Review: Dell Axim X30 Pocket PC PDA

I've been pushing the limit of my PDAs since the early days of Win CE with a Cassiopeia and Palm OS with a Handspring Visor. However, the last "advanced" PDA I used was Zire 72 (built-in 1.3 MP video camera and bluetooth for mobile e-mail and web browsing) After switching to an Abacus WristPDA, the only functions I really used are address book and reading novel. Basically I've given up on using PDA as a PC replacement.

What got me curious about the current state of PDA again was Nokia's new PDA-like Internet Tablet N800. Based on open source OS (linux) and platform (Maemo), it has got quite a few positive reviews. However, the high price tag ($399) made me look for a cheaper alternative on eBay and I bought this Dell Axim X30.

So, what functionality am I looking for this time around and how well does it perform?
1) Watch live TV: X30 is one of the supported (and cheapest) device for Sling Player, the client for watching TV streamed from Slingbox through internet/intranet, and in my case, mostly 802.11b Wifi. I can't expect great quality on such a small screen and relatively slow connection. To me, it is good enough and I'm willing to sacrifice quality for portability. The Pocket PC version of Sling Player costs me $30 though.

2) Watch downloaded video: The free software TCPMP does a pretty good job. It handles most popular formats except RMVB. I wish it won't pause when I touch the screen accidentally but I work around it with a hard case.

3) Read downloaded website: I simple use HTTrack on my PC to download websites to my SD card and use Pocket Internet Explorer on the Axim to read them. It would have been more convienient if I could mount the Pocket PC to Windows as a letter drive but I could live with this.

4) Read downloaded website in Chinese: what good does a PDA do if I can't read Chinese newspaper with it? Even my WristPDA could do that! So I installed CEStar on the Axim. So far so good. I have seen lots of recommendation of Monster Chinese over CEStar but I haven't tried it.

5) Read e-book: I have some Chinese (Big5) e-books in Palm's .prc format. CEBook is the only one that works with them.

6) Internet access: I'm happy with its versatility. I used these 3 modes extensively:
- Wifi (802.11b),
- Bluetooth-enabled cellphone as dial-up modem
- when you maintain an ActiveSync connnection (thru Bluetooth or USB) between a Pocket PC and a PC that is connected to the internet, the Pocket PC could access internet as well.
Surfing the web is not that fast. Pocket Internet Explorer might have something to do with it but my expectation is low to begin with. Also, I found a bug with surfing thru Bluetooth ActiveSync on PIE, it is unable to load pages after a while. I had to disconnect and reconnect. This is rather annoying.

7) E-mail: a client is built-in. It supports the popular protocols like POP3 and IMAP4. I found out Yahoo serves @yahoo.com e-mail thru IMAP4 for free. Simply install Yahoo Go and it will configure for you. It has been working fine for 2 weeks but incoming traffic has stopped for 3 days for some unknown reason. Maybe I've jinxed it :(

8) Note taking: I hand-write notes using the "Writing" view in Pocket Word. I've also tried the highly praised notetaking software PhatPad (costs ~$30-40) but I ended up not buying it. The problem is not with the software though. The screen is just so small that even PhatPad couldn't improve the notetaking experience much.

9) VOIP/IM: Skype is supported on this version of Pocket PC (2003). The voice quality is not bad.

[Extra credit] Listen to music through Bluetooth A2DP: It is not officially supported by Dell but HP iPAQ's driver is supposed to work. I'm able to listen through my Plantronics 590 headphone but the video played by TCPMP became choppy in this mode. I suspect the A2DP code eats up too much resource. So I ended up not using it.

Accessories
- PDAir Aluminum Case: I want a hard case with belt clip. The first one I found was from Innopocket and the reviews at Aximsite are not great. This PDAir case is recommended over it. I don't think it is that great either:
1) when I closed the case, the cover (or the top piece?) got "stucked" in the side of the bottom piece and it is hard to get it out. To make it worse, I lose some of the Neoprene lining in the process of getting the cover out.
2) The belt clip is attached to the case thru a screw and relies on friction to keep it attached. It came loose and dropped my Axim to the floor twice in 2 weeks already.
3) the PDA gets in the way often when it is clipped to the belt. It's not the fault of the case though. That's the nature of belt clip.
- Energy Leaf Extended Battery (1800mAh): the original battery won't last more than 2 hours with Sling Player on non-stop. This extended battery came in a combo deal with the PDAir case and it stole the show.
- St. Tropez Petite: a nice looking stylus pen combo

Alternatives
Would I be better off buying a Nokia N800 instead? I'm not sure. On one hand, it has lots of free (as in speech and beer) software and an enthusiastic community behind it. For example, the note taking software Xournal is available on N800 (BTW, before I bought the Axim, Xournal wasn't compatible with N800. Looks like it has been patched and hopefully the bugs were fixed) The larger screen (800 x 480) should help too. On the other hand, it is still Linux. Things like enabling Chinese is still harder than it should be. Also, I doubt Sling Player will be ported to it ever. So your best bet for live TV would be encoding and streaming from a PC thru other Open Source server/client combo.

Final words
Was it a good buy? Well, I bought it second hand so it costed less than my Zire 72. It does a somewhat better job with web browsing and multimedia than the Zire, thanks to the built-in Wifi and a faster processor. The bottom line is: I had enough prior experience with Pocket PC/Windows Mobile so my expectation is quite low. The Axim is on par.