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Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal)
Linux Journal
reviews the Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 PDA, a cool new tech-toy.
"The Zaurus is not like any other PDA on the market. What really differentiates it from other PDAs is what's inside: Linux. This OS choice allows development on many different platforms. Libraries are available for Python, PyQt and Java. There also is version of Xfree86 for the Zaurus."
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Sharp Zaurus - nice, but what about Europeans? Posted Jan 30, 2004 18:32 UTC (Fri) by alspnost (subscriber, #2763) [Link] These things look seriously nice. I've never owned a PDA, in fact I've only just got my first cellphone, but the Zaurus looks like a really tempting gadget. But unless I'm mistaken, you can't get the blessed things in Europe. Is there any sign of a return to this continent in 2004?Perhaps I'll just buy one on my next US trip, but it's not ideal, due to warranty, power supply and other issues....
Sharp Zaurus - nice, but what about Europeans? Posted Jan 30, 2004 22:01 UTC (Fri) by lakeland (subscriber, #1157) [Link] Dunno about .eu, but we had a hellova time getting one to .nz.Eventually we found a shop in .au which did mail-order. They're pretty cool from a hacking perspective (we were using it for a flight controller), though I don't think it would be my first choice if I wanted a PDA for use as a PDA.
Sharp Zaurus - nice, but what about Europeans? Posted Jan 31, 2004 12:23 UTC (Sat) by rjforster (guest, #3375) [Link] Try expansys. They claim to be getting some back in stock.http://www.expansys.com/product.asp?code=SL-5000D
Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal) Posted Jan 30, 2004 19:03 UTC (Fri) by doodaddy (guest, #10649) [Link] I'd like to own a *cheap* PDA that I can program for my girlfriend. So I assume Linux would be the way to go. (I think Palm et al require developer licenses.) But the key word here is *cheap*. It would be a fun project and both her and me would probably drop the PDA and need to replace it. So does that exist? $100 or even cheaper?
Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal) Posted Jan 30, 2004 19:28 UTC (Fri) by maney (subscriber, #12630) [Link] Cheap. Programmable. Linux. Hmmm, sounds like an Agenda...Which are still on the market to some extent. I haven't got all the links handy right now, but SurplusMax still has some previously owned articles proced 'way under $100. OTOH, these are somewhat limited machines, grayscale only, limited memory, no longer really well supported... $100 plus S&H from Softfield; these are later models, with more RAM and/or flash than the one I got from SurplusMax a couple months ago. The other URL you simply must have for these is the Agenda Wiki - from there you can get to pretty much everything else. The Agenda is kind of minimalist as modern PDAs go, but at a fraction the price of bigger, more colorful items they're an interesting alternative.
Yup, the Agenda's nice Posted Jan 30, 2004 21:06 UTC (Fri) by gnb (subscriber, #5132) [Link] I got one mostly out of curiosity, but it's ended up becoming my main PDA,largely because of the nice form-factor. The applications that come with it are rather old (Softfield are selling it withthe last official release from the late lamented Agenda Computing) but it's not hard to update, and you get a fairly simplistic but quite useable PDA. The hardware was nice for its day. Shame the software wasn't ready before AC folded, it could have been quite succesful. If you are interested you want the later 16M version (either 2nd hand or new from Softfield). The comment about greyscale only applies to all versions.
Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal) Posted Jan 30, 2004 19:34 UTC (Fri) by scherbis (subscriber, #4434) [Link] The GNU Tool chain is available for the Palm platform as well as free documentation. You have to sign up with Palm to get access to some of what you need, but there is no cost. The tool chain runs under both Windows and Linux. It may not be as convienient as the commercial versions, but it works.
Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal) Posted Jan 30, 2004 19:53 UTC (Fri) by holstein (subscriber, #6122) [Link] You don't need any developpers licence from Palm to develop for the devices/OS. There is a suite of development tool built around GCC to develop for Palm. In fact, there is a lot of Free Software (aka GPL and friends) built for Palm. Look at PalmOpenSource.com, or dig around SourceForge for examples.
Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal) Posted Jan 30, 2004 22:23 UTC (Fri) by doodaddy (guest, #10649) [Link] Thanks everyone! Yeah, I assumed B&W, and would prefer that if the PDA has a crisper screen and has longer battery life.
Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal) Posted Jan 30, 2004 23:18 UTC (Fri) by gnb (subscriber, #5132) [Link] The Agenda VR3 has an OK 4-level grey screen. Clear enough, but notvery quick (arcade games are a bit of a blur). The backlight is a rather dated- looking green. The battery situation is unusual: it takes 2 AAA batteries. The new VR3s as sold by Softfield are connected internally so that if you use rechargeables you can recharge them without taking them out of the VR3. Recharging weekly (with about an hour of actual use a week) they have never run out. Not sure what the longets you could possibly go is. Non-rechargeables last about 3 times longer in my experience. One nice feature is that /home is on a jffs partition rather than RAM, so if the batteries do run out you just stick new ones in and carry on, without having lost anything (other than what you were changing at the time).
Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal) Posted Jan 31, 2004 23:15 UTC (Sat) by XERC (guest, #14626) [Link] Well, one possibility is to build it yourself. It's possible to order some of the hadware(uCLinux already ported) from the following link:Dragonix VZ Regards, XERC
Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 Personal Mobile Tool (Linux Journal) Posted Jan 31, 2004 4:55 UTC (Sat) by ccchips (guest, #3222) [Link] What I'd really like is a portable CD player that could hold enough Linux to run all sorts of music software, including ModPlug, MikMod, Ogg, MPG123, etc. If I break down one 700-MB CD of tracker mods into MP3's, I get about 10 or 11 CD's...that's kind of hard to carry around on the subway....Then again, a CD full of tracker mods in such a machine would last for....what....3 weeks at 3 hours a day?
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