Hewlett Packard HP 620LX

Technological improvement occurred rapidly during the late 1990's with regards to portable computing and the Hewlett Packard HP 620LX is a fine example of this (with some caveats). The 620LX was the follow up to the HP 300 series, one of which I reviewed here. Released in 1998, the 620 took the basic premise of the 360 and added new bells and whistles to make it the then go-to model. These included a new version of Windows CE (v2.11 compared to 2.00), a faster SH3 processor (75MHz instead of 60MHz), double the memory (16Mb), more ROM (10Mb) and most obvious of all, a colour screen. Now before anyone gets too excited, when I say colour, I mean 256 colour CSTN with the same 640x240 half VGA resolution as the 360, so nothing special even compared to the laptops of the time. However, colour was something new and it was a useful feature to add, certainly making the built-in Internet Explorer somewhat more user friendly. All this for a launch price of £699 ($899). In today's money, that's north of £1,200.00!!!

That's the extended battery right there. The case is nifty too.

First up, that new tech meant a bigger device, and, as you can see from the picture below, it’s a fair bit larger than the 360LX and the much older Psion Series 3. The card is for scale. That extra space didn’t entirely go to waste as the keyboard, whilst keeping the calculator style of the 360LX, has slightly larger keys and they are more widely spaced. This does mean that it is easier to type on and I got up to a decent, accurate speed with it. It's still not in the same league as the follow up Jornada series or the Psion 5's (yet to be beaten) exemplary keyboard. There are also some application softkey shortcuts above the keyboard and four to the right of the screen.

Yes, I still buy books from a high street shop! What's your problem??? ;-)

It certainly looks the business.

As the device has a colour screen, the keyboard and symbols have a splash of colour themselves and the unit itself is a rather tasteful black rather than the dark grey of previous models. Think Psi-Corps compared to the dull Earthforce Security...

Also doubles as a make up mirror. So I am told...

A note on that screen. It is very readable but uses that popular tech of the time, the resistive touchscreen. This means that you really need the included stylus to get any real use out of it and it’s reflective as hell, as you may have noticed from the pictures. Being CSTN, it does appear rather washed out but you can change to contrast to help out with that.

That reflection is me taking the picture. Told you it was reflective...

That extra bulk (1.29 lbs vs 1.01 lbs of the 360LX) meant that the newer machine was no longer a jacket pocket “whip it out when required” (oohhh-errr, missus!) device. Nope, the 620LX was just too damn big and that was with the smaller battery. The picture with the carry case also shows the extended battery that adds a smidge more weight and sticks out of the back of the device. That said, the extended battery does mean you can make it through a full working day with extra to spare, not something that could be said of the standard power pack.

As per the 360LX, the software is the usual Windows CE mix of office applications and utilities, with just what seems minor enhancements. There is the expected compact flash card slot for additional memory and a PCMCIA Type 2 slot for network, modem and VGA adapters (amongst other things). A word of caution here though: any use of the PC card slot means a dive in battery life, and the extended battery isn’t much help here.

What makes it useful to this day, removable storage.

You can also get a very fragile docking cradle that acts as a syncing aid, but in reality, is neither use nor ornament and its true purpose was to take up desk space at home when you weren’t being an always connected on the road net-warrior (how '90's!).

Even with two rather suspect batteries, the 620LX is still very usable today and, if using a rucksack or other large bag, would be the go-to device if I couldn’t carry the Alphasmart. That would also include a mains adapter as twenty year old battery cells are unpredictable, as well as a spare back-up battery as those coin cells get chewed up pretty badly when the main battery goes. And that pretty much sums up the caveats with this device. It's a bit too large as a handheld and the move to a colour screen meant ditching the ubiquitous AA battery for a lithium-ion pack that also meant carrying the mains adapter around for when the pack inevitably died. 

620LX, 360LX and Series 3 - at least the screens got bigger.

Upon its release, the 620LX was described as a laptop killer. Bigger and of more use than a PDA, smaller and more portable than any laptop at the time, it seemed to be the perfect middle ground. Yet, as time was to prove, it wasn’t. Practical use was hampered by the form factor (the keyboard too small for real touch typing, the screen too small for more than one person to view at a time) and the abomination that was Windows CE/Handheld PC – an operating system that never truly knew what it was supposed to be. Tech also improved with laptops and when you’re paying seven hundred quid for something, you want it to work well. Ultimately, business users (for that was who HP were aiming for with the 620LX) didn’t jump ship to the product and by the time the Jornada 720 was released in 2000, the writing was on the wall for the device format.

Pretty similar but the bigger keys do it for me.

That is not to say that some silly fools continue to try to get some use out of these devices and as I said above, it’s a handy machine and a good back up.

This will be the last of the retro tech pieces I’ll be doing for a while, the main reason being that I have pretty much bought the machines I wanted to and these cover pretty much everything I need (and there is no way I am paying that much for an Apple eMate 300!). You could say I am a fool for using this old tech but to be honest, it works for me. I am not a fan of touchscreen keyboards, adding a keyboard to a tablet is akin to adding a chocolate handle to a frying pan and modern day small keyboard devices are rather expensive. So with that, if you’ve missed any of my previous pieces, the links below will take you to them and below that, a picture of the collection:

SonyPEG-UX50

AsusEEE-PC 904HD (Catchy name, that)

AmstradNC100

OregonScientific Osiris

HandspringVisor

PsionSeries 3

Alphasmart3000
HP 360LX
Zodiac Tapwave

Seven Days to the River Rhine - Preview

Seven Days to the River Rhine by Great Escape Games describes itself as a fast play set of rules covering the NATO/Warsaw Pact 1980’s. It claims it is suited especially for large multi-player games where each side has an overall commander who guides strategy and the other players control the actual units. In this preview, I’ll let you know what I think.

Not as gung-ho as Team Yankee

I had heard of this game last year but it wasn’t until the First Partizan of 2019 that I saw a demo game taking place. Intrigued, I searched for a copy of the rules and found a set for around a tenner. The rules themselves are a nicely produced 44-paged softback accompanied with a set of special cards. More on them later.

The overall layout is clear and concise, with quite large text and numerous photographs. Unlike Team Yankee, these picture detail miniatures from several manufacturers and credit is given to them with each picture.

The process of play is based on command tokens and initiative. One player has the initiative, uses their command tokens, then there are reaction rolls and this continues until all of the command tokens have been used or the other player steals the initiative via a 6 on a reaction dice roll. On the whole, this is probably the part of the game that I am dubious about the most. It just seems so finicky and I can’t help but think that the process as described might hinder fast play more than help. Having said that, most games I have played are simultaneous movement and effect so this initiative malarkey is a bit of a stranger to me. When we do get round to playing these rules, we’ll see how this goes. There is the usual morale and stats sections and the rules don’t get too bogged down in minutia unlike some sets I could care to mention.

The biggest game changing aspect of the rules would be the Tactical Advantage Cards. These are mostly generic but there is a card specific to each side and whilst I can see how they can add to the game, I am not entirely sure they help the game play to the period, and that is a thing for me and my approach to historical gaming, hence the amendments I made to the core Team Yankee rule set last year. A play through will sort out that question. 

Another interesting part of the game is range, or lack of it. Except for infantry fire, there are no defined ranges for weapons, the inference being that given the scale of miniatures used, assigning ranges to say tank cannon fire in relation to an assault rifle would make the scale of the game look a bit funny. Again, I can see how this would help the game but would add a caveat in that if you game on quite a large table as we often do (say 16x5 feet), you’ll need to consider terrain and buildings in you scenarios or you’re just going to have a shoot ‘em up on your hands. Then again, maybe that was what they were going for with the fast paced point of the game.

Sgt Bradford and a QR code? Tsk!

There is one bugbear that I must comment upon, and it’s nothing to do with the mechanics or the style of play. No, it’s a layout choice and one that peeved me slightly with my recent look at Cruel Seas. It’s the ‘advice’ boxes, from either Sgt Bradford for the British or Lieutenant Vasilov for the Soviets. These seek to impart tactical or strategic advice for those in it for the game and whilst I can understand why the designers put these sections in, they do come across as a little condescending for anyone with only a little knowledge of the tactics of the period. It’s a small thing, and you may very well disagree, but I would prefer it if games designers did not think every reader is a bored child with the attention span of an MP in a re-election campaign. Oh, and in case you don’t understand what the rules are trying to tell you, there are QR codes that will lead you to videos explaining the relevant section of the rules. Helpful, maybe, appearing to cater for the Fisher Price ‘My First Wargame’ market, almost certainly. I know I am being waspish here but if you can’t explain a simple process in two paragraphs, are you really trying at all?

It could be considered easy, and lazy, to think of Seven Days to the River Rhine as a kind of Team Yankee lite without the model catalogue level of miniature pictures. And yes, it would be. The designers have clearly thought long and hard about what they wanted to put on the table and, my reticence aside for initiative table tennis, it feels like they have succeeded in their self declared goal. For the price, I don’t feel set upon by the rules and there isn't the relentless commercialism of Team Yankee and its ilk. As with my recent Cruel Seas preview, I have certain doubts but am more than willing to give these rules a full airing, probably in late 1990’s H’irraq at 15mm or West Germany in 20mm if the kit is available. Command Decision is our usual modern rule set (albeit at a different unit scale to Seven Days or Team Yankee), but the latter has become our alternate go to set with suitable amendments. You never know, maybe Seven Days could replace TY in that role. We shall have a play and find out.

The State of the Blog (and what a state it is too...)

Since we are now into the second half of 2019, I thought it appropriate to provide an update on what's going on with this blog as well as other projects I am involved with.

At the beginning of the year, I set myself a target of three to four posts per month, obviously depending upon having something to write about. Whilst the cadence of posts hasn't been entirely predictable, I've hit that three per month target in every month except May, so I'm pretty happy with that. There have, however, been a couple of other things that have taken up time which has, to a degree, slowed down my posting here.

First up is Then There Were Two, a podcast featuring myself and Eddie Carter of Attention Please, Across the Pond (search Facebook for AttentionPlease1976 for both of those shows), All The Time I Was Listening To My Own Wall Of Sound (link here) and Bearded Gentlemen Music (link here) infamy. You can hear the first two episodes here and more will be incoming. We're also on iTunes if you're so inclined (search in podcasts to Then There Were Two. It's the one with the two dodgy fellers on it...) and there is a Facebook page to be found by searching for TTW2NE. The format for these is pretty simple. Around an hour in length, opinion based and containing ramblings of two middle aged bearded gents, Then There Were Two will basically be a talking shop on various topics, one topic per episode. Four have already been recorded and they will be released on a monthly basis. Another recording session is due next week and as each one is released, there'll be an update on the Facebook page.

Spot the podcast - it's the one with the parental advisory.

In addition to TTWT, there is also Retrovideogamer.co.uk. I was asked to provide some retro game reviews a couple of months back and have so far posted four, with more in the works. It's a fun thing to do and not only does it allow me to replay games from yesteryear but it also allows me to develop my reviewing skills as well. My reviews are posted under the name Oystoa77 and if you have any requests for old videogames, have a look at the platforms supported and let me know via this blog or my Twitter handle @andrew_oyston and I'll see what I can do.

Of course, with the podcast and RVG, that has eaten into my spare time a lot but with a bit of careful planning, this shouldn't affect the TIT much and, as I noted above, as long as I have something to write about then I'll be putting it on here. This will include expanding into the other hobbies and interests I have as well as some more in-depth pieces that I can't cover elsewhere but also the occasional op-ed as well. Let's see what the rest of 2019 brings, shall we?

Toy, Train and Sci-Fi Mega Fair - Newcastle

I have been going to war games shows for over twenty years but on each of those occasions, I have never attended as a simple punter. When I saw a Facebook advert for the Toy, Train and Sci-Fi Mega Fair being held at the Newcastle Eagles Arena on Saturday 6th July, it piqued my interest.

I'll admit it now and say that I am not one for trains or toy collections. Trains never really grabbed me, not like aircraft or military ships do, and toy collections are only something that I might look at from a wargaming point of view. I do like sci-fi though and show me a die-cast aircraft carrier and I'm yours, so to speak. Ahem, anyway, I thought there might be enough to interest me and I'd never been to a show like it before. Since it was local and there was nothing else planned for the day, my good lady and I ventured to deepest, darkest Scotswood Road to find out what the show could offer.

We arrived shortly after ten, missing the queue to get in but finding the room rather busy. The show itself occupied two-thirds of the room, the other third being used for basketball practice. It sounded like it anyway as there was a barrier dividing the two. Lighting wasn't too bad. In fact, it was rather decent and nothing like the horrid orange sodium glare you get at some sports venues (Gateshead, I am looking at you!).

The show is pretty much traders only with a couple including some display tables as well - the Meccano set up was good and the railway table was really good - ok, trains aren't my thing but I can appreciate when a lot of work has gone into something and that work is on show.

Quite a decent venue.

Walking anti-clockwise round the room, the traders here were very much train-heavy on kit. One trader pretty much occupied the right hand wall of the show and if that's your thing, you'd have been in seventh heaven.

A lot of stock of rolling stock...

Choo-Choo's, Sir! Fa'sands of 'em! (A slight exaggeration!)

Moving on brought out the die-cast traders and my only criticism of the trade here. Most traders arranged their stock in neat rows or on top of container lids or in a loose fashion about the table top. All well and good. There were a small number who just had plastic and wooden boxes with stock dumped in them, leaving you to search for anything you might like. It's one way of doing it but it doesn't do the toys any favours and cost one trader a sale. A die-cast aircraft carrier in its box. Nice, I thought, but on closer inspection, it had been kept in with a jumble of other die-cast kit and the box was shredded, the model loose inside and some damage had been taken to the flight deck. No sale there then. Some traders did have some nicely painted toy soldiers that looked the part but for the prices they wanted, would stay put.

Don't ask how much.

Sci-Fi traders took up the rest of the show and it was mostly a mix of Dr Who and Star Wars toys. All I'll say to that is why did my parents let me play with this stuff as a kid? The prices being charged for toys I played with 35 years ago are in many ways silly, but charged they are and I saw some people pay them too.

There was a cake stall for refreshments and a book trader as well. Sadly for me, he dealt in railway books only so that was a dud. The final stand that caught my eye was the one in the picture below:

What in the actual f...? A doll's head in a lamp???

I initially thought it to be steampunk which I have a sneaky liking of, but no. The wares available here were weird and off-putting. I get the idea, but I don't like the look.

Two points remain to be made about this show and they both relate to the attendees (and for those who attend war games shows, you'll know exactly where I am coming from):

• Back packs were a thing here and more than once I received a glancing blow from someone turning around without looking to see if there was anybody near them. I know why people use them but for the love of all that is holy (non-denominational or Cthulhu, it's your call), carry them by hand when in an enclosed space.  
• The unwashed. By that, I mean some of those who attended had not seen a shower or a bath in days. I know it's been rather warm recently so you would expect a bit more attention to personal hygiene but a couple of blokes in there were so bad, I gagged as they passed by. This wasn't fresh, same day sweat. This was sour and cloying, built up over days. I know you can't expect organisers to deal with that issue but it still surprises me that people leave the house in that state. 

So that was the show and a well organised one it was too. I picked up a couple of thoughts for future war games and I'll be turning up next year when they will have the whole hall and up to 30 additional traders. It's something a bit different and I might find something I like next time.