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The Digest Fri, 08 Apr 2005 Volume 02 : Number 726
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Sent to: 756 subscribers
In today's The Digest 16 messages
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- Wi-fi card for NetBook; Apple; this Digest
- *** SPAM *** Re:Treo 600, UIQ style guide
- PDF software for 9500 and user info for 9300 - Digest V2 # 725
Date: 6 Apr 2005 09:06:26 +0700
From: Fotograf Anders Henriksen <address truncated>
Subject: Re: Wifi on Netbook
"Can someone please confirm that the model Expansys
are selling currently is the one that suits the NB, thank you.
Buffalo Airport PCMCIA card no: WLI-CB-G54A price: £26.75inc
A similar card is recommended on http://www.pscience5.net/WiFi-2.htm but
is referred to on the Buffalo web page as WLI-PCM-L11GP."
I have an Mbook, with the WLI-PCM-L11GP card. I do not know for shure, but I suspect that the card you mention is an IEEE 802.11g card. This based on the name "wli-cb-G54A", referring to the speed (54 Mbit/s). The Nbook only supports IEEE 802.11b. If a Buffalo WLI-PCM-L11GP is no longer aviliable, Sitashop.com is selling a Cisco Aironet PCM342 at $40. This card does not support Wep though, but works right out of the box.
Anders Henriksen
Oslo
Mbook & Wlan
Date: 6 Apr 2005 09:42:03 +0700
From: Marcus von Cube <address truncated>
Subject: Re: Battery capacity
Hi Bernhard,
>Lions are a pain as they need expensive duplicate batteries and have >typically 750mAh. AAs have 2400mAh.
Did you compare the voltages, too? The total energy stored in a battery is measured in mWh, not mAh (1W = 1V * 1A). You can compare the cpacities of NiMH and NiCad because they have the
same nominal voltage (1.2V) but as far as I know, LiIon cells have a much higher voltage than that.
Marcus
http://www.mvcsys.de
Date: 6 Apr 2005 09:43:00 +0700
From: Steve Litchfield <address truncated>
Subject: Selling up
Reluctantly, having realised that I've only used my MC218 (5mx clone) once in the last year, I've decided to sell it off and raise a little cash. All my work and interest these days is in the newer Symbian devices (sorry).
If anyone wants my (immaculate) MC218, it's now on ebay at
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=5183425071
I console myself with the fact that I can mess around with EPOC still by using the emulator/SDK 8-))
..........................
Steve Litchfield, 3-Lib, http://3lib.ukonline.co.uk/
Software and features for Psion/Symbian handhelds and smartphones
Also PocketInfo, useful files - http://3lib.ukonline.co.uk/pocketinfo Journalism: sub-editor and/or senior contributor to:
Palmtop User - http://www.palmtop.co.uk/
PDA Essentials - http://www.paragon.co.uk/mags/pdaessentials.html
PC Basics - http://www.paragon.co.uk/mags/pcbasics.html
Reviews editor, AllAboutSymbian - http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/
Date: 6 Apr 2005 12:12:42 +0700
From: Rolf Brunsting <address truncated>
Subject: Re: For Roy: 9500 Qs
Dear Steve,
<< ... I really can't see the point in anyone syncing email over to a palmtop ... >>
I've synchronised my Psion and Outlook mailboxes a few times to the effect that I had a large number of e-mails on my Psion that gobbled up (precious) storage space. Which made me wonder why I used the function. How many times would I check old e-mails on my Psion and what would I check them for? I concluded that I synchronised e-mail on a "You never know" basis. While I did know that I hadn't been badly off before. I therefore stopped synchronising e-mails and never regretted it.
<< There's an official Acrobat reader, and it handles graphics, but it's not as slick as on a Desktop - but then decoding and rendering Acrobat files needs HUGE resources - I think you're asking a lot of a palmtop here! >>
Handling complex web pages is also not for the faint hearted software developer either. Still, PDA and smartphone web browsers take then in their stride - albeit a slower stride than their desktop and laptop cousins. I therefore don't see why the handling of PDF files should pose such a problem for the Palm PDAs. After all, the days of the old 16-bit Motorola Dragonball equipped Palms has gone. While PalmSource has taken over Be Inc. and the BeOS operating system. If there are people who know a lot about fast and efficient graphics handling it's the former BeOS development group PalmSource now employs.
---
Kind Regards,
Rolf Brunsting - Beilen - Netherlands
Date: 6 Apr 2005 14:16:44 +0700
From: Bruce A.Knox <address truncated>
Subject: Wi-fi card for NetBook; Apple; this Digest
To Peter McCafferty - and all
The Buffalo card for the NetBook is WLI-PCM-L11GP. The other one
mentioned is almost certainly unsuitable. For the WLI-PCM-L11GP I can
vouch, as I have now been using one for about 3 weeks.
As a matter (maybe) of interest, I had trouble finding a card. The one
I have was bought for me by my daughter in London, from Misco (£23;
www.misco.co.uk) and brought in person to Melbourne. Misco has stocks
but - and it beggars belief - not only would not undertake postage to
Australia but would not accept payment by any card, including HSBC
Switch on an account in England, which does not have a U.K. address.
Might this be one of the (many) evil consequences of the EU?
That I am now a happy wi-fi user was made possible, first, by the
articles on Martin Guthrie's and Ian Sylvester's web sites, and,
secondly, by a subscriber to this Digest. I had awful trouble getting
my NetBook to talk to my Apple eMac, using Airport (the Apple wi-fi
card) and Airport Express (as router). After posting a couple of
bleating messages in the Digest, I made a search of back numbers and
came up with a two year old message from Stephen Bedford who had
successfully made a Psion-Apple connection. I contacted Stephen and he
took a lot of trouble to lead me by the ethereal hand through the wi-fi
mangrove. Thanks to his advice I am now able to transfer files
wirelessly between NetBook and eMac, as well as access my broadband
cable modem from the NetBook. This is one more tribute to the
excellence of this Digest but also to Stephen's generosity.
As to replacements for the Psions, I am persuaded by various recent
postings that if my 5mx gives up the ghost I might well make do with a
Nokia 9500, but I hope the day is distant. If my 7Book and mBook go I
am, as things stand, in dire trouble, for I cannot see any machine
which can touch them for convenience and efficiency. In the end I
suppose I might have to get an iBook or PowerBook - at the cost of
tripling the weight and doubling the linear dimensions of the machine I
tote to libraries and archives and, occasionally, carry on aeroplanes.
Meanwhile, floreat this Digest.
Bruce Knox
Date: 6 Apr 2005 15:52:09 +0700
From: Jim Watson-Gove <address truncated>
Subject: *** SPAM *** Re:Treo 600, UIQ style guide
<<Re.: Treo 600 - Thanks for the answer. While in principle this is an EPOC / Symbian digest I think it is in the interest of the readers to hear from time to time about other devices as well, also because our EPOC Psion's will sooner or later "die" on us and than we all will have to make a new choice between either a Symbian model or other OS's. So do feel welcome to inform us from time to time [this is my personal opinion and if others are against this feel free to voice this in the digest].>>
I am one of those on this list who is a solid Psion user (between my wife and I, 2 MX5s and 2 MBooks) who is slowly migrating to Palm.
I have no use for a cell phone at all, being retired and living in a small town so I am not interested in any of the "combo" units. I tried the combination of a Treo 90 (no phone) and the Alphasmart Dana - the Treo for mobility and the Dana for the keyboard. Both had pathetic processors (I have an extremely large collection of Word files). I traded the the Dana for a broken MX5 which I had repaired as a spare to the other Psions. The Treo became a mobile PIM machine, a task it performed with excellence.
I say "performed" as a couple of weeks ago I dropped it it on the kitchen tile floor and cracked the screen. The repair bill would be $160 American and the machine only cost me $90. I took this as an opportunity to move up to a Tungsten C with an IR keyboard. The C has a thumboard like the the Treo but supports the external keyboard (which Palm is offering as a bonus on a C purchase until late May). This will give me mobility as well as the ability to enter large texts in my studio with ease.
The reviewers say the processor has blinding speed so I am hoping that my file access time is as good as advertised (45 seconds to a minute on the Treo 90 with 300+ word files).
More later as I learn more (C should arrive within a few days).
By the way, Palm's technical support is as excellent or better than Psion's used to be when Psion USA had an office in Burlingame, California.
jim - port townsend, wa, use - straddling the worlds of Psion and Palm
Date: 6 Apr 2005 17:39:17 +0700
From: Itamar Engelsman <address truncated>
Subject: Treo 600, Clove Technology,
Answer to: Mike Dyer
Re.: Treo 600 - You are right _if_ you find the synchronisation with a PC important. Besides backing up I never felt the urge to synchronise my Psion's with my PC. I use them both independently of each other, each for different functions, and don't have the need to have the same details on both.
Answer to: Alan Morris
Re.: Clove Technology - It could of course be that they produce the 5MX-Pro only on demand in blocks of X machines and that accordingly the first orderers of such a block production will have to wait longer than the last ones ? A while back I ordered once or twice from them and received an overnight service to London.
Best regards,
Itamar Engelsman
London, UK
Date: 6 Apr 2005 19:25:57 +0700
From: Walker, Jan <address truncated>
Subject: PDF software for 9500 and user info for 9300 - Digest V2 # 725
>>Date: 5 Apr 2005 07:30:41 +0700
From: K. Liebmann <address truncated>
Subject: RE: PDF software for 9500
I needed to visit the Adobe sites for a download of an older version of Acrobat and saw that they offer a reader for Symbian OS (6680, 9500 and 9210/ 9290). Would that work?
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readerforsymbian.html
Karsten.<<
My Nokia 9300 (one month old) came pre-loaded with Adobe Acrobat reader, just FYI. I thought I would give a brief update to the digest(ers.) First, the screen is magnificent. Even at half brightness it is legible in sunlight. And at that setting, either the main screen or, even the smaller phone screen, is so bright that I use it as a flashlight at night to locate stray items on the floor of my car.
The more I use it (still weaning myself from the 5mx and/or the Revo Plus) the more impressed I become with the added capabilities. I am in Calif using Cingular/AT&T. Sometimes the phone reception is poor due to the service provider but no worse than my standard Motorola. But, I am now able to surf the web using GPRS/EDGE and it is pretty swift--about the same as a dial-up phone from home. Most buttons on sites work well with an occasional glitch where one either doesn't show or won't complete the function shown.
I am using Earthlink. I downloaded 84 emails in about the time Steve Litchfield mentioned; time to go to the fridge and get a drink, pour it, sip, and return. I intend to use his email (free) program as soon as I sort out the rest of the 9300's standard fare.
I truly miss a few EPOC features: One could touch the soft key labeled >Time< and instantly see what the next pending alarm is, whether from an Agenda alarm or within the Time program itself. On the 9300 the same feature is there, but only if an alarm was set using the Time /Clock feature, not if the next alarm is an Agenda alarm. Also, the Locking/Password feature is there but not as flexible as the old one. The maximum time one can set until the Password requirement kicks into effect is 60 minutes. The world clock and alarms are about the same with the global map etc. Cities can still be added the same way.
It is quite fun to wirelessly download new telephone ring tones and some of them are splendid. The communication capabilities are impressive; once I asked Cingular to add the GPRS capability ($24.99 for unlimited data per month vs. $.03 per kb for the cheapest plan) then the configuration >Wizard< pretty much did everything once I accessed the Nokia website the Cingular store informed me about. One caution: while I was futzing around, setting passwords for everything, a window popped up reading >PUK code required.<
As I wasn't quite sure what that was, I entered the standard password(s) I had been playing with for my other features. When I finished entering the third attempt, then the unit locked up and would not function. I had to go the Cingular store where they informed me that I had fried the sim card (automatic after the third attempted entry) so they gave me a new one free. I think I had activated the feature in the phone whereby it would lock up if the sim card was changed and then I didn't have, or know, the required PUK code. Bottom line: if you ever see the window asking for the PUK, then visit or call your provider to obtain the code so you won't have to change out cards.
This is getting long so I will cut it off now; suffice it to say that the PDA functions are different enough that I was aggravated for a while (12 years of Psion habits are hard to ditch) but am now getting to love the little bugger. If I had to do it over, I might have preferred the 9500 as I have average sized hands and the keys are a bit tiny for me. But, the small size is incredible for all the power it packs (it is about 75-80 percent of the Revo size) and everywhere I open it, people ooooh and aaaaah with amazement and it has been a long time since I could feel so good about a device.
Best to you all and thanks...more later,
Jan in Silicon Valley
Date: 6 Apr 2005 20:02:33 +0700
From: Matthew Walters <address truncated>
Subject: Re: WiFi card for netBook
To Peter McCafferty
>>
"Looking around for a NBook friendly WiFi card, I see that the Buffalo
Airport card suits the NB very well and comes recommended by the Psion
community; suitable Lucent-Hermes chipset/form factor/power etc.
Expansys are still selling them, but there seems to be a small confusion
with the product no. Can someone please confirm that the model Expansys
are selling currently is the one that suits the NB, thank you.
Buffalo Airport PCMCIA card no: WLI-CB-G54A price: £26.75inc
A similar card is recommended on http://www.pscience5.net/WiFi-2.htm but
is referred to on the Buffalo web page as WLI-PCM-L11GP."
<<
Peter, you need to use the WLI-PCM-L11GP. The WLI-CB-G54A looks like a CardBus device, running at G54 - this will not work on the netBook.
My L11GP runs fine, also have a Buffalo wireless router taking care of the ADSL connection.
Don't forget to use WEP and MAC filtering if you set up a router for home use.
Regards
Matthew Walters
Date: 6 Apr 2005 20:26:30 +0700
From: Martin Guthrie <address truncated>
Subject: RE: WiFi card for netbook
Reply to: Peter McCafferty
Hi Peter,
> "Looking around for a NBook friendly WiFi card, I see that the Buffalo > Airport card suits the NB very well and comes recommended by the Psion > community; suitable Lucent-Hermes chipset/form factor/power etc.
>
> Expansys are still selling them, but there seems to be a small confusion > with the product no. Can someone please confirm that the model Expansys > are selling currently is the one that suits the NB, thank you.
>
> Buffalo Airport PCMCIA card no: WLI-CB-G54A price: £26.75inc
I can confirm that you do NOT want this card. Even before I had a look on their site to check I suspected as much because I'm not aware of any 54Mb WiFi card (speed given away by the part number) that is 16-bit PCMCIA (which the nB supports) rather than 32-bit CardBus (which it does not). A quick look at the photo confirms this: CardBus cards always seem to have the tell-tale gold strip at the connector end. And then when I go on to read "The AirStation 54Mbps Broadband CardBus Card..." it's finally confirmed.
It simply won't work in your Psion - sorry.
> A similar card is recommended on http://www.pscience5.net/WiFi-2.htm but
> is referred to on the Buffalo web page as WLI-PCM-L11GP."
Indeed it does and indeed I did. However, looking at
http://www.expansys.com/product.asp?code=111534 it seems that Expansys no longer stock it. :¬( In fact, looking on eBay (.co.uk), I wasn't able to find any either... Hmmm... I'd recommend looking at some of the threads on this at PDAStreet Peter as they're probably the most up-to-date refernce and I'm hesitant to recommend any specific card that I haven't used myself.
Have a look here and
browse:http://www.pdastreet.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?s=&forumid=117
Hope this helps.
Best regards,
Martin
www.pscience5.net
www.freepoc.org
www.foxpop.co.uk
Date: 6 Apr 2005 22:02:32 +0700
From: Mortlock, Larry <address truncated>
Subject: rally
Ta Mike
I haven't tried it on my netbook but what I have is version 1.05 dated 30/11/01. Yes - could you email it to me, please.
Maybe v1.05 will work when installed over v1.02?
Did you want a copy of 1.05 if it does ?
> Date: 5 Apr 2005 08:04:32 +0700
> From: Mike Woodward <address truncated>
> Subject: Rally[Scanned]
>
> Reply to Larry
>
> Rally version 1.02 by Johnie Walker works on my Netbook, let me know if
> you want the original zip file dated 17/08/00.
>
> Mike
Date: 6 Apr 2005 22:18:18 +0700
From: Mortlock, Larry <address truncated>
Subject: stylist (psion) artist
Some time back (before I got my own nBook) I came across a web site with drawings by someone using a nBook. They had interesting colour combinations and a kind of a cartoon style. I haven't been able to find that site again and searches fail too. (Maybe I'm using the wrong key words and yes, I should have bookmarked it.) I didn't note the artist name but has anyone else seen this and can tell me where
to find it.
I'd be interested in any site that has hand drawn graphics drawn on the nbook or any of the psion range. Any psion artists out there?
Date: 6 Apr 2005 22:20:44 +0700
From: Phil Aypee <address truncated>
Subject: Recycled opinions
Hi,
Ian (Chapple), you say you disagree that abandoning free software protected by a registration strategy is a little unfair. I'm afraid I don't understand why you think it's not a little unfair. I don't think it grossly or wilfully unfair, just a little.
But I certainly don't think the author doesn't have the *right* to do as he will.
Rolf (Brunsting), I have not now, nor will ever, insist that *anyone* keeps a registration system running. Nor do I think that free software is necessarily free of copyright. Why you imply such is a mystery to me but I wanted to make it clear that I do not insist that anyone does anything (particularly I don't insist that they abandon their copyright while abandoning their program).
And while you may think that fairness is an irrelevance I don't. I think it immoral to abandon software in that way *but* I do not think that anyone should be forced to support such software nor to "decripple" it.
That such behaviour should not be illegal is, to me, obvious but it is demonstrably unfair. People, myself included, are given the impression (often actually told) that free software, while not necessarily free of copyright, is otherwise free. We then find that it is crippled whilst unregistered so we try to register it. We can't.
"Unfair" seems a reasonable term. "Wrong" would be understandable.
And in the UK there *are* legal constraints on "free" stuff, whatever it may be. Certainly sanctions are rarely sought as such "free" stuff is often generously given away and that generosity is usually taken into account (as it should be).
End of lecture!
Happy days,
Phil.
"Make it idiot proof and someone will make a better idiot."
http://www.philaypee.co.uk/copyrightmorality.html
http://www.philaypee.co.uk/warezmorality.html
http://www.philaypee.co.uk/index.html
Date: 7 Apr 2005 00:51:12 +0700
From: Klaus Gottlieb <address truncated>
Subject: Re: WiFi card for netbook
Dear Peter McCafferty
Take the Buffalo WLI-PCM-L11GP !
It works very nice on my netBook.
It does not use too much battery and
it does not stick very much out of the netBook.
I got help from this page: http://www.epocfaq.co.uk/faqNetworks.htm#LANcompat
If you can't get this card, please look for a 16bit PCcard (not 32bit) !
Greetings from
Klaus Gottlieb \@()
Århus - DK
Date: 7 Apr 2005 15:51:10 +0700
From: Franco Cozzani <address truncated>
Subject: Clove build quality
hello everybody.
I understand that 5 MX Pro's ordered to Clove take a while to arrive, but how well are they built?
Do they use an improved screen cable?
Is the lid for the battery compartment thin and flexing as in my 2001 MC 218 model, for example ?
Any feed-back on any of this, please?
Franco COZZANI
Brussels
Date: 7 Apr 2005 16:39:48 +0700
From: Arne Christensen <address truncated>
Subject: Summary: Large CF card recommendations
Hi,
In Digest #716 I asked for recommendations regarding large CF cards for my NetBook/5mx, and I promised to summarise whatever advice I would receive.
I got an answer only from Ulrich Hornstein, who included a lot of
detail. Thanks for sharing this! I agreed with him to post his findings wholesale, see below.
-- Arne Christensen
Hello fellow Psionists,
just recently I bought a Compact Flash Card 1 GB Type Xs from Dane-Elec with a nice free additional feature - 10 year warranty with worldwide exchange service - for 90€. Thanks to Herbert Heuberger for the tip. The card is rated 22x or 3.3MB/sec Write and 44x or 6.6MB/sec Read. WIth the help of Martin's CF pages I tried to find the best way to format it - in terms of space usage and speed.
First a word about my old card, a 128MB (123MB free) CF from Simple Technology. It was filled with 1769 files, which used 121.8 MB of space. >From these, 1492 files are under 32kB. This "old file set" was used to test the new CF.
Format (1):
The 1 GB CF came formatted on a Win machine: FAT 16, 512 bytes/sector, 32 sectors/cluster (the minimum value to address 1 GB), 512 root entries. Disk-Info on the new disk showed strange things: the disk had -240kB of used space, and CheckDisk revealed invalid entries in the root folder, which I removed.
I made speed measurements of the 1 GB disk as empty and partly filled with the "old file set":
empty CF DiskBench write 8.16 sec / read 0,74 sec
partly filled write 8.25 sec / read 0,74 sec
I did not like the 8 sec write time, being used to medium-long 4 sec on my old 128 MB CF, so I did format the 1 GB CF with new values:
Format (2):
128 root entries, 64 sectors/cluster, 512 bytes/sector.
This means to waste 31kB space when storing a 1kB file due to the formatting - strange thought, but let's check the facts.
BTW, the formatting took 5,5 hours (!!). Checkdisk showed 1 lost cluster after this, which I cleared.
Again, I made speed measurements with the empty and partly filled (same 1769 files as above) disk:
empty CF DiskBench write 3.06 sec / read 0,75 sec
partly filled write 3.11 sec / read 0,75 sec
Write-speed-wise, a very nice gain of 8,25/3,11=2,65 .
What did it cost space-wise?
Format (1) used 134368kB
Format (2) used 161920kB
Space-wise, a loss of 161,9/134,4=1,2046
In the moment, I have lots of space free, so I decided to stay with Format (2) and barter the speed gain against the space loss. Should my MC218+spares (=Psion 5mx) live long enough to fill the 1GB up to the rim like I did with the 45 MB and the 128 MB CFs before, I may think about going back to Format (1) again - but that will not happen too soon.
A nice side-effect: when pressing Tab in System, the old 128MB took 16 secs to display all folders, the 1GB with Format (2) only (sigh) 14 secs. This will rise when more files accumulate.
If anyone has questions to the above, no problem. But please read the article http://www.pscience5.net/compactflash.htm *before* as some sort of a FAQ to this matter.