More toys for the road warrior

"Sync it to me," Michael Mover said to a prospective buyer last month.

The computer consultant for Whittman-Hart Inc. was in the process of closing a deal - the exchange of business cards representing the conclusion of the afternoon's discussions. Standing in the restaurant parking lot, ready to head back to their respective offices, the two businessmen discovered they have more in common than the collaborative technology they just bought and sold. They both own a 3Com Palm Pilot.

"I couldn't live without it," Mover says, "and as of late, I know more people who have them."

The latest in hand-held organizers, the Palm Pilot is a computer device small enough to fit in your shirt pocket, yet large enough to store up to 2 megabytes of information. In addition to making portable your fax, e-mail and database programs, the device can synchronize the information stored on it with that stored on a desktop PC - hence, the expression "sync it to me." With the click of a button on the included cradle, information is exchanged and updated between the Palm Pilot and the desktop PC, and vice versa. The latest version of the Palm Pilot, Palm III, can perform this same function without the cradle and by infrared technology.

"Think of it as a window to your desktop PC," says 3Com representative Clinton Pope. Like mothers who stash just a few pictures in their purse instead of a hundred-page photo album, business executives can leave their laptops at the office and just grab their Palm Pilot, programmed with their most-often-used desktop applications. "It can be just as much a calendar as a true database machine," says Pope.

In Mover's case, he no longer has two calendars. He can just sync his Palm Pilot regularly with the one on his business server to keep his employees updated on his whereabouts. "I live by my calendar - that's my number-one thing," he says, adding that before the Palm Pilot, he was inconvenienced by the number of appointments, addresses and phone numbers he attempted to record in his Month-at-a-Glance organizer. Now, his Palm Pilot is programmed with several hundred appointments and more than 800 contacts.

While the device is, perhaps, most appreciated by the mobile executive whose wish list includes a portable Rolodex, anyone can personalize the device with a choice of software programs, including Lotus Works, Microsoft Excel, even city map guides and global-positioning devices. In addition, a number of applications link to the Internet, intranet and/or corporate server.

As for entering data, a graphical interface and text input system called Graffiti give Palm Pilot carriers the ability to enter alphanumeric information with a stylus. The only hitch is that one must learn to write each letter of the alphabet without picking up the pen. Letters also may be selected with the stylus from an on-screen keyboard, or information can be entered on a desktop computer and then synchronized with the Palm Pilot organizer using the HotSync technology.

In addition to matching all contact and scheduling information, remote TCP/IP-based network synchronization is incorporated to provide users with hassle-free access to e-mail and other information using an existing network or dial-in server. A portable modem can be attached to the device, yet hooking the device up to a phone and using a dial-in server provides much faster Internet service.

"We have web-based e-mail," Mover says, "so I can dial into our Windows NT server [by phone] and get my e-mail from my Palm Pilot. "For text only it does a good job."

A good job indeed, based on the fact that 1.5 million of these hand-held devices based on the Palm Computing platform have already sold - their retail price ranging from $249-$399, depending on the model. This not only makes the Palm Pilot the fastest-adopted hand-held computing platform in history, but Forrester Research predicts 3.5 million more devices similar to 3Com's Palm Pilot will be sold in the United States this year. For some, the gadget will replace the paper calendar, the laptop computer and perhaps, even their the portable phone.

For example, Mover was recently scheduled to meet a business partner for lunch and arrived a few minutes early. Instead of calling his party on his portable phone and disrupting the other diners in the restaurant, he chose to send a message using his Palm Pilot and its modem attachment that said, "I'm here. Will be in the back." Sure enough, Mover's friend didn't even have to trouble the maitre d' upon arrival.

If there's one function the Palm Pilot can't perform, however, it's talking on the telephone. Enter the Nokia 9000. Literally, the pocket-size device is a computer and a phone in one - the phone giving executives the ability to fax, e-mail, page and surf the web wirelessly, as well as to speak into a receiver and communicate by good ol' speech. "By far, the best thing about the Nokia 9000 is the ability to send and receive faxes from it without having to use a modem or a phone," Mover says.

A single interface for all of Nokia 9000's applications makes it easy to use. For example, one might write a single note and subsequently send it both by fax and by e-mail, without having to type it twice or even copy and paste it into different applications. A keyboard makes creating and saving longer documents easier.

To print out faxes, e-mail or other notes, the 9000 can be connected to a printer via an infrared link or indirectly through a PC using an infrared or cable connection. This enables users to back up and store information or transfer addresses and text documents between a PC and the Nokia 9000. The device itself provides up to 180 minutes of talk/fax/data time or 35 hours of standby. No need to worry about losing your data, however, since even if the phone is switched off, the computer can stand by for a week without recharging. In fact, data is safe even if the battery runs down completely.

Many of the Nokia 9000's most advanced features would be impossible without Global System for Mobile Communication, or GSM, technology, offered in Indiana by wireless carrier Omnipoint. Touted as the leading wireless digital technology in the world, GSM is different from average wireless phone service in that it incorporates voice mail, high-speed data, fax, paging and short-message service capabilities, all from one network and one handset.

"Inherently, it's just feature-rich," says company spokesperson Ellyn Byron. Translation: One can do away with the alphanumeric and numeric pager, the cell phone and the laptop for e-mailing and have them all in one device.

In addition to these capabilities, GSM phones have a removable memory card, called the Subscriber Information Module, or SIM Card, which holds all the information a subscriber needs to dial into the wireless network. Thus, when traveling, the card can be switched from one phone to another to equip the second phone with the ability to receive all calls to the subscriber's number, as well as recall all stored numbers and data. Faxes can also be sent to the phone and stored for later retrieval.