Amazon Leaks Release Date for the LifeDrive

[Ed Hardy]

A major online retailer has jumped the gun and posted a page on palmOne's next high-end handheld before it has been officially announced.

Read more at http://www.brighthand.com/article/Am...rive?site=Palm

Update: Amazon.com isn't the only one to jump the gun a bit. The most recent issue of Laptop Magazine has a full-page article on palmOne's upcoming high-end handheld.

Read more at http://www.brighthand.com/article/Li...zine?site=Palm

[k2stingray]

This looks like a big step in right direction for palm. Dual wireless, decent size hard drive, landscape mode, and USB is a great combination.

One thing that really surprises me is the BT1.1. It seems like BT1.2 has been out forever, but manufacturer's are still making 1.1 devices like crazy. Is the cost savings of 1.1 vs. 1.2 so great that this is what's keeping them from using the latest version? I just don't get it.

If they released a version of this PDA with CF vice SD and BT1.2 I'd seriously consider jumping ship from PPC camp.

[ri5*]

Ed, just curious why you put
"able to store up to 8 hours of video, depending on how the movie is encoded."

I think I saw part of the Powerpoint slide where you may have gotten that from, but forums here on Brighthand have guides that show how to get great looking Xvid/Divx videos of full length moives (2hrs) down to 150-200MB for this size screen. Unless you know of some other limitation, using something like mmplayer and Xvid compression you could get quite a bit more than 8 hours worth of videos on this thing.

Will we be seeing VGA and possibly Cobalt in a similar device a year from now?

[imported_SaxonMan]

since im just about to buy a new pda im spending my spare minutes lookin for the right one....

just to let you guys know: the german retailer www.mindfactory.de lists the lifedrive as well.
it's priced at 385.88 euros which is considerably less than the deal from amazon.com

heres the link:
http://www.mindfactory.de/cgi-bin/Mi...50#.filereader
... sorry but thats a pretty weird link.
if u wanna see the real webpage go to
www.mindfactory.de -> handheld/pda -> handheld/pda -> palm -> PALM Livedrive Multilingual


thats particulary strange because so far p1's priced pda normally at the same amount of euros in the EU as they did in the USA ( USD )

[Ed Hardy]

Originally posted by ri5*
I think I saw part of the Powerpoint slide where you may have gotten that from, but forums here on Brighthand have guides that show how to get great looking Xvid/Divx videos of full length moives (2hrs) down to 150-200MB for this size screen.

It will be able to store 8 hours of video with the included software. To get more you'll have to go to a third-party solution, many of which people have to pay for. You mentioned MMPlayer, which costs $14.95.

I don't want to promise people something on palmOne's behalf, and then have them find out later that they have to buy additional software in order to get it. That tends to make people mad.

Originally posted by ri5*
Will we be seeing VGA and possibly Cobalt in a similar device a year from now?

It depends entirely on how well the LifeDrive sells. There was never a Tungsten C2 because the original didn't do very well.

[imported_SaxonMan]

just an update on the availability of the lifedrive in europe.

i just talked to one of the salesmen from www.mindfactory.de . He said it's gonna be in stock by may 20th.
Sadly, he couldnt give me any more information on the specs.

[imported_SaxonMan]

Ed,

assuming that the lifedrive is going to hit the US market on may 18th by when do u think are u going to have a preliminary review online?
just asking that cause i dont want to buy that device without a decent second opinion.


Thanks,

Rainer

[Ed Hardy]

Originally posted by SaxonMan
assuming that the lifedrive is going to hit the US market on may 18th by when do u think are u going to have a preliminary review online?

I hope to have at least a preliminary review ready on the day it launches. Of course, this all depends on when palmOne gets the device to me.

I haven't talked to them about this yet, as I haven't been willing to go under NDA yet.

I might soon, though. Really, there probably won't be too many new articles about the LifeDrive until it comes out, as there's really not much else to say about it. We already know everything except the amount of RAM.

[eick]

I am kind of curious about the status bar. First couple of pictures show an all grey status bar with the graffiti anywhere button where the rotate screen button is on the T3 and a new button where the graffiti anywhere button was. The rest of the pictures show a grey bar with a blue clock and the rotate screen and graffiti anywhere buttons where they are on the T3.

[TheZodiac]

There are no reports (that I have seen) that indicates whether or not if the hard drive is removable or not... if the battery is removable OR if the SD slot is SDio.

This would be some really big points, if all above were true. For instance: an SDio would/could mean GPS mapping, and with a 4GB or stoarage, a map of the entire US could be stored.

Also- even though it would probably be cheesy, SDio could mean a camera attachment, which could lead the way to video encoding as well!

I hope this is upgradable to COBOLT or their Linux based Cobolt systemin the future

I also wonder if this Line of products will be the first, as were with the Tungsten T line of handhelds.

Good luck Palm1! Hopefully, this is their "iMac", if you will.

-Anthony