as they have "replaced the mechanism with identical parts from a company that supplies a driver compatible with OS 5". There's no way they'd stand by for this. I truly feel it's just a ploy to get people to...oh, I don't know what I'm saying. I'm just really sick of the way HP has done the iPAQ line in. From the heyday of the iPAQ line (I mean come on - the 4150 is STILL the most awesome Pocket PC ever designed - reliable, powerful, feature laden to the point of drooling, and in a footprint compact enough that the Palm V became the obese ugly step sister. :-) So with an ultra popular, great selling, critically acclaimed device, what do they do? Cancel that design. Don't offer upgrades for it. Or even carry it on in the next generation. Instead they come out with larger devices with fewer features AND More Expensive than their predecessors. Prime Example: the ridiculously overpriced and RAM-deficient 1700 series with no BT and barely enough ram to run the OS! This device - which HP should be sued for releasing with so little RAM - replaced the 1930 and 1940 series - devices which were smaller, sexier, had 64MB of RAM and far more feature laden. Oh, and CHEAPER. The ONLY thing better on the 1700 was the screen, where the 1900 series had the "yellow" tint screen at any angle other than head on. Had HP merely updated the screens and OS, the 4150 and 1900 could have easily continued to be top sellers for HP even to this day (absolutely NONE of the new devices come close to capturing the splendor, fun, and power of that line of iPAQs. And worse, HP seems to be absolutely CLUELESS that anything is wrong with their lineup, and laughingly wonders what has happened to the popularity of the iPAQ! How is this possible? Just once I'd like God or anyone capable (it'd tale a supreme being to figure this lot out) to explain how humans - especially ones im charge of large corproations' product lines, can be so out of touch with what is so obvious to everyone else.

I have been a loyal HP customer...well, loyal iPAQ Customer since the 3650 first came out and gave the Windows CE Platform not only a fighting chance, but a winner of a device that actually EXCELLED and slammed every device before it (and all the ones that were concurrent with it). But HP has simply gone from ridiculous to inexcuseable after purchasing the iPAQ "name" and ruining it!

Who knows, maybe this same mysterious "3rd party driver" was also the reason for no ROM update for what, like 10 months after it's introdution when the lesser models had updates only a month or two after introduction? One would think the most expensive Pocket PC on the block would be treated with respect and excellent support, otherwise, what exactly did I pay for?

I've been admiring the Dell x50v from a not so distant afar since it came out. The form factor easily trounced the 4700 (try holding them both in your hand...the 4700 - slightly too wide, slightly uncomfortable....the x50 - just feels good. There's no debating this). The color saturation is slightly better on the 4700, colors are warmer. But the Dell appears to be more accurate. Menus are light gray, whites are pure brilliant white. The difference is not enough to put a mark against the Dell - it's simply different. Both are beautiful, breathtakingly sharp and crisp. The Dell also has the surprisingly useful hardware button to turn wireless on and off, and a standad D-Pad. Some people may like HP's trackpad....while a significant number do not, myself included. It's always getting activated when it shouldn't, and never seems to d what it should. Even with the "nubs" to guide you, "OK" frequently is recognized as "Down", etc. And using it in the dark or low light conditions to look up valuable information is impossible as there's no tactile feedback! If this is the source of the driver issue, then I am absolutely serious when I say that HP would do well to offer the upgrade to people who want it early without the Trackpad support. They'd probably be surprised at how many people hate that "experiment" in redundancy (a touch pad when a touch screen is right there? Why use a cursor to move around and point to icons and buttons when you can just freaking tap the icon or button itself??? Who thought this would be a good idea?). I seriously would be totally fine with it sitting there NOT getting in the way for a change.

Serious Question - IF we could get HP to reveal that it is the TrackPad, does anyone think those dime a dozen - I hate to say it - Peititions for those who want the OS uprade and WELCOME the TrackPad being disabled? I'd even give up the application buttons if necessary. I'm sure HP won't do this - I'm sure it's just beyond the realm of acceptable quality for HP to allow something like that to be relased without full hardware support - ignoring the fact that the greater number of users are annoyed by it anyway! Really though, it could only benefit everyone involved - HP could still sell the updates (if they really want to sell the upgrades instead of new hardware, which is still my sneaking suspicion if "new" 4710's or whatever come out with slightly modified trackpads that DO work under OS5...but anyway, as I was saying, HP sells ugrades, we users get the OS we want AND get the annoyance disabled without having to use reg hacks that we currently do AND most importantly, a large base of users who will test out the new OS and report any bugs that could then be worked out befoore the official OS 5 Upgrade release for the 4700 series (which could also include even new sales as well - if they really don't have a modifed hardware version to satisfy all those wanting an OS5 VGA based iPAQ. I really really can not believe HP would sacrifice all those sales for a driver! I mean they have no other VGA model. So does this mean anyone wanting a VGA model and the latest OS - that ALL those sales will be lost to Dell, Siemens/Pocket Loox, Asus, and any others? IF HP really isn't concerned about this enough to either scare the begeesus out of that company that's not writing the driver or even volunteering some help, then the only conclusion I can draw from this is that the 4700 must not have sold very well anyway. Either that or HP severly underestimates the demand for Windows Mobile 5, which with all of MS's hyping of it's significant UI overhaul to be so easy that it makes me think HP is even more out of touch than ever. Whatever the case may be, there is much much more to this story and details that we simply aren't getting...there's just no way any company would do this!

I'm sure I'll get the inevitable response of "If you think the Dell is so great then go get it". And I probably will as soon as WM 5 is available on it. Hp has simply gotten BORING in the PDA Market. The only complaint I have heard relative to the x50 series is in the outsourced foreign support. And at least Dell seems to stll have a sense of excitement and dedication to their PDA line. HP seems like they simply don't care anymore. No new models on the horizon (forget the phone models with their pathetic 240x240 display resolution - once again, offer the very least you possibly can instead of going the extra mile and making a truly wondeerful product that everybody has to have. How have they forgotten this?

The only way I'd stick with HP now is if they released a 2700 series with VGA and 5.0. Or even better, resurrect the 4150 with VGA and 5.0 and I'd actually evangelize for them again. The hospital where I work long ago shifted to the majority of new devices being Dell x50 series devices...and that was with no coercion on our part - we simply listed models we recommended - the 4700 and x50v both being among them - and of course orice probably did the rest.

Well, I didn't mean to trun this into a rant, but it's just the latest disappointment in what has been an incredibly disappointing state of affairs for the entire iPAQ line. I don't know if HP fired or lost the COmpaq team originally responsible for the glory days of the iPAQ, but something very real, and very substantial has happened to the line.

Whew, sorry for the mega-vent - anyone else feel like this is just the last straw? Or do I need to try going out at night, meeting people, engaging in kinkygroup opulion an drinking merrily il the night is done? (yes, I'm telling myself to "get a life". But what I'd like to get is an awesome iPAQ worthy of the name. But what I will get will undoubteldy be a Dell Axim x50v ith WM5.0 and maybe even a nice MicroDrive just to be cool. :-)

[Siliconaddictio]

Bastards. I need a crying emoticon right now.

[Siliconaddictio]

Originally posted by huangzhinong
nothing exciting. Worst PPC I ever saw.

And biggest and best screen on the market...so to each their own.

[wshwe]

This must be a sign of David Nagel's magic touch.

[PocketTV Team]

> I bet it's the Ati driver.

I doubt that's the ATI driver.

The ATI video hardware is used in many devices, so I'm pretty sure that they have a driver for WM5 for all their customers.

And ATI's video drivers are pretty good, in fact much higher quality than the driver for the Intel 2700G video accelerator (used in the Dell x50v). Yes, Intel's hardware is superior in performances compared to ATI's hardware, but that's another story.

So I doubt very much ATI would be the cause for this delay.

[dbman]

Personally, I am not going to lose any sleep over this delay. Like almost every computer or PDA that I have owned, I keep it until it no longer does what I need. I have owned several Palm devices and a Dell Axim and the 4705 really is a great device (even if the touch pad is too small to be really useful.)

Right now, I have no issues with the 4705. I use it to browse the web, run my GPS software, keep me on time, watch movies and much more. The day that I see an application that I need that will not run well on this device, will be the day that I start shopping for a replacement.

Until then, I plan to sit back and enjoy what I have. When and if the 5.0 upgrade is available, I will read the reviews and forums and upgrade if the concensus is that 5.0 is a winner.