An interesting read on the
BargainPDA.com site concerning how the newly launched Windows Mobile 5 for Pocket PC stacks up against Palm OS and its latest expected incarnations.
Last week, I had a chance to take in the keynote by Bill Gates as he introduced Microsoft's next stage in mobile computing, Windows Mobile 5. He talked a lot about being able to deploy mobile services in a way that was only dreamed of a few years ago. He touched on some of the changes in hardware that would happen (mainly memory usage and processor requirements). And finally, there some discussion on the interface changes that took place.
As a PalmOS fan, and user of PalmOS devices for most of my mobile digital life, I looked at the introduction of Windows Mobile 5 as a concession by both the Palm platform and the Windows Mobile platform. Whereas the PalmOS platform has been largely static; from a hardware perspective there has not been many innovations, just steps here and there; and from a software perspective in that the GUI and basic applications have not changed much since PalmOS 2.0.
Granted, that doesn't mean that Windows Mobile has been running head and shoulders above either. I think in its fifth iteration that Windows Mobile is truly becoming a pocket computer. Aside from the more powerful hardware requirements in RAM and processing, there haven't been all too many advances in the Windows Mobile platform either.
I see the two platforms as pretty much coming to the same point from two different perspectives and trying to do the same things. PalmSource has had a major debacle on its hands with the lack of Cobalt (PalmOS 6) devices on the market. In my opinion, Cobalt is a lot better than Windows Mobile 5 and had it been released in a device already, Windows Mobile 5 would be less lauded for its features, and more critiqued on its effectiveness and efficiency.
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