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