Paul's Down-Home Page

What a coincidence: David Pogue and Walt Mossberg both have columns about Windows Mobile smartphones today.
Mossberg (who rather seems to have it in for MS lately) says:

Neither phone [the MPx-200 and the Samsung i600] is anywhere near as good as the Treo 600. Unlike the Treo, they lack keyboards for entering large amounts of text, so I can’t recommend them for serious e-mail users.

Pogue, for his part, is a bit more friendly:

The MPx200 itself ($300) is a gorgeous flip phone, clad in shiny black plastic that resembles the lacquer of a Montblanc fountain pen. You can recharge the battery either by plugging its cradle into a wall or, when you’re traveling light, by connecting its U.S.B. cord to your laptop – a terrific touch. Either the cable or the cradle can also synchronize the phone’s address book, calendar and e-mail stash with Microsoft Outlook on a Windows PC. The two-way updating is effortless; just connecting the MPx200 fires up the ActiveSync software automatically.

Both columns miss some key points, though. Pogue seems to have missed the fact that the Windows Powered smartphones aren’t supposed to be PDAs… they’re phones first and foremost, but they also happen to synchronize with your Outlook data. Most people will use this functionality to get mobile access to contacts, tasks, and emails. Both columns make the point that– without a touchscreen or thumb-board– these phones are inferior for heavy email use, but that’s not what they’re designed for. For an average email user, either of these phones would be fine, and I don’t think either column made that point clear.
There are a few other errors and omissions in both articles (Pogue para 5: Verizon was an American company last time I checked, their Vodafone partnership notwithstanding; Mossberg para 16: Verizon has unlimited data plans, but they also has an unlimited “Express Network” plan that counts voice and data minutes as equal). Neither points out that the MPx-200 can be had for free (with activation, natch) from Amazon, probably because an upgraded MPx-220, with camera and Bluetooth, is due early next year. Pogue doesn’t mention the difference in size and weight between the Samsung and Motorola phones; it’s substantial, with my preference being toward the Samsung (although I still love the form factor of my 7135).
Puzzlingly, Pogue doesn’t mention the slow caller-ID problem that Mossberg centered his column criticism around; I’ve never heard any reports of this from the many MPx-200 users I know at Microsoft. It’ll be interesting to see what the root cause turns out to be.
Now, I need one of these phones for the chapter on OMA/EAS security for my forthcoming book. I think an MPx-200 will fill the bill.
Update: Mossberg was kind enough to write me a note (although it was sort of testy) pointing out a couple of errors in my original post. He says that the “people in charge of the phone software” admit that the caller ID problem is real, but I reiterate that none of the real-world users I know of have complained of it. Then again, I haven’t asked them. At least he wrote back; that’s what Scoble calls having a conversation.
Update 2: David Pogue wrote me a nice note politely taking issue with a couple of points. We agree that some folks won’t want a phone without a touch screen, and we (now) agree that yes, Verizon counts as a US phone company. Now, off to figure out whether there’s a market for a Missing Manual book on smartphones.

Taking advantage of my generous partners (and the vendor’s 30-day return policy), I just ordered a new Toshiba M200. It’s fairly vanilla; the only changes I made were changing RAM to a single 512MB stick (vice 2 x 256) and a 60GB 5400-RPM drive. Adding Bluetooth apparently adds 21-28 days to ship time, and there’s no longer an 802.11g option (funny, I still don’t have a g card for my ThinkPad– conspiracy?) I can add more RAM for less money by avoiding Toshiba altogether, so that’s what I’m doing. My previous Tablet experiences were colored by the slow speed and limited RAM of the Acer C102, but this unit should have neither of those problems. Next up: a face-off between the T40 and the M200, both of which have approximately equal specs.

I signed up for my 60-day trial of Apple’s .Mac service today. We’ll see if it’s worth a hoot or not. In the meantime, you can now reach me at perobichaux@mac.com, although I don’t expect to be checking mail there very much. (I would like to experiment with iChat, though– Tim, give me a yell!)
Update: without having posted my address anywhere other than this blog, I got my first piece of .Mac spam last night. That didn’t take long.

Mike wonders who’s using dual displays. I am, and I love it. With a combined 2560 x 1024 desktop, I have enough room for multiple RDP sessions, Safari windows, Word documents, PowerPoint slide decks, and other miscellanea, and the addition of Exposé makes it even better because I can quickly pick exactly the window I need.