Opera 8 for Windows Mobile Smartphones now available

I tested out the previous tech preview editions of Opera for Windows Mobile Smartphones and have been following its development. I very pleased to get the note from them this morning that the Opera 8 web browser for WM Smartphones has been released as a full version download. I just downloaded it and plan on installing it soon. I was also pleased to hear that they are working on a version for WM Pocket PC devices. In my comparison testing with Pocket Internet Explorer, Opera beat the page download times in almost every case. I love using Opera on my Nokia 7610 Series 60 device and Sharp Zaurus and will be reviewing the version for Smartphones soon.

Accident claims settled and sneaky traffic ticket

I just wanted to close the loop on the auto accident postings I made in the past and let my readers know that I was blessed with closure on the two collisions yesterday. I received a fair settlement for the accident where the drunk and stoned driver took out the entire left side of my truck. I have never had an accident where there was a pain and suffering amount given to the victims and after doing some research online I was expecting something at least double what I eventually settled on. In reality though, my truck was fixed, my medical bills were paid for, and I felt we were adequately reimbursed for all the trouble and stress it caused in my life the last 6 months or so. I am not interested in suing or messing up the insurance companies even more because all of our rates are high enough as it is and I don't feel that would be a good example for my children, family, friends, and church. The guilty parties insurance adjuster was a very nice woman who I truly believe did all she could for us.

In regards to the recent accident where the guy ran right through the stop sign and hit my truck, his insurance just sent me a check based on the estimate that the body shop (the ones who fixed my truck from the drunk driver accident) gave us a month ago. The damage isn't that visible and since I plan on keeping this truck for a while as my work and house truck I am not going to pay to get it fixed. Instead, I am taking this check and the other settlement, along with my wife paying a nice chunk from her Party Lite business, to pay off my truck early and get rid of a monthly payment. So thank God for a happy ending with these accidents and I pray people stop thinking of my truck as target practice.

In other driving news, I received my first ticket in over 20 years of driving (I have never even been pulled over before). I drove into work yesterday to drive to our user group meeting and was stopped at an intersection with a red light. I then let an elderly woman walk across the street and checked to see that there were no cars coming from the left. I then safely proceeded to turn right on red as it is legal in WA State. As I came around the corner there were a couple motorcycle police indicating to people to pull over. I was mystified why they were doing this and wondered if it was some random seatbelt check. I then discovered that at this particular intersection you can never go right on red, even if you fully stop and it is clear. They wrote me a ticket for a whopping $101 and I was shocked. The officer was very nice though and told me to check the box to mediate the ticket since it was my first ever and he said I would get it cleared so it would not go on my record or to my insurance company. He said it would probably be $50 and come with a 6-month probation. I have no problem with probation as I have been driving safely for 20 years and it is very important that it not go on my record or insurance. I think it is quite a racket they have setup on that intersection and am now paying serious attention when I drive in downtown Seattle.

Added Sony PSP to my collection

It is convenient living so close to Microsoft because I get asked to participate in usability studies about twice a year. I give them a few hours of my time and then get a software gratuity that I then sell on ebay to use to support my mobile device habit. I am doing a Tablet PC study soon and as a result I picked up a Sony PSP yesterday via a person found on Craigslist. My brother planted the idea after saying that is where he found a good deal on his PSP and I picked one up for $190 that included the Spiderman 2 movie and Untold Legends game. The unit is in MINT condition and comes with a hard flip cover as well as the value pack accessories. My daughters have taken over the 2nd DS I bought since they love the wireless chat and gaming functionality and now that school is out they are having a blast with those units.

The PSP display is awesome and movies and games look great. I was always a huge fan of the Sony CLIE PDAs and Sony continues to impress me with their hardware. I am now going to sell an extra Newton MessagePad 2100 I have to pick up a couple games and a Memory Stick for the PSP. I also saw that pt has a method on the MAKE magazine site for running emulators and I hope to have Donkey Kong and maybe even Zaxxon running on it soon.

PSHUG meeting is ON for tomorrow!

I have been busy this spring coaching T-ball and have missed the last couple Puget Sound Handheld User Group (PSHUG) meetings and thought tomorrow's meeting would be cancelled as well. I then just received an email that the meeting is on and we will even get to see a HTC Universal (MDA IV) device!!!!! I am making plans now to attend and if you are in the Puget Sound area I encourage you to go as well. Check out the PSHUG site for details a bit later today.

My daily device usage, OneNote is great at church again

With my collection of mobile devices you may be wondering what I use on a daily basis. Right now, I have been primarily using a Motorola MPx220 Smartphone with the Dell Axim X50v. I use the Tablet when I am at home since I like the freedom of not being tied to my desktop in one room of the house. However, I still like the portability of my smaller PDAs when I am in the vanpool or out and about. I have also been using my older Tungsten T3 quite a bit since I like the way Agendus Mail 4 downloads and sends email from all my accounts with a single action. On Windows Mobile devices you have to go to each account and press or tap the menu to get email. With several email accounts this gets to be a bit bothersome. I have actually considered trading up my T3 for a T5 due to the better 5-way navigation support and more memory. Then again, I like the metal body on the T3 as well as the voice recorder, stable performance, and vibrating alarm feature so I think I'll keep the T3.

I used OneNote again on my Tablet PC at church to take sermon notes and find this is an incredible use of the technology. I also use eSword to read the applicable verses and then copy and paste the verses into my OneNote sermon notes. I also made a complete switch at work to using the Tablet PC and the only hang up with using an external monitor, keyboard, and mouse is that we have no USB keyboards at work right now and the USB to PS/2 connector is not working with my Tablet right now.

You may also notice a Pocket PC Magazine Judge logo over on the right sidebar of my blog. This is my 3rd year serving as a member of the Pocket PC Magazine Boards of Experts and I will be judging Pocket PC and Smartphone categories this year.

Mobile gaming devices spread in the Miller family

The mobile gaming craze is sweeping through our family as we now have 2 Nintendo DS devices in our house, along with 2 Gameboy SPs, a Gameboy Advance, a Gameboy Color and my original Gameboy. I went up to the Buckley Log Show today to see some high school buddies participate in the competition and found out my brother now has 2 PSPs and a Nintendo DS at their house as well. He is the best dealfinder ever and bought a PSP from Craigslist from a local seller for a great deal that now has me thinking I need to keep my eyes open for one as well.

Christians in the mobile device community

The mobile device community is a very fun group to be a part of and it is made even more special when I discover other Christians who are as excited about techie gear as I am. I have been working with Kevin Doel for a couple years as he represents many companies who send me items to review for Geek.com. Kevin just recently emailed me a link to his blog and also informed me that he is a Christian as well. I added him to my Blogrolling list and added his site to my Firefox bookmarks as well.

Kevin has a recent post called, Geeks for God, that link to a couple other Christian gadget fans. I know there are many others out there too and will add them to my blogroll as I discover their sites.

Missed the second day of Gnomedex

I was at Gnomedex 5.0 (check out the Wiki page) on Thursday night and all day Friday, but then I had to go home before the Friday night bash at the library because the entire rest of my family was quite sick and needed me to take care of them. I also missed the conference today and am really bummed out. I did get the chance to meet a few people I have chatted with online, like Hobie Swan of MindManager, and bumped into pt with all his cool gadgets. Josh Bancroft even bummed me out some more when I heard that he had a chance to play and talk about pt's toys at the Friday party. I would love to have been there with Josh because I love to talk with others about gadgets.

Gnomedex 5.0 starts tonight and I am there

I am going to Gnomedex 5.0 tonight since I couldn't pass up this event being held here in my own backyard. I'm probably one of the only ones who actually rode the bus in to the city for the event, but parking is way too much of a hassle and I like the one hour downtime on the bus to chill out. There is a kick-off registration reception sponsored by Google tonight and then two full days of activities with some of the best bloggers out in cyberspace.

I am hoping to win the Mac Mini or an iPod Shuffle since the odds are better than one in 300 (max number of attendees) and I am a pretty lucky guy, which is why my friends call me Forrest sometimes. There is already quite a list of goodies that I should be able to score as well.

It will be great to meet so many people I have been reading or emailing face-to-face as well, which is really the best part of events like these. I also plan on learning quite a bit since I am still a newbie to this blogging thing.

It looks like Mailblocks finally died :(

I have been using the Mailblocks email service since early 2004 after I tested it at CES 2004. In August 2004 they were bought by AOL so I knew their days were numbered. I have been getting more errors lately and now the web interface has been down for over 24 hours. I can still receive email via Outlook, but cannot send any out. I think they are dying so I am in the process of jumping ship right now before it goes all the way down.

I created a new AIM Mail account since it is powered by the Mailblocks technology, gives you 2GB for FREE, and supports IMAP. I also have Yahoo and Gmail accounts, but they don't support IMAP which is essential for managing email on mobile devices or multiple computers. The AIM Mail has adds added to your email if you use the web interface, but is ad free if you use a 3rd party email client like Outlook. I am copying over all my email folders from Mailblocks to AIM Mail in Outlook right now and am happy I had IMAP for this since I may have lost quite a bit of email with POP.

I am asking Joel to update where my Geek.com email address gets forwarded to so I should not lose anyone in the transisiton. If you send mail to me at palmsoloATmailblocks.com then please try palmsoloATgeek.com instead.

Thank God for the Mirra!

While I was at work yesterday we lost power at our house for a couple seconds. My wife then told me that the new desktop computer I built would not start up and there were white words all over a black screen. I didn't have time to look at it that day since we had our anniversary and my daughter's birthday party, but thought I just needed to do a reboot or something.

Well, about 6 hours later I found my only alternative was to reinstall Windows XP Professional on the unit. I scoured the web and tried everything, including DOS commands in the Recovery Console option of XP. It wouldn't boot in Safe Mode or Last Known Config or anything and something was corrupt. In the RC I kept getting access denied errors and unable to read errors so I had to reinstall Windows.

The blessing in all this is that I have a Mirra Personal Server that backed up all my personal documents and files so the only thing I have to do is reinstall my applications, which is time consuming but not fatal. Thank God for the Mirra. If you are looking for an easy backup solution I highly recommend these devices.

Another milestone: 12th wedding anniversary

We had a party for my daughter yesterday to celebrate her 9th birthday and a great time was had by all. Yesterday was also my 12th wedding anniversary and my wife bought me an awesome Ryobi cordless drill, saw, flashlight, vacuum set. I bought her the navigation system upgrade for her Acura so we each bought something for each other that was actually needed and practical. I also gave her a nice bouquet of flowers from the Pike Place Market flower shop.

It is amazing to think we met and got married in 17 days just over 12 years ago. Our story is quite incredible, but the key to the whole thing was that Jesus was at the center of our lives so we were comfortable in getting married that quickly after meeting. Now, if one of my 3 daughters tries to pull this stunt then that is another thing. (Just kidding, of course) I am confident my daughter's will make the right decisions when the time comes as they are quite confident and secure in their faith and morals.

Happy Father's Day and busy week ahead

I had a very nice Father's Day yesterday and received a new gas powered weed eater with blade attachment to help me take care of the out-of-control blackberry bushes trying to come over the fence into my yard. This unit also takes attachments for pruning, edge trimmer, small rototiller, and more. I can't wait to go out and attack our several hundred feet of area that needs trimming without having to drag out my 150 feet of extension cord. I also received Rugby 2005 for the Xbox, which is great since I don't get much time to play anymore now that my three girls are so active in sports. My mother-in-law gave me a complete barbeque utensil set so now I am really set for the summer.

We had a very nice family get-together with excellent barbequed chicken, potato salad, cake, and more. We have a busy week this week too as my daughter's 9th birthday party is tomorrow along with my wife and I celebrating our 12th wedding anniversary. At the end of the week I am attending Gnomedex and then on Sunday we plan on going up to the Buckley Log Show after church. I grew up in Buckley and my Grandpa Miller was even named "Bull of the Woods" back in 1987.

palmOne provides updates for Treo 650 devices

Sure, now that I sold off my awesome Treo 650 package (leather case, extra battery, sync/charge cable, screen protector, etc) palmOne decides to finally issue a ROM update that fixes the memory allocation issue and may also fix the volume problems. The memory deal didn't bother me much, but the low volume was the killer for me. I emailed the guy who bought mine to make sure he knew of the update and he replied that the Treo was NOT FOR SALE:) Dang, I thought I may have been able to swing a deal to bring it back.

It really is a nice piece of hardware for the most part and I saw a ton of them being used in airports on my crazy May trips. I am content with what I have now and am able to get over the desire more quickly now that I have my head on straight. At least I think I am ...

Interesting article on the impact of the digital Bible

I was browsing through the Mobile Ministry Magazine site today and found the link to an interesting article on Crosswalk.com that discusses technology and the Bible. I particularly liked the quote by Steve NeSmith, "Technology can’t force a person to study Scripture, only a person's heart can do that." Amen, brother. That is why you see the focus of my site changing a bit lately towards more Christian content and focus. This may result in losing a few regular readers, but this blog was created to express my thoughts and experiences of my life while serving as a resource for some mobile device related issues.

I'm now reviewing some Christian books

I was reading some blog posts discussing the taxpayer dollars Congress is wasting away by passing a resolution that apologizes for lynching tragedies of the past. I won't get into it here, but anyway reading through the blog sites led me to a great find, La Shawn Barber's blog that I am now adding to my blogroll and favorites. Reading through her blog then led me to the Mind and Media site where they were looking for book reviewers. I primarily stick with ebooks, but also like to still read regular paper books and am an avid reader. I applied yesterday and was accepted so I am now going to start off by reviewing the No More Christian Nice Guy and Connecting with Your Kids books soon. I need to put a link on this blog to the site as part of the deal and if you are interested in reviewing some of them I encourage you to apply as well.

Cool Flickr Zeitgeist stream

I have a camera and cameraphones and most of the time the little photo blogs I have tried out fizzle after a few weeks. I am still waiting for a Series 60 or Windows Mobile version of SplashBlog, but just discovered some cool tools with Flickr so I created an account and have included the fun Zeitgeist tool over in my right column.

You can also check out a few photos I have uploaded so far on my Flickr site too.

Giving Google Adsense first $100 to church

I added some Google Adsense ads to my blog a few months ago after hearing Chris Pirillo and others rave about them and figured I would give it a shot. I do not write on this blog as a means to raise money or anything and figured it may help pay for my hosting fees and URL registration. Well, I just checked my account page and I should finally pass the $100 earned point sometime in the next couple days. This is after 5 months of Google ads so you can see this is not a moneymaker for me by no sense of the imagination. Anyway, I should be receiving my first payment sometime in July and have decided to give it to our small local church as part of my tithe. If this site happens to generate a few spare dollars then I will make giving to our church with Google Adsense money a regular habit.

So thanks to all the visitors for clicking the links and supporting New Life Community Church in Puyallup, WA. We appreciate it and if you ever want to swing by and visit on Sunday morning you are more than welcome. You can find services starting at 10:30 am at Stewart Elementary school located at 426 4th Ave NE in Puyallup.

Cool Christian Tech blog site and other resources

Antoine posted a response to my recent Happiness blog entry and I just added his site to me new Christian link section. He has a wonderful site, Mobile Ministry Magazine that I enjoy reading. I now have to add it to my RSS feeds as well.

Another reader, Steve, also emailed me in response to that blog entry with some excellent links to resources you may want to check out. He recommended The Cross Centered Life and John Piper's books that can be found here as free PDF books. Steve also recommended I check out Life as a Vapor, When I Don't Desire God, and The Dangerous Duty of Delight.

If you have a Christian site, book, or resource you recommend I check out, please email a link to me at palmsolo@geek.com. Thanks and God bless.

Newton 2100 package arrived

I also recieved the package from Canada containing the Newton gear that I traded a Dell Axim X30 for last week. The package contained two mint Newton 2100 MessagePads, ethernet cards, linear flash memory cards, a Newton keyboard, and the Newton book, Defying Gravity. The units are in excellent condition and I am happy to have an Apple PDA back in my hands for old times sake. I probably won't use them much, but will play with them from time to time and recall the good old days. I now have a PDA from most all operating systems and can prepare my Raincoast 05 talks. I don't plan on selling off this collection now and won't keep making the mistake of selling my older units unless there is a compelling reason to upgrade. Since I will be able to upgrade the Axim X50v to Windows Mobile 5.0 I don't see getting a new device this year at all since the LifeDrive isn't compelling enough over my existing Tungsten T3.

Decided on Nintendo DS for more family fun and cheaper price

After thinking a bit more about whether to buy a PSP with my PayPal mobile device funds I decided against it and instead went with the Nintendo DS. I needed to get my daughter who is turning 9 something for her birthday next week and we were going to get a Nintendo DS for her for Christmas. I thought if I bought her one for her birthday and picked up one for myself then we could play multiplayer games and use the chat function together. Also, we have several GBA games and they are playable on the Nintendo DS. While the PSP hardware is very nice, I can watch movies and listen to music on my other mobile devices with SD cards and don't have to buy proprietary UMDs or Memory Sticks. I also don't have to spend a lot of cash investing in PSP games. To top it all off, I bought the unit with Super Mario 64 and a huge accessory kit (containing a stylus, case, extra battery, car charger, etc.) for my daughter at Costco for $200. I then picked up an Electric Blue DS, cool metal briefcase (containing screen protectors, car charger, and game case), Madagascar and Spider-Man 2 for another $225 ($70 off there) at ToysRUs. I also ordered the GBA Movie Player that lets you listen to tunes, read ebooks, view photos, and watch movies for $25.

We started playing my DS last night and it was a lot of fun. I am a huge Donkey Kong fan and enjoy playing Donkey Kong Country on the GBA and DS. I am also looking forward to the upcoming Spyro game for the DS. My daughter's birthday is Tuesday, the 21st and then I'll be able to try out the multiplayer gaming and chatting experience. It is cool that some games, like Mario, only require one person to have a cartridge.

I may still dream about a PSP, but with my other mobile devices I think I'll be quite satisfied with the cheaper DS and ability to play GBA games.

Should I get a Sony PSP?

I found an unopened box containing a full retail version of Office 2003 Professional while cleaning up all my junk at home and am selling it on ebay right now. It looks like I should get around $300 for it and now am considering picking up a PSP at Costco. My mom bought me the original Gameboy back in 1989 as a Christmas gift when I was in college, but I haven't had my own portable gaming unit since then. My daughters have Gameboy Advances and GB SP, but the games on the PSP looks awesome. There is quite a bit you can do with a PSP like watch movies, play games, listen to music and view photos as well as hacks, like listen to podcasts and read RSS feeds. I always had Sony CLIE PDAs and loved their quality and innovative designs, but don't really like the MemoryStick format. It would help if Netflix or BlockBuster started renting PSP games or UMD movies though. I have also been offered my choice of PSP accessories to review that I understand I could keep afterwards so I wouldn't have to use my own money for extra gear either. Geek.com is reviewing game and accessories so I may be able to find some games to review as well. I am quite the PDA case collector and could find cases to review for this site and Geek.com. Then again, I don't want to get wrapped up in playing games with all my free time, but this hasn't been a problem on my PDAs so I don't think it will be much of an issue. Finally, all the geeks have them so why shouldn't I? :)

Should I pick up a PSP, buy something else (Nintendo DS, palmOne LifeDrive), save my money for something else in the future, or something else? Please email me or post a comment with your advice before my PayPal money burns a hole in my pocket.

Garmin Forerunner 301 review posted on Geek.com

I know some of you have emailed me about the Garmin Forerunner 301 and wanted to let you know the review has been posted now at Geek.com and you can read it here. I didn't have a chance to really check it out myself, but my coworker Morgan who runs quite a bit did get to check it out and wrote the review. If you have more questions on its use I will pass them along to Morgan to answer.

Tablet PC and eSword rock at church

I used my Tablet PC again to take sermon notes at church yesterday and now that I have eSword loaded on it the method really works great. I copy the verse and then paste it into OneNote and have my handwritten sermon notes around the verse. I can even highlight sections of the verse with different colors and also highlight sections of the sermon with different color inkpens. My Fuji fan never turns on during church and is as silent as a church mouse. I have the display down to a low brightness and you can't even tell I am really using a computer during service. With the amazing wide angle display, I can hold the tablet just like a piece of paper at any angle and still take my sermon notes.

I thought that maybe I could do this same thing with my Axim X50v and PocketBible, but it is more comfortable writing on the Tablet size paper where I can rest my hand on the screen, etc. I may try the Pocket PC once though since I think I can bring it into OneNote after the service.

BTW, our church is going through some great things right now. We had some tough times back in the late fall/winter time period where we had to split from another church we tried to combine with and I was quite exhausted from that episode. We recently had a meeting, I blogged about it here, and ever since then it seems our church has been more focused on prayer and helping each other out. I see some wonderful things coming out from that meeting and the desire of our small body to grow and am excited as we get ready for our big yearly church camp-out. I am also getting the men's ministries geared up again with monthly breakfasts, weekly Bible study, and planning for Promise Keepers 2005 here in Tacoma.

I think my wife needs an iPod Shuffle

My wife is quite a music fan and likes the iTunes interface and ability to purchase single songs that she likes rather than full albums. The problem is that her Acura TL Type-S system likes to keep and swallow CD-Rs that I burn of her music. She has had to go into Acura several times and have them remove the disks and no longer uses them in her car. I tried my old iPod and a FM transmitter before, but the FM transmitter (Belkin Tunecast II) was a bit unreliable and the sound wasn't that great. She has been asking me to get the iTunes music in her car again so last night I used my daughter's iPod mini and the cassette adapter from my Delphi MyFi system to hook into my wife's car. This setup absolutely ROCKED and the sound was outstanding.

I now need to go get another cassette adapter and am thinking of picking up an iPod Shuffle for my wife. I am looking for something inexpensive for our upcoming wedding anniversary (almost 12 years) and the shuffle should be a good solution for her since she likes the random playback ability and it is nice and small to fit in her car without causing a big mess.

Another Bluetooth car kit to review

I also received the latest Bluetooth auto solution from Parrot, the EasyDrive, that takes care of the external mic issue I had with the DriveBlue+ (see my Geek.com review). My wife liked the DriveBlue+, but didn't like the half-duplex issue and mic so I will test this one out for my review and then see if she wants me to pick one up for her to use in her car with the Motorola MPx220 Smartphone. I still use the DriveBlue+ in my truck and find it works very well.

Zaurus arrived, but I didn't stay up all night

In the past, when a new device arrived on my step I would stay up all night (literally without sleep) and set it up, goof around with it, play games, etc. Now that I realize and have refocused my life on what is important I didn't do that when the Zaurus SL-5500 arrived yesterday from ComputerGeeks.com. I simply opened it up, put it on the charger, and then saw that it worked fine. I then hung out with my girls while my wife had a PartyLite show and then went to bed.

The Z looks to be brand new and is in perfect condition. I knew it was a refurb, but can't believe how good of shape it is in. Everything came extremely well packed with new manuals, cables, CF slot blank, etc. One thing I really like about these Zaurus devices is that I can put custom ROMs on it without a hitch and change the look and feel of the OS. I don't plan on using it as my primary device, but it is nice to have a Linux PDA back in my hand.

Speaking of Linux, I just received Symantec's PartitionMagic 8 to review on my newly built PC and can now easily partition one of my hard drives as a Linux drive. I plan on figuring out a Linux product to install and giving that a whirl sometime too.

Internet Explorer now with tabbed browsing

Microsoft just released the updated version of the MSN Toolbar Suite that includes MSN Desktop Search and now tabbed browsing for Internet Explorer. I was beta testing this on my Tablet and loved it, even though at that time it still had a few bugs. The primary reason I use Firefox or Maxthon is for tabbed browsing and now I can save some space and go back to Internet Explorer. Visit the MSN Toolbar site and download the latest version for yourself.

I still use MSN Desktop Search and love the improvements they made to the final release version. People are still installing it at work and I am spreading the news about this powerful search client.

Smartphone thoughts

My wife's Motorola MPx220 was experiencing serious issues and was unusable over the last month and thankfully Motorola sent out a replacement. I then also found a ROM update online and updated her current unit that fixed the problems. As a result, I get to use the other MPx220 for now and am finding that I really do like the Windows Mobile interface much better than the Symbian Series 60 one.

The Series 60 is icon and directional pad driven where as I can quickly navigate using simple keypad presses with the Windows Mobile Smartphone. Both sync with Outlook fine, but Windows Mobile is more seamless and never gives me any errors. There are also some very fine games on Windows Mobile devices :)

The one issue I haven't yet resolved is connecting my Tablet to the MPx220 for wireless surfing. I can do it via the USB cable, but for some reason Bluetooth isn't making a successful connection yet. I then pop out the SIM to the Nokia 7610 for wireless browsing if I don't have the MPx220 cable handy.

I also just received a CoPilot Smartphone package that I am reviewing and will see if it can compare to the excellent Mapopolis Smartphone application. The one bummer about the MPx220 vs. the Orange SPV E200 I have is that the 220 uses miniSD cards while the SPV E200 uses the standard SD format.

My pursuit of true Happiness

As readers of my blog know, I spent almost two weeks out on vacation to Hawaii and Soap Lake recently and really had a chance to recharge my batteries and take stock of my life. You may also know that I am an elder of our small church in Puyallup. Our church went through quite a trial a few months ago and I was feeling quite discouraged and disappointed with myself the last couple of months. On Sunday, our EXCELLENT pastor, Pastor Brad, gave a moving sermon on Happiness from the book of Proverbs 8:32-36. I admit that I am quite a fan of mobile devices and get quite excited when a new device is released or purchased. However, this pleasure wears off after a few weeks and I realize that I am not going to find true happiness with mobile devices. True happiness can only be found in the Word and living a life pleasing to the Lord.

We then had a ministry meeting that evening where less than 10 were planned on attending. It turned out that about half the church came and we had an incredible prayer session after the meeting. My prayers and the direction for my life was quickly affirmed by the sermon and prayers that evening and it is so absolutely amazing how God works in our lives. I am devoting myself to getting back into the Bible regularly with the help of PocketBible on my Smartphone and Windows Mobile device and MyBible on my Palm Powered device. I also use eSword on my Tablet and may install it on my Windows Mobile devices as well.

I am not going to stop writing about mobile devices or stop reviewing or writing for Geek.com, but I am going to try to stop spending so much time dwelling on them and lusting after the latest and greatest. My current collection actually contains mostly all devices that I have had for at least 6 months, which are getting to be records for me. I was turning over devices about every 3 months the past couple of years (thanks to Sony's crazy CLIE releases) and plan on taking serious stock of what I really need before upgrading so quickly in the future.

I feel that God has given me some talent in the mobile device and writing areas so I am going to try to use these gifts to serve Him. The devices do allow me to always have a Bible in my hand and now I need to ensure I am actually using them.

XM Radio on Windows Mobile and another truck accident

I am quite the XM Radio fan and used to carry around the Delphi XM MyFi quite a bit, but lately it has been staying mounted in my truck most of the time. I just found this Aximsite thread that now allows me to connect and listen to XM Radio on my Windows Mobile device. This is awesome since my Windows Mobile device is always with me and extends XM even further for me personally.

Speaking of my truck, can you believe someone else just ran into me again this last weekend. Last October a drunk and stoned driver took out the entire side of my truck while I was driving with my three girls on the way to the dealership to trade it in. My wife was behind us and saw the whole thing. That accident resulted in an almost entire rebuild of the driver side of my 1997 truck at a cost of $9,500. Now I was at a 4 way stop and then as I started going through the intersection a guy totally blew down the road and through the stop sign and right into the front passenger side of my truck. I was seriously ticked because my truck went through that last accident and was in MINT condition again. After checking that my three girls were OK, I jumped out to take a look at was amazed that there was very little visible damage to my truck. Only the front part of the bumper was bent and some scratches and a small broken lens resulted from the accident. The idiots older Volvo had all broken headlights, a smashed bumper, and dented front left panel. We took it to the auto shop and I was surprised by the almost $1,000 estimate to repair my truck. Now I have to try to get the other driver's insurance to pay up. It has been a bit difficult to get this going though since the driver speaks broken English and keeps saying "All OK" to me. Yeah, it will be all ok if your insurance pays for this damage caused by your senseless actions.

Thankfully no one was injured in the accident and my truck lives on for another day. My truck plate says PDAGEEK, but I am starting to think it says HIT ME HERE!

Should be adding a Newton back to my collection soon too

As I prepare some gear for Raincoast 05, I want to build up my older collection of devices I used to own a bit and since my Dell Axim X30 High is sitting idle and needs to find a good home I offered it up for trade on the NewtonTalk list and received several responses almost immediately. It looks like I will be able to make a trade for a Newton 2000/2100 unit like I desire and will be giving away a VERY nice package that contains a MINT Axim X30 High, Piel Frama black leather crocodile case, 2000 mAh extended battery, retractable USB sync/charge cable, and USB cradle. The total Dell package is worth over $350 or more in today's prices (much more for original costs) and the specs blow away the Newton, but I personally love Apple products and desire to get a Newton back in my possession. I'll keep you updated on the trade and post some thoughts when the Newton arrives.

Another Zaurus on the way

In anticipation of speaking at Raincoast 2005 and to satisfy my desire to have a handheld Linux devices, I jumped at the ComputerGeeks.com recent ad for a Sharp Zaurus SL-5500 for $164 this weekend. I have used a couple of these Zaurus devices and liked the 760 the best, but it cost over $500 and my second favorite was the 5500. Since I don't plan on using it that much I went with the much cheaper option. I want to demo as many devices from different operating systems as possible at Raincoast and this unit even has a 90 day warranty.

Searching around for this device led me back down the road of remembering all my old devices and I really do miss a few of them, like the CLIE NX70 and UX50, the Zaurus C-760 and the Jornada 568 (I owned this one for over 9 months and is second to my T3 that I have now had for I think over a year).

Presenting at Raincoast 2005 in October

I wanted to let my readers know that I will be presenting at two sessions of the Raincoast 2005 conference being held in Tacoma, WA in early October. I am planning one session where I present an introduction to all the different mobile device configurations I have access to, including Palm, Windows Mobile, Handheld PC, Linux, and Smartphone (Series 60 and Windows Mobile). I now need to pick up an inexpensive Sharp Zaurus again to cover Linux and am looking at a 5500 for $150. I enjoyed this device and it meets all my Linux needs while being well supported. I may show my Tablet for a short period, although it may not be considered a mobile device by most people.

In my other session I plan on presenting some advanced tips and tricks for device owners to help them maximize the functionality of these powerful devices. If you are in the area then I encourage you to register for the event.

What is up with the LifeDrive and MPx220 thoughts

My current Palm Powered device is the palmOne (actually it is still labeled Palm) Tungsten T3 which I am quite happy with since I really only use it for reviewing software. There has been quite a bit of talk about the new palmOne LifeDrive with 4GB hard drive, Bluetooth, and WiFi. I haven't yet had a chance to play with one myself so I can't make my own judgements on it, but I am leary of the reported long lag times. Super fast response is a quality that is still an advantage in the Palm OS world and I hope these lags are just due to certain applications and not the standard operating procedure. palmOne hasn't sent Geek.com a review unit yet and so we have to wait until the first tier PDA sites return the units for us to get one. We may have a guest reviewer post something on Geek.com soon instead and I have to get to a local CompUSA to try one out myself.

My wife was converted to a Microsoft Windows Mobile Smartphone after I gave her the Motorola MPx220 I received at Mobius last December. Her phone has had serious issues in the last couple months that were supposed to be taken care of with a ROM update that still seems to be in the works. Thankfully Motorola sent us a replacement phone that seems to be working quite well and I found a link to a ROM update via the Howard Forums discussion threads and am loading that on her older machine as well. I have been using the Nokia 7610 as my main smartphone for over a month due to the excellent battery life and easy Bluetooth functionality. I may start using the other MPx220 though since I prefer the Windows Mobile Smartphone interface with the quick keypad navigation functionality.