I apologize in advance for the length of this post.
Sometime soon, I'm going to have to "upgrade" some of my current electronics, like my 7 year old Macs.
However, what I need help with is this: I own a Palm Tungsten E2- a PDA about the size of a human hand- that has a thumbprint-sized dead spot on its screen. Its not completely inactive, it just will not accept data accurately- try to draw a straight line in it, and it gives you zig-zags and spiderwebs.
This also makes it impossible to recalibrate the touchscreen. One of the calibration dots is in the zone. Ditto some of the letters in the on-screen keyboard.
I'd like to get a new one if I could...
...but as it turns out, technology has progressed since I purchased my E2 back in 2005! (GASP!)
Today, PDAs are seemingly extinct- they're as rare as pregnant pandas. They've been supplanted by smartphones.
This is all well and good, but smartphones don't meet my needs:
1) They're expensive. A contract for a smartphone costs as much annually as my one-time purchase of a PDA, in addition to the underlying phone contract. This is largely to support things I don't need- portable & remote access of email and the internet, GPS, and so forth.
2) They don't do what I need them to the way I need them to. My E2 is primarily used 3 ways:
a) I have a nearly complete backup to my phone's contact list...and its got more datafields to boot, like birthdays, anniversaries, etc;
b) its notepad is full of text files containing PCs, campaign ideas, shopping lists for groceries, instruments, CDs and the like, short-story ideas, and an illustrated list of chords I've developed for Robert Fripp's New Standard Tuning- something I could turn into a book.
c) an electronic sketchpad. I design jewelry, and I'd hoped to use my E2 to replace my pencil & paper for those designs. I could just sketch something out- the resolution and control is sufficient to the task- and I could use its memory card or Bluetooth it to my main jeweler's electronics. But with that "Dead Zone," I can't do that any more.
The smartphones, in contrast, have tiny screens- my E2's screen is bigger than many of the phones themselves. And most no longer use a stylus- essential for the pinpoint control for a decent sketch.
Laptops and notebook computers, OTOH, while capable of doing all of the above, will not fit in a pocket.
So...what is out there? Is there anything out there?
Sometime soon, I'm going to have to "upgrade" some of my current electronics, like my 7 year old Macs.
However, what I need help with is this: I own a Palm Tungsten E2- a PDA about the size of a human hand- that has a thumbprint-sized dead spot on its screen. Its not completely inactive, it just will not accept data accurately- try to draw a straight line in it, and it gives you zig-zags and spiderwebs.
This also makes it impossible to recalibrate the touchscreen. One of the calibration dots is in the zone. Ditto some of the letters in the on-screen keyboard.
I'd like to get a new one if I could...
...but as it turns out, technology has progressed since I purchased my E2 back in 2005! (GASP!)
Today, PDAs are seemingly extinct- they're as rare as pregnant pandas. They've been supplanted by smartphones.
This is all well and good, but smartphones don't meet my needs:
1) They're expensive. A contract for a smartphone costs as much annually as my one-time purchase of a PDA, in addition to the underlying phone contract. This is largely to support things I don't need- portable & remote access of email and the internet, GPS, and so forth.
2) They don't do what I need them to the way I need them to. My E2 is primarily used 3 ways:
a) I have a nearly complete backup to my phone's contact list...and its got more datafields to boot, like birthdays, anniversaries, etc;
b) its notepad is full of text files containing PCs, campaign ideas, shopping lists for groceries, instruments, CDs and the like, short-story ideas, and an illustrated list of chords I've developed for Robert Fripp's New Standard Tuning- something I could turn into a book.
c) an electronic sketchpad. I design jewelry, and I'd hoped to use my E2 to replace my pencil & paper for those designs. I could just sketch something out- the resolution and control is sufficient to the task- and I could use its memory card or Bluetooth it to my main jeweler's electronics. But with that "Dead Zone," I can't do that any more.
The smartphones, in contrast, have tiny screens- my E2's screen is bigger than many of the phones themselves. And most no longer use a stylus- essential for the pinpoint control for a decent sketch.
Laptops and notebook computers, OTOH, while capable of doing all of the above, will not fit in a pocket.
So...what is out there? Is there anything out there?
