Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should. We find that's never more true than when we're reviewing new wireless gizmos that are in the works -- or worse, already on the streets.
In this article, we take a peek at two devices worthy of a raised eyebrow or two. First, Dave Sims looks at the Motorola V100, which attempts to incorporate cell phone capability into the body of a text pager. Then Derrick Story checks out the Parafone Springboard module for Visor Handspring devices that allows you to use your PDA as a cordless 900-MHz phone.
In our opinion, one of these devices seems a little more practical than the other. Which one? Read on and discover for yourself.
Devices with just one purpose usually have great interfaces. Consider your toaster, or a dial telephone.
Every time you add a function to a device, the interface becomes just that much more complicated. Toaster ovens add dials and switches, and phones with redial and speed dial have more complex interfaces. You've probably been asked by at least one grandparent to help figure those out.
Design engineers keep adding functions and complicating the interface until it becomes so multipurposed that it isn't optimized for anything. Suddenly nothing is easy, and at some point someone adds the function that is like the final straw breaking the camel's back.
When I first heard that Motorola was sticking a mobile phone into its text pager, I thought it sounded great -- not unlike a toaster oven or a phone with speed dial. We gadget lovers are stuffing more and more black-and-silver appliances into our pockets and onto our belts. Convergence offers the promise that we may be able to carry fewer devices without giving up any functionality.
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But after a few weeks carrying the V100, I saw that like several other converged devices, it suffers from trying to jam too many functions into too small a device. It's not that the electronics don't fit, but the interface remains optimized as a text pager. The GSM phone they've packaged inside appears to be (as indeed, it is) an afterthought -- awkward to use and demanding tradeoffs that only early adopters are likely to endure.
The V100 is one of several converged devices Motorola's showing this fall; others include a phone with an FM radio and some with PIM (personal information manager) features to compete with Palm OS devices.
The V100 takes the popular text pager form -- a device with a tiny QWERTY keyboad and a screen with several lines of text -- and almost invisibly slips the guts of a GSM phone into it. But to do that, Motorola has skipped the speaker and the microphone -- which have, traditionally, been pretty basic elements of the telephone. To use this one, you have to plug in a hands-free set.
My experience with hands-free sets is they're good if you're setting up the call: plug them in before you back out of the driveway. They're not so good if someone's calling you, because it's a real hassle to find the phone and cord, plug them together, and take the call -- and it's that much harder if you're speeding away from a toll booth.
But let's say no one ever calls you, and you have to initiate your own calls. The V100 is still difficult to use. One button has an icon of an envelope on it (for getting email) and another has an icon of a pen on paper (for writing email). But there's no button with a phone on it, and there should be.
Patience and experimentation with menus will reveal that you can enter a phone number by tapping on the keys labeled with letters and numbers, and then dial it by tapping the OK key.
But the tiny QWERTY keyboard just isn't optimized for phone users. Here's another example of how: Let's say one of the numbers you like to call is the voicemail system at your office. Once I'm into mine, it asks me to press "P" to play the first message. By "P", the system really wants me to hit my "7" key, the one with "PRS" on it. But the 7-key on the V100's keypad is also the Z-key of its QWERTY keyboard. The P-key on the V100 is way off on the top right of the QWERTY keyboard, where it would be very handy if I were typing an email. So while my voicemail system waits, I'm trying to recall the numbers above the keypad on every phone I've used over the past 30 years -- and finding it more time-consuming than I would like.
The disconnect between me and the V100 may have as much to do with my preferences as with its shortcomings. I carry a mobile phone and use it often. What appealed to me was the notion of having a full keyboard on my phone so I could use it to compose short email messages, which I find painful to tap out on a 10-key pad.
But the V100 is less a mobile phone with a keyboard than it is a text pager with an auxiliary phone. A colleage of mine, who relies on his text pager and doesn't own a mobile phone, might have found it a more appropriate balance of interface tradeoffs. But for now, I'll have to stick with my phone, or look toward one that supports graffiti.
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Call me vain, but I feel a little self-conscious when holding my Visor PDA up to my face and talking in to it like Dick Tracy.
We have this running joke around the office about doing geek things in public that might lead to getting picked on by some Luddite bully. Activities such as turning your laptop sideways and reading it like a big electronic book are sure-fire bets to making your next train ride an embarrassing one. Sorry, Adobe and Microsoft, but e-book software on the laptop has a ways to go before I risk using it on the bus. And I must admit, talking into my PDA is a close second to the sideways-turned laptop. This is one of the reasons why I've shied away from the Visor phone.
 We recommend that you stay inside the house when talking into your Visor for fear of vicious neighborly gossip. |
Clearly, the folks over at Arkon Networks Inc. are less self-conscious. Their clever invention, the Springboard Parafone for the Handspring Visor brings true 900-MHz cordless phone capability to the Palm-sized PDA. You plug its module into your trusty Handspring, dial the number, and talk directly into the Visor's built-in microphone. However, you may be more comfortable using the supplied headset for conversations in public.
I must admit, however, from a purely practical standpoint the Parafone worked just fine when secretly talking directly into my Visor. I tested the device during a number of conversations to friends and co-workers, and everyone commented that my voice came through loud and clear -- much better than most cell phones.
The first question that popped into my mind when I read about this product was, "Why would someone want to make their Visor a cordless phone?" After all, the range is only a couple hundred feet from the location of the cradle that is tethered to the phone jack.
One answer relates directly to those hundreds of phone numbers that you have stored in your PDA. Parafone smartly integrates this data into its software. Once you have the Parafone module installed, all you have to do is press your address book button, tap the name of the person you want to call, hit (the new) Dial button that is present when the module is inserted, and Parafone dials the number for you. It doesn't get any easier than that.
When you remove the Parafone module, your address book returns to normal, and the Dial button disappears. If you have multiple phone numbers for an address entry, then you're presented with a list of those numbers, and you can tap the one you want to dial. Having this kind of data right there in the calling device really makes you wonder why standard cordless phones haven't integrated this capability into their interface.
 The 2-in-1 Charge/Sync Base Cradle looks handsome on a desk and is versitile to boot! |
Another Parafone plus is the 2-in-1 Charge/Sync Base Cradle that's included in the package. This handsome gizmo behaves like a regular cordless phone cradle that plugs into your phone jack and transmits the call to the wireless handset. But wait, there's more!
The Base Cradle also has a USB cord that allows you to plug it into your computer and access your Palm software. And if your Visor is in the cradle, all you have to do is press the Page/Sync button to HotSync the device to your computer. So now you can replace your mundane, single-use HotSync cradle with this smart-looking cradle that also transmits phone calls to your Visor. It's really kind of cool.
And if you want to recharge the Parafone battery, you can either leave the module in the Visor and put the whole unit in the Base Cradle, or you can detach the module and charge it in the cradle separately. Visor HotSyncing works regardless of whether or not the module is in the PDA.
Parafone can also handle a number of advanced calling features such as 3-way conference calling, speed dialing, and dialing from call history.
Other than explaining why you're talking into your Visor to curious onlookers, there are really only two minor drawbacks to the Parafone. The first is the common Visor problem of not having enough room for more than one Springboard module at a time. If, for example, you normally keep an 8-MB memory module in your Handspring, and you're talking to a co-worker on the Parafone and need a bit of information that's on the memory module, you're stuck.
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CardAccess has addressed this problem in its Thinmodem Plus product that incorporates a modem module with 8 megabytes of Flash memory. That way you can store your extra data on the same module that you use for dial-up Internet access.
The other potential drawback to the Parafone is the USD$119 price tag that's about twice as much as most 900-MHz cordless phones. On one hand I understand that it is more difficult to design and manufacture a Springboard module than it is a standard cordless phone. But the fact of the matter is that it still costs twice as much.
If Parafone's address book convenience and clever 2-in-1 Base Cradle are valuable to you though, you probably can justify spending the additional 60 bucks for the device.
I have an older 2-MB graphite-colored Visor that I'm not using much these days that would be a perfect host for the Parafone. I could load my entire address book into it, along with some of my other essential data, and never have to look up a distant relative's phone number again. Granted, it's not the most essential device in my life, but I just can't help liking it -- in private, that is.
David Sims was the editorial director of the O'Reilly Network.
Derrick Story is the author of The Photoshop CS4 Companion for Photographers, The Digital Photography Companion, and Digital Photography Hacks, and coauthor of iPhoto: The Missing Manual, with David Pogue. You can follow him on Twitter or visit www.thedigitalstory.com.
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