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PDA Reviews HP iPAQ rx3715 Pocket PCEditor's rating (1-5): Review posted September 22, 2004 by Lisa Gade, Editor in Chief The iPAQ 3715 is at the top of the line among HP's new Fall 2004 "Digital Entertainment" line of iPAQ Pocket PCs. The iPAQ rz1715 and the rx3000 series models comprise the Digital Entertainment iPAQs, and these target consumers with a taste for multimedia and performance. HP lists three rx3000 series models in the US: the rx3115, rx4314 and rx3715, though the rx3415 appears only in HP's US specs pages and not on their main site so we're not sure if it will be available here. The camera-less rx3115 seems to target the US market and hasn't been announced for Europe or Asia, likely because of US corporate rules about cameras in the workplace and even public schools. All rx3000 series models have much in common, varying only in casing color, processor speed, available memory and the added camera in the case of the iPAQ rx3415 and iPAQ rx3715. You'll notice much of this review is similar to the rx3115 because many of the features, software and hardware are identical. Features at a Glance The iPAQ rx3715 is an excellent offering in the $500 price range. It runs Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition (SE) with native support for both portrait and landscape modes and has a fast 400MHz processor that benchmarks well. It has 56 megs of RAM and 96.5 megs of NAND memory available as the File Store, an SD slot supporting SDIO, a 1.2 megapixel digital camera, large capacity removable battery, Bluetooth and WiFi. That's a lot of features to pack into a compact device!
In the Box The iPAQ rx3715 comes with a replaceable Lithium Ion battery, world charger, cradle (for syncing via USB and charging too), stylus, earbud headphones, case, software CD and several manuals including a thick "Special Features of the rx3000 series" manual which covers the bundled multimedia software in depth. Design and Ergonomics While the rx series doesn't have the style and curvy good looks of the last generation iPAQ 1945 and 4150 models, it isn't bad looking either. It's thicker than the rz1715 and the wider, shiny black side insets and graphite finish do much to balance the device's hard-angled design. The unit is compact for a Pocket PC, and as you can see from our comparison photo, it's one of the smallest Pocket PCs. All rx3000 models use the same casing and are the same size, they vary only in color.
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The device has a clean design, and the only button you'll find on the sides is the record button on the upper left. The SD slot is located on top as are the IR window, power button, headphone jack and stylus. On the front you'll find an LED that indicates wireless radio status and another for charging status and reminders. The iPAQ has a 5-way directional pad flanked by two buttons on each side. By default, these buttons launch, from left to right: iPAQ Mobile Media, HP Image Zone, Nevo AV remote and iTask. On most other Pocket PCs, these buttons launch the PIM apps, but since this is a multimedia oriented device, HP went with their multimedia apps. As with all Windows Mobile devices, you can re-map the buttons to launch any application you wish, and as with all 2003 SE devices, you can specify which applications are launched when the buttons are pressed and held for a second or two. The d-pad itself is small and takes some effort to press, which isn't the best thing for action gaming but works fine for other tasks.
The removable Lithium Ion battery lives under a large door on the back of the unit, as is the camera lens. As you'd expect, the sync connector is on the bottom edge, and it's the same connector as the iPAQ 3000, 5000, 2200 and 6315 models. For example, my iPAQ 5555 charger works with the rx3715 as does my iPAQ 6315 cradle. HP now refers to this as the universal connector, but don't confuse it with palmOne's universal connector, because they are different!
Display and Sound
The rx3000 series iPAQs use the same display and it's very bright, colorful and sharp. It has a neutral color bias and is perfect for viewing photos and watching movies. It has a 3.5" QVGA (240 x 320) transflective display, which are standard specs for Pocket PCs.
Sound is great on the rx3715 and all the rx3000 series models, as it should be for a multimedia-oriented device. The iPAQ is very loud and you'll be able to hear movies, alarms and music in rooms with average or a bit higher than average noise levels. Like all Pocket PCs, the iPAQ has a standard 3.5mm stereo headphone jack, and unlike all, the unit comes with a set of earbud headphones. Sound quality is excellent through headphones and the volume is plenty loud. The iPAQ Audio control panel allows you to control headphone treble and bass as well as set microphone AGC (automatic gain control). All Pocket PCs have a mic and voice recorder, and the iPAQ is no exception.
Camera
While cell phone and PDA cameras won't compare with a standalone digital camera, the iPAQ 3715's 1.2 megapixel camera takes excellent photos by those standards. The Sony Clie models have had some of the best cameras, and this is the first I've seen that really challenges many of their offerings. Colors are often true and saturated, even in bright daylight where other PDA cameras overexpose and blow out highlights. It handles indoor lighting well, as long as the room is decently well lit. Don't expect it to take good shots outdoors at night or in dimly lit rooms, but do expect it to take nice shots in rooms with decent sunlight and in well-lit offices. See the sample photos below. These were shot at the best compression setting, 1280 x 960 resolution. You can click on an image to see the full size, unedited original.
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The 1.2MP camera can take still photos up to 1280 x 960 in size, as well as lower resolution photos. You can shoot videos at 176 x 144 or 128 x 96 with audio if you like.The camera has 4x digital zoom (digital zoom basically enlarges pixels and crops the image, and is not the same as optical or lens zoom). It saves photos as JPEGs, and videos in MJPEG or H.263 (BGPP) format. Video quality is pretty decent and is best for well lit indoor environments. Audio quality was surprisingly good.
The software offers a variety of camera settings, though I found in most cases that the auto settings did a good job. As with the iPAQ 6315, the camera software works in landscape mode and uses the full screen as the viewfinder. Along the bottom of the screen you'll find a large shutter button and smaller buttons for zoom, help, movie mode/still image mode switching, and settings. Settings allow you to turn on/off camera sounds, use a self timer, control white balance (auto, sun, tungsten or fluorescent), set color (full color, b & w, sepia, negative, cool), set image quality compression (good, better, best) and even select from center-weighted or averaged AE metering.
WiFi All Fall 2004 iPAQs (rx3000 series, hx4700 and the 6315) except the entry level iPAQ rz1715 have both WiFi and Bluetooth wireless networking. All use HP's new iPAQ Wireless as your one stop application for managing these wireless radios and their connections. The large round buttons turn each wireless radio on and off, and the other buttons allow you to manage each wireless connection's settings. The iPAQ rx3715 has built-in WiFi 802.11b wireless Ethernet networking. It has very good range even though it doesn't have an external antenna. The iPAQ uses the Windows Mobile Connection Manager (a part of the OS) to manage wireless connections, and the device supports 64 and 128 bit WEP encryption, 802.1x using PEAP, SmartCard or Certificates. It comes with the Windows Mobile Certificates applet for managing certificates. The connection worked reliably for us when connecting to access points (with and without WEP) and worked seamlessly with iPAQ Mobile Media. Bluetooth The iPAQ uses HP's Bluetooth Wizard which is powerful and user-friendly. It walks you through connecting to a variety of devices, from your ActiveSync partner (if you have a USB Bluetooth adapter installed on your PC), to mobile phones to access points and GPS units (it doesn't support Bluetooth headsets). The Bluetooth software is made by Widcomm and is version 1.5.0. I ActiveSync-ed wirelessly, connected to Belkin and Red-M Bluetooth access points for Internet access and transferred files to other Bluetooth enabled Pocket PCs. |
iPAQ Wireless is where you'll manage your WiFi and Bluetooth radios and connections. |
iPAQ Mobile Media Player and Nevo Software HP's iPAQ Mobile Media (powered by Nevo) allows you to listen to MP3s, view photos and watch videos stored on the Pocket PC. It supports Windows Media format video files (.WMV), MP3s and images (JPEG, BMP, GIF, PNG and local TIFF files). The Windows XP-only desktop apps, NevoMedia Player and Server, work with iPAQ Mobile Media on the Pocket PC to allow you to manage and play music, pictures, and video through your wireless home network— very cool. You can also wirelessly transfer your digital music, photos, and videos from your networked PC(s) running NevoMedia Server to your iPAQ and take them with you. The iPAQ app has a Media Control function that allows you to control movie, photo and music playback on any Windows XP machine running the player app on your network. You can also stream movies to the Pocket PC and view photos stored on a machine running the server. All worked well when we used the iPAQ to control music, image and video playback on a networked PC running Windows XP Pro, and we were able to copy multimedia files from the PC running the server to the iPAQ. However the iPAQ player won't play MP3s via a streaming connection (yuck), and won't play Windows Media movies streamed from the server if they have any form of copy protection. Playing non-copy protected content via streaming media, we got sound but no video. The manual says that streamed WMV files must be formatted specifically for the iPAQ in order to playback, but gives no information on what that means exactly. The same movies do play fine when stored locally on the iPAQ. A shame, if this unit could stream MP3s and all WMV files of 320 x 240 size or less, it would be much cooler. Last but not least, there's the ever-popular Nevo AV remote, which keeps getting better. Nevo is a powerful AV remote app that will allow you to control pretty much every piece of home AV equipment on the market. It controls TVs, VCRs, DVDs, CDs, amps, tuners, cable boxes, satellite dishes and more. The list of supported brands is amazing, and the interface is unique yet very intuitive. You can set up multiple rooms and switch among them, so you can control your living room AV gear, bedroom stereo and TV, and so on.
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