October
9, 2004 - HP’s
latest round of Pocket PCs, the iPAQ rx3000
Series, is geared toward all things multimedia.
From viewing photos to watching video to
controlling your PC remotely over a wireless
network, the rx3000 iPAQs are self-proclaimed
Mobile Media Companions. The iPAQ
rx3115,
the entry-level model in the rx3000 Series,
offers a moderately speedy Pocket PC with
both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi for under $350,
making it the most affordable iPAQ ever sold
with both wireless standards. Aside from
a somewhat boxy design, we found the rx3115
an excellent choice for the Pocket PC buyer
on a budget, and if you can live without
the digital camera found on the other two
models in the rx3000 Series, the rx3115 may
be the best deal of the entire iPAQ
line.
Introduction
The
rx3115 runs the Windows Mobile 2003 SE
Operating System and is powered by a 300Mhz
Samsung ARM-based processor, which is almost
100MHz faster than the Samsung processor
at the heart of the popular iPAQ
1935.
Internal storage consists of 64MB of RAM
and a 32MB ROM chip, 3.98MB of which is
allocated as the iPAQ File Store. Expansion
is offered by way of a Secure
Digital slot with SDIO compatibility, allowing for use
of SDIO peripherals as well as SD
flash memory cards. Display quality has always
an iPAQ bragging right, and the rx3115
maintains this tradition well, though the
screen is the Pocket PC standard 3.5” QVGA 16-bit transflective display.
Both Bluetooth and 802.11b Wi-Fi are onboard,
allowing the rx3115 to connect to both of
today’s short-range wireless standards.
A long-range IRDA port is also part of the
package, which is necessary for the unit’s
included Nevo universal remote software.
Included
in the box is a USB Sync Cable (cradle
optional), a 920mAh Lithium-Ion battery,
an AC Adapter, a set of black stereo earbuds
from Plantronics, a black slip case, a
set of manuals and a CD-ROM. The CD-ROM
includes an electronic User Guide, Outlook
2002, ActiveSync and NevoMedia software
for your PC. Other optional accessories
can be viewed here.
Design
The
iPAQ rx3115 isn’t the most stylish
Pocket PC to come down the HP pipeline. With
its latest round of iPAQ Pocket PCs, including
the rz1715 and hx4705,
HP seems to have steered away from the curvaceous
designs Compaq inspired with the first iPAQ,
opting for a plainer, boxier look. That is
not to say that the rx3115 is unattractive;
it is a well designed Pocket PC. However,
we wish there was more of the iPAQ
1945 design to the unit, rather
than that the iPAQ
2215.
The
rx3115 is one of the smaller Pocket PCs
we’ve
seen - though it is thicker than many like-sized
handhelds - and weighs in at 5.1oz, which
is just over half an ounce heavier than
the svelte iPAQ 1945. It shares its design
with the other two units in the rx3000
series, the rx3415 and rx3715 iPAQ Pocket
PCs. The two siblings have darker coloring,
while the rx3115 is light silver and black.
Because the rx3115 is touted more as a
mobile multimedia center than a PIM-centric
PDA, the four hardware buttons near of bottom
of the face are not shortcuts for email,
contacts and scheduling, but are labeled
for photo viewing, remote control and media
applications. The four-way navigation pad
also doubles as volume, skip and playback
controls. The SD card slot and headphone
jack are located on top of the unit, making
it much less awkward when listening to music
than those Pocket PCs with side-mounted headphone
jacks. Our one complaint is that there is
no scroll wheel on the left-hand side of
the rx3115, which makes scrolling through
documents or turning pages in eBooks less
natural.
As
noted above, the rx3115 shares its exterior
shell with the rx3415 and rx3715,
which both have a digital camera in the rear.
Because the rx3115 lacks an onboard digital
camera, the section of the back intended
to house the lens is simply covered over
with a plate, but still protrudes from the
otherwise flat back piece. We prefer a handheld
with a smooth back, though opinions will
vary from user to user. It is something to
keep in mind, however.
General Performance
As
common sense would suggest, we expected
the 300MHz Samsung processor of the rx3115
to be noticeably slower than the 624MHz
Intel Processor of the Dell
Axim X30. While
this was true in some cases, the rx3115
held its own in most general usability
tests. When compared side-by side, applications
like Pocket Word and Solitaire started
up simultaneously on the two devices, with
other programs like Windows Media Player
showing only slightly faster start times
on the X30. In some tests, the rx3115 proved
even speedier than the Dell X30 – it took the X30 11 seconds
to load our homepage in Pocket IE, while
it took the rx3115 only 8 seconds. Microsoft
Reader was the only program that we tested
where the X30’s 624Mhz CPU truly showed
its superiority. eBooks loaded much faster,
there was less lag time between page “turns,” and
the Reader program itself responded better
overall on the X30.
The
iPAQ’s 920mAh
Li-Ion battery provides up to six hours
of use, depending on several variables
such as wireless usage, screen brightness
and level of processing activity. Two additional
batteries are available for the rx3115,
both the 1440mAh Standard Battery and the
2880mAh Extended Battery.
What
You See & What You Hear
As
mentioned above, the iPAQ rx3115 has an
excellent transflective display. Like most
Pocket PCs, the screen is a diagonal 3.5” with
a 240x320 QVGA resolution. When compared
to the displays of the Dell
Axim X30, Toshiba
e405 and ViewSonic
V36, the iPAQ screen
is far brighter with higher contrast and
sharper text. Pocket PCs with VGA displays
(those capable of resolutions up to 640x480)
are beginning to make their way into pockets
across the country (most notably the Toshiba
e805 and iPAQ
hx4705), and while no 240x320
display can match the image quality of
VGA, the rx3115 is as good as it gets for
QVGA displays.
The
speaker on the rx3115 is located under
the navigation pad. While you will likely
not listen to music through this speaker
for any appreciable period of time, it’s
loud enough to listen to some audio, and
certainly adequate for system sounds. The
headphone jack, on the other hand, provides
a nice sound with the included earbuds
or any quality hear-gear. In a “listen
to both, make the call” comparison
(admittedly subjective) of the iPAQ rx3115
and Apple’s iPod mini, the iPAQ held
its own, but the devoted audiophile will
probably opt for a stand-alone MP3
player.
For casual listening, the iPAQ is quite good,
equal to – or
better than – other Pocket PCs.
Wires?
We Ain’t Got No Stinkin’ Wires
Wireless
capabilities are practically a
must-have for PDAs of late, and
the iPAQ rx3115 offers both popular
standards, 802.11b Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.
Many Pocket PCs with dual wireless
connectivity have, shall we say,
shortcomings in the area of user
friendliness, but HP handles Wi-Fi
and Bluetooth cohabitation well.
Rather than having a designated
hardware button or switch that
activates both radios, an application
called “iPAQ Wireless” gives
you one-tap “on” or “off” for
both Wi-Fi and Bluetooth respectively,
and a control that turns both functions
off.
With,
at most, three taps from any screen,
you can start or stop either wireless
function or both simultaneously.
A small icon also sits on the taskbar
at the bottom of the Today Screen
that gives you one-tap access to
the “iPAQ Wireless” app.
Rather
than one LED indicator light for Wi-Fi
and a second for Bluetooth, the rx3115
has a single wireless indicator LED, which
is blue. The light does not blink to show
activity or to indicate which of the two
wireless features are in use (as far as
we can tell), but the light is thankfully
not as bright as other LEDs we’ve
seen, which were so bright that the screen
itself could seem dark at times.
Unlike
other dual-wireless Pocket PCs we’ve
tested, we found the iPAQ rx3155 free of
wireless woes.
Software
Package
The iPAQ rx3115 runs the latest version
of the Pocket PC OS, Windows Mobile 2003
SE. Although Windows Mobile 2003 and Windows
Mobile 2003 SE are largely identical, the
ability in SE to view the screen in either
landscape or portrait mode is an excellent
addition, as well as added simplicity in
some wireless configurations.
Along with Pocket Word, Pocket Excel, Windows
Media Player and the software suite included
on all Pocket PCs, the rx3115 ships with
several applications and utilities that make
the unit more useful.
Most
of the extra applications are multimedia
centered, like PocketTV
Pro (right),
the retail version of PocketTV. This
application is preinstalled on the
iPAQ, which allows you to view MPG
and MPEG video files right out of the
box, a compatibility that is absent
from Windows Media Player. PocketTV
is a very popular third-party application
that won several awards, including
Pocket PC Magazine’s “Best
Video Software” award.
HP
Image Zone is an excellent image viewer,
which provides thumbnail viewing, the ability
to edit or add to digital photos, slideshow
functionality and more. Images can
be viewed in a preview window, as seen to
the left, viewed to fill the screen, or viewed
at full size with a sliding section selector.
A
Today Screen plug-in called iPAQ
Entertainment (right), which is in
use by default, transforms your Today
Screen into a media shortcut center.
Rather than showing the usual date,
owner and email information, a nest
of shortcuts appears on the screen.
From the Today Screen, you can choose
to view photographs in HP Image Zone,
start the Nevo remote control software
or use the Mobile Media application,
which is also part of Nevo’s
iPAQ Mobile Media software (more
on this application in the next section).
A
program called DockWare by Iliumsoft
(left) shows a calendar and photo slide
show whenever the iPAQ is in connected
to your PC or on external power. Think
of DockWare as a screen saver of sorts.
Be advised that the feature that automatically
begins the program must be activated
by the user.
iPAQ
Backup (right), a utility that allows
you to backup your Pocket PC to a SD or MMC flash memory card, is also included,
but another great utility that lives
in the “Settings” menu
called “Format Storage” formats
the portion of the unused ROM called
the iPAQ File Store. This makes clearing
the iPAQ File Store easier than ever.
Nevo’s
iPAQ Mobile Media
As we mentioned in the introduction, the
iPAQ rx3000 Series handhelds are multimedia
focused. A program from Nevo, maker of the
popular remote control software that is also
included on the rx3115, called iPAQ Mobile
Media gives the iPAQ its real multimedia
savvy.
The
iPAQ Mobile Media application exists
as the handheld client for server software
that must be installed on your Windows
PC. By installing the NevoMedia Server
and NevoPlayer software on desktop or
laptop, the Mobile Media client on the
iPAQ can stream content from the PC to
the Pocket PC, transfer content from
the PC to the Pocket PC and allow you
to control your PC with your Pocket PC,
all over your wireless network.
When
you run the iPAQ Mobile Media application,
a menu appears which allows you to access
the functions mentioned above. Let’s say, for example, that you
are sitting in your kitchen and want the desktop in the living room to begin playing your favorite
song. From the iPAQ Mobile Media menu, you
select “Media Control.” With your
home’s wireless network, the application
connects to the NevoMedia Server on the desktop
and gives you a menu of available music files,
sorted by album, artist, title, etc. You select
the song you’d like to hear and, by
way of NevoMedia Server, instructs your desktop
to begin playing the song. Without leaving
your kitchen, you have access to your entire
library.
Supporting
specific audio, video and image files,
you can also view pictures or video over
the wireless network, or stream an audio
file stored on your desktop and listen
to it with the iPAQ’s
headphone jack, not disturbing the rest of
the house. Or, say there are several photos
stored on your desktop that you’d like
to transfer to the iPAQ so that you can show
them at the office. Just connect to your
desktop with the “Media Copy” function
and transfer them to your iPAQ in a tick.
Nevo Home Control is also featured as a part of the iPAQ Mobile Media application,
though it is actually separate. Nevo is an infrared remote control application
that transforms your Pocket PC into a universal remote, good for controlling
TVs, DVD Players, VCRs, TiVo, Digital Satellite, or any other device that has
an infrared remote control. Nevo is highly customizable, and it is one of our
favorite Pocket PC applications.
Overall, iPAQ
Mobile Media is an excellent application,
though you should keep in mind that, as of
this writing, the NevoServer application
that must be installed on your Windows PC
is only compatible with Windows Media Player
9; Nevo tells us that compatibility with
the new WMP10 is forthcoming.
Conclusion
The
iPAQ rx3115 exceeded our expectations,
and aside from a few quibbles - such as
HP’s
failure to include a scroll wheel or USB
cradle - we have no trouble recommending
this Pocket PC. With moderately speedy
usability, both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi onboard,
a small, portable form factor and a brilliant
display, the iPAQ rx3115 offers a lot
for $325-$350.
