Rating: 
Summary: Businessman's viewpoint
Review: Got it on Christmas 2000 and it's already paid for itself. I did not want all the gizmo's but the OUTLOOK features for contact mamagement. It comes out of box with more memory than my fist desktop (Tandy 1000SX) that I hopped up to 20meg and everyone thought was awesome 20 yrs ago. Remember 360K disks? It's a Compaq. Hand recognition is outstanding. Easy to use and technical support is outstanding. I leave my laptop at home now. I hope a hard cover waterproof case is in the future so this can be carried like a wallet.
Rating: 
Summary: Buy something else!
Review: Great idea, extremely poor engineering and manufacturing. I bought one three months ago, when my old Palm III failed. I had the original iPAQ 3600 replaced because the screen would rapidly shift between a normal image and one readable only in a mirror. Now the replacement unit has the same problem. I like having Excel and Word available. The screen is very readable and the unit has good performance. Compaq has just done a very poor job of implementing the concept. Buy something else!
Rating: 
Summary: A great product with too many problems
Review: I bought the iPAQ because I wanted to upgrade from my Palm to a color screen, and the Palm color display was just terrible. Enter the iPAQ, a stylish executive gadget with a great color display, and a built-in MP3 player. Add the built-in speaker with a joypad, and this unit would be great for games too! So I ordered one, and after months of waiting, it arrived. The first thing that struck me was that the reset door was not closing, but rattled like a rattlesnake if you moved the unit. Research on the internet showed that this was a common flaw, but it could be fixed by bending the door with a small screwdriver. Next I found out that dust had entered the display, and due to the construction of the backlighting, dust particles shine brightly and can only be removed by fishing them out with a long hair. Apparently this too is a common problem, since Compaq forgot to seal the display of the unit, so dust can enter between the display and the touchscreen foil. Compaq does exchange the iPAQ if there is dust in the display, but the replacement unit will have the exact same problems since this is caused by an engineering flaw. So don't bother sending it in until Compaq has a real fix. The MP3 player proved to be pretty much unusable, because the amplifier is switched off and back on between tracks, causing a deafening popping noise on the headphones. Compaq has promised a firmware update to remedy this problem, but that keeps getting postponed every two weeks, the latest announcement is sometime next year. I won't hold my breath. Using the unit for games is also all but impossible, because the joypad/buttons are somewhat limited by the hardware design. Don't be fooled by the metal looking case; it's really just painted plastic, and the paint comes off easily. Just slide on one of the Expansion Packs regularly and see for yourself where the scratches develop. By now I was subscribed to a forum and found out about a myriad of other problems, including that the symbols on the buttons rub off after a few weeks of using them. Compaq thinks this is normal, so my conclusion would be: don't use them. Great. My advice to Compaq: don't print on metal unless you're certain the paint will stick! The paint on my (plastic) Palm buttons stayed on for two years, and probably will stay on for another twenty. Would I buy it again? Yes and no. The iPAQ was a great idea, it's currently the fastest Pocket PC around, and if it didn't have the quality problems it has, I'd buy it again. But for this price I expect a unit that works as reliably as my Palm did, that I can actually use daily and not just carry around and not use it to prevent it from becoming unusable. Unfortunately the demand is currently so great that Compaq seems to be getting away with anything, as people don't care about the problems as long as they can get their hands on an iPAQ. Personally, if I were you, I'd wait a while until either Compaq gets things done right, or the competition comes up with a similar product which doesn't have the problems the iPAQ has. If you're waiting for the iPAQ to become available again, stop waiting and be glad you didn't spend your money on this prototype that accidentally went into production, and spend your money on something else instead.
Rating:
Summary: A Great product but before you buy you should know few thing
Review: I bought this product a few months back and was so happy, yes it's true what everybody says about it but that part I will not repeat. what you should know is that the ipaq has a few hardware bugs for example: 1. many times (almost every time I switch the machine on) the screen is "back to front" and you must restart the machine until it comes back. 2. the screen is not sealed properly so dust can come in from the stylus hole and get between the screen and the plastic cover. 3.the joystick works in a special signal to the processor which makes it impossible to move to an angle or to use two buttons at once which takes all the fun out of games. I heard Microsoft is working on solving this problem. after checking out about these problems I was told that Compaq knows all about them all over the world and working to fix them and that most of them are caused from putting the ipaq in the pocket and sitting on it (which I did).. I contacted Compaq in Israel and got great support and was told to bring the ipaq in and they will take care of all the problems, I know that in the U.S. Compaq sends you home a special box to send it in to be fixed or replaced. My recommendation is WAIT, I heard a new model is about to come out soon with 400 and 500 mhz, and with more built in memory, and you should wait for these problems to be fixed. If not of these problems I would have given it 5 stars...
Rating:
Summary: Activesync Stinks
Review: I have had nothing but problems with my Ipaq since day one. I was not happy with the unit nor was I happy with tech support for the most part. (Although, I must say some technicians were much better then others). At first, I was very excited with the product but then after several months of problems, I finally gave up. Some of the problems were as follows, the screen displays in reverse, sometimes upside down, other times it shakes. Many times I've lost valuable data when I inputted the information on the hand held and tried to sync back to my desktop (Gateway). During the syncing process with two different computers, my data was overwritten with incorrect information, wiped my data out off one of the computers and the unit froze frequently. It also appears to be dirt inside the display, which at times made the data unreadable. I spent enough money on this unit and was happier using my Motorola True Sync program and hardware (startac) rather then the Compaq, Ipaq. Sorry to disappoint some of you, I love the concept but it does not work properly perhaps with certain computers.
Rating:
Summary: unhappy with compaq
Review: I love my ipaq but the lack of service provided by Compaq makes this project almost worthless. When you finally get finished being transferred from one line to another the person on the line cannot even begin to help you. Even worse is trying to get anything, or any information from the web site. It is worthless. I have a strong distaste for anything related to Compaq.
Rating: 
Summary: compare casio e-125 before you spend your money
Review: I own a Casio em-500 for a month. I'm glad that I had picked the em-500 instead of ipaq. From ipqa's user reviews, it seams there are quite a few problems about this ipaq PDA, such as activ sync is unstable, dust enters to the display. But the casio em-500(or e-125) never have such problems, They are very stable and the activesync work very well. If you go to read em-500 or e- 125's user reviews( I strongly recommend you do so), there's no those complains at all. Both casio and ipaq have are powerful unites, here are a little differences, other then those ipaq bugs: 1. Display. Casio displayes over 65,000 colors and ipaq has 4,086. For those of you who cares of color and picture quality, you know the difference. The casio delivers better picture quality indoors. Because ipaq uses different display technology, it has much better display out doors. You can hardly see casio's screen when out door an under the sun. So you have to thing if you use your PDA out doors more or if you mostly use it in indoor environment. 2. Ipaq have a faster CPU speed according to the tech feature. I didn't acutally test them side by side for the speed. But after one month of using my em-500, I thing the casio em-500's speed is very fast, it runs all my applications very quick and smooth. So I think the ipaq should be ever faster too. Bottom line, read both ipaq and casio e-125(orem-500)'s users review and go to the shop to compare both before you spend your money. They are not cheep.
Rating:
Summary: Absolutely the Best Ever
Review: I purchased the Compaq Ipaq not out of dire necessity, but mostly because of the many features it has: One, it looks the best out of all of the PDA's. It has a sleek, futuristic, design, unlike the Jornada, for example, which is just plain black. Two, the stylus can store inside of the body, so there is less of a chance of losing it and you don't have to carry it around separately. Three, It has an Mp3 player, which is one of the main reasons I picked it over the Palm and Visor, in which an Mp3 expansion costs as much as the PDA itself. Four, the writing area is retractable and there is an on-screen keyboard; the Palm and Visor don't have the keyboard, and the writing area takes up precious screen space. Five, the processor is an Intel Strong ARM 206MHz; the other pocket PC's only have 133MHz or lower, and they're not Intel, which is the best and most reliable processor. Six, it doubles as an E-book, you can read books on your iPaq with Microsoft Reader and download them from numerous websites, even a thesaurus and dictionary; the Palm doesn't have this feature and the Visor expansion is expensive and you can only choose from a selection of four books. Seven, one of the most important factors in my buying the iPaq is the color screen; the resolution is the best out there, especially compared to the color Palm and Visor PDA's, which are expensive and have very low resolution. Not much of an improvement from a Game Boy. I went through excruciating research on the other PDA's before I decided on the iPaq, visiting Casio, HP, Visor, Palm, and Compaq. The Palm and Visor I ruled out immediately after seeing the capability of the Pocket PC's. I looked at CNET, Epinions, and PDA Buzz, and went to my local Best Buy, CompUSA, and Circuit City. I saw that it got high praise from many electronics and technology magazines, such as Best of the Year from Popular Science. It took me 2 weeks before my final decision. That was two weeks too late, into the middle of the Christmas shopping frenzy. Almost every retailer was out because of the popularity of the iPaq and on eBay, it cost around $600-$700. I finally snagged it at a Brandsmart USA, it was the last one. A very useful feature is AvantGo, which is included. You can load your favorite web site onto your iPaq for viewing anywhere. Also, you can read the Wall Street Journal, the New York Times, USAToday, you can play Jeopardy from SonyStation, you can access Yahoo(with movies, news, sports, stocks, etc.), and thousands of other sites. There are many games and lots of software that you can download for it, like Flight Simulator. I am very happy with my iPaq, and I would suggest it to anyone. It's good for the music lover, disorganized person, businessman, etc.
Rating: 
Summary: Needs work
Review: I'm a technology consultant and needed a solid PDA. After my Palm shattered after 3 years of use, I decided to upgrade to the iPAQ. Par for the course, Compaq makes excellent products and this is no exception. Microsoft makes software that needs significant patches and improvements, and this is no exception to that rule either. Meaning - the hardware is reliable, packaging and setup is easy (albeit a bit disjointed between setting up add-ons and optional software), and help documentation is useful. The USB operates flawlessly, but don't expect the same if you are trying to Sync using the infra-red. The biggest issues I've found are with Microsoft's ActiveSync utility and Microsoft Money. Even with the latest patches and updates these programs exhibit consistent problems. Money will generally corrupt its database and find your file unreadable, which in turn usually causes a critical error in Money. Reinstalling only helps for a short while (30days tops). ActiveSync has problems releasing resources, especially when using IR sync. When using IR to synch, ActiveSync will keep your iPAQs connection open, even after turning off your iPAQ. The only "clean" way I've found to let the resources go is to ENDTASK its key application WCESCOMM. ActiveSync also seems to get confused with Outlook2000, which at times is unable to read without shutting down all Outlook & ActiveSynch threads. In Short: Yeah its neat, it plays MPG, and connects to Outlook - but if you spend you're time troubleshooting, is it worth it? I suggest waiting another year for the PocketPC platform to mature a little, and for the vendors to get the complaints to Microsoft addressed. Get a Palm for now.
Rating:
Summary: unhappy with compaq
Review: I've owned this unit now for 3 months. I've got the PC Card expansion for it, allowing me to use a wireless ethernet card to surf the web when I'm at home. The included applications from contact management to excel and word are all first rate. The synchronization is fantanstic (much better than old CE devices). I actually sync via the wireless card. I read and send my email through this thing. It really is much close to a full function laptop in terms of capabilities that a contact management device such as a palm. I've also got the Pharo GPS device/software combo for it, works great, actually talks you through the directions as you drive! The Reader software is also fantastic. I've read a couple of books (the ClearType is amazingly smooth and readable) and the best part of it is I don't have to leave the light on to read! Your significant other would appreciate that! I would strongly recommend this product.
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