A PPC runs the Windows Mobile operating system (built on Windows CE and .NET), which is a slimmed-down counterpart to Windows. It has much the same look and feel, but not all of the features of Windows (hey, how much can you get into these tiny units?). You'll see the familiar Start Menu, taskbar, Control Panels (called Settings) and so forth. Navigation is pen-based, or you can use your finger if you don't mind smudges on the screen. The screen is a fixed portrait oriented 240 x 320 pixels (specified by Microsoft) in all OS versions prior to Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition which offers both landscape and portrait orientations and support for VGA resolution. The latest OS, Windows Mobile 6, supports even more resolutions, including 320 x 320. Most Pocket PCs offer transflective 16 bit, 65,000 color screens. All have one or more expansion slots (Compact Flash and SD on older models, miniSD or microSD on newer phone edition models) which allow you to add more memory (all), modem and network cards (those with CF, SD or miniSD slots). All Windows Mobile 6 Classic (the new name for Pocket PC) and Windows Mobile 6 Professional (the new name for PPC Phone Edition) devices are compatible only with PCs running Windows. They have a USB sync connector, so reallly old versions of Windows like Windows 95 won't work since they don't support USB. Windows Mobile devices come with no Mac support, though there are 3rd party syncing apps (MissingSync for Windows Mobile and PocketMac Pro) for the Mac that can do the trick.

Pocket PCs are generally a bit larger than a Palm OS devices, though some models are now as small as some Palm OS PDAs. You'll get the following applications with Pocket PCs: Pocket Outlook for mail, calendaring, contact and task management, a Notes Application, Pocket Internet Explorer, Pocket Word, Excel and a PowerPoint viewer. Input is done using the stylus and the on-screen keyboard, or via handwriting recognition programs included with the units. These recognition programs work remarkably well! There are models with thumb keyboards, and these are phone editions.

Windows Mobile 6 Professional and older Phone Edition Pocket PC models incorporate a cellular phone into the Pocket PC, and are available on CDMA networks (Sprint and Verizon) as well as GSM networks (T-Mobile and AT&T). Non-Phone Edition models, now called Windows Mobile Classic, do not have built-in mobile phones.

Windows Mobile 6 devices hit the market in 2007, and it offers minor UI and some behind the scenes improvements over Windows Mobile 5 including support for more screen resolutions and HTML email. In addition to the Professional and Classic versions, there's Windows Mobile 6 Standard Edition, which is the new name for MS Smartphone. Standard Edition smartphones don't have touch screens and look more like traditional mobile phones.

Windows Mobile 5.0 was released in the early summer of 2005, and the first devices running that new operating system began to appear in the early Fall of 2005. It boasts quite a few improvements, including persistent memory, which you can learn about in our Introduction to Windows Mobile 5.0.

Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition was announced in the Summer of 2004. It varies little from Windows Mobile 2003, hence the "Second Edition" title. The most significant feature of Second Edition is the ability to support larger displays such as VGA (Pocket PCs have always had QVGA 240 x 320 displays) and both portrait and landscape display orientations. In the US there are two VGA Pocket PCs: the HP iPAQ hx4705 and the ASUS A730, both of which were released in the Fall of 2004.

A Little History

Windows Mobile 5 devices began hitting the market in September 2005. They offer all of the features of Windows Mobile 2003 SE, and add improved mobile versions of Internet Explorer, Word, Excel and Outlook. WM 5 adds PowerPoint Mobile, which can read and display PowerPoint presentations, basic GPS driver support (3rd party drivers are no longer required for GPS devices) and more. The user interface was improved somewhat to make one-handed operating possible (still a ways to go here), and to make the device more intuitive overall.

Windows Mobile 2003 (sometimes called Pocket PC 2003) was introduced in June 2003. It bears many similarities to the original Pocket PC 2002 operating system, but it has numerous bug fixes, a more capable version of Pocket Internet Explorer that supports many current browser standards, improved networking capabilities and support has been added for XScale optimized 3rd party applications. It's built in the Windows CE 4.2 core, while older versions are built on Windows CE 3.0. You can read our Pocket PC 2003 Comparison here.

Pocket PC 2002 was introduced in the Fall of 2001. It's fairly similar to the original Pocket PC operating system, but the user interface and networking capabilities were significantly improved.

Generally, Pocket PC 2002 units physically differ from their Pocket PC forbearers in 2 ways: they have more built-in memory for storage, and faster processors. Pocket PC 2002 models were replaced by Pocket PC 2003 models in the summer of 2003.

The original Pocket PC OS and models were introduced by Microsoft on April 19, 2000, is the oldest iteration of WinCE for the PPC. These models are discontinued and were replaced by Pocket PC 2002 in the Fall of 2001.

Standard Features of Windows Mobile

They all include a stereo headphone jack and Windows Media Player, which can play MP3 files and Windows Media format movies (ASF and WMV). There are several free and commercial video players from 3rd party developers that can play MPEG1, AVI and DivX files. You get Mobile versions of Word, Pocket Excel, PowerPoint (viewer) and Internet Explorer as well as a calculator, MSN Messenger and Pictures & Videos for viewing photos. Some come with Terminal Services. Handwriting recognition is a part of the operating system and works well.

You have three handwriting options pre-installed on the units: one for printing letters, one for writing in script and another that's a Graffiti clone. In addition an on-screen QWERTY keyboard allows you to peck away at letters and numbers if you don't want to use handwriting recognition. Even if the PDA has a built-in hardware keyboard, you'll still get these software-based solutions.

All Windows Mobile devices come with MS ActiveSync, the desktop syncing app for Windows desktops. It syncs your Outlook data to the PDA (you can select what will be synced-- i.e.: you can choose to sync contacts but not email if you desire). ActiveSync supports "partnerships" with 2 different computers (i.e. home and work) on the Pocket PC, and file/application install capabilities (in "guest" mode) from as many PCs as you like. You'll also use ActiveSync to install applications and transfer files to the PDA and to backup the PDA. Unlike Palm OS PDAs, backup isn't automatic, so do remember to choose the backup menu item in ActiveSync on the PC regularly to backup the PDA, or turn on automatic backup. The newest versions of ActiveSync (4.5 for XP and Windows Mobile Device Center under Vista) have no backup option.

Battery life averages three days on a charge with average use for non-phone models. Phone models generally need charging nightly or every two days with moderate to heavy use. Since the introduction of Windows Mobile 5, all devices have persistent memory, which means they won't lose their data if the battery runs dry. All Windows Mobile 6 Standard Edition (and older Smartphone Edition) phones have persistent memory, regardless of OS version.

Most PPCs have 32, 64 or 128 Megs of RAM (memory), and 128 megs or more of ROM (where the OS and built-in applications are permanently stored). They run on XScale ARM family processors at speeds of 200 to 624 MHz, depending on the model. The specs vary depending on the price of the unit, just as with notebook and desktop computers. But all of these devices pack quite a lot of power in a small package! Most PPCs also have one SD card slot (generally used for memory cards and SD WiFi cards) and some have a CompactFlash Card slot, generally used for adding more memory (these are the same memory cards many digital cameras use). The CF expansion slot can also accommodate CF modems, wired Ethernet cards, Bluetooth cards and WiFi (802.11b wireless Ethernet networking) cards. Current Pocket PCs with CF slots can accept both type I and II cards. Phone Edition models generally have microSD cards for storage expansion only.

All Pocket PCs come with a 2.5mm (phone models) 3.5 mm (PDA-only models) stereo headphone jack, a stylus with touch screen, built-in speaker and microphone, syncing cradle or cable, rechargeable Lithium Ion battery, color display and hardware-based navigation buttons. Several models feature integrated WiFi and/or Bluetooth wireless networking.

So the PPC has Palm functionality, often with greater processing, memory and graphics capability than many (but not all) Palm OS PDAs. The Pocket PC operating system is more demanding however, so it needs more processing power and memory compared to Palm OS PDAs.

Read our Introduction to Windows Mobile 5.0

View our Windows Mobile 2003 Second Edition Model Matrix

Read our Windows Mobile 2003 Model Comparison

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