Stowaway,
Palm Portable and Targus Stowaway For Palm, Handspring Visor, Clié,
iPAQ, HP Jornada, Kyocera 6035 and 7135 - Posted in 2002 by Lisa G.,
Editor in Chief
What's in a Name?
ThinkOutside developed the Stowaway and sells
it under their own name. They supply the keyboard to Targus
and Palm, who sell the keyboard under their own brand names.
So, regardless of whether you buy a Palm
Portable Keyboard, Targus Stowaway or
a ThinkOutside Stowaway, you're
getting the same keyboard and driver software. The Palm Portable
is available for all Palm devices, the Targus is available
for all models listed above except Palm and Kyocera, and
the ThinkOutside is available for all models listed above.
You'll find Palm and Targus brands at most retail outlets,
while you can buy ThinkOutside Stowaways directly from ThinkOutside.
The Stowaway is the most popular PDA keyboard
to date, and has become the standard by which other keyboards
are judged. Why? When unfolded open, the keyboard is a reasonably
rigid keyboard with full-sized keys and notebook key travel
(how far the keys move down when pressed). When not in use,
it folds into a neat little rectangle not much bigger than
a Pocket PC or Visor. You won't have to adjust your typing
style to use a Stowaway.
Open the spring latch, unfold the keyboard
and use the red-lined grips to lock the panels together and
you've got a rigid keyboard that flexes only in the center
joint when picked up and moved. This means you can use the
keyboard on uneven surfaces, though you may be bothered by
a bit of center joint flexing if you use it on your lap.
Offset of center, there's a flip-up stand that supports your
PDA for easy viewing when it's docked via the sync port to
the Stowaway.
Installation and Driver
The software is excellent. You do not need
to disable the keyboard driver when you wish to sync your
PDA to your computer.The Targus
and Palm branded keyboards come with drivers in the box on
CD. If you buy the Think Outside branded keyboard, you'll
have to download the drivers from their website.
Palm OS: No Hackmaster required on the Palm. The driver installs
as an application called "Keyboard" on your PDA. The application's
screen, is similar to Palm prefs: it has a popup menu on the upper left
to select between additional screens: General, Command Keys, Layout,
Pointer and Help.
You can set repeat delay and rate, enable and
disable keyboard, turn on key clicks (audible typing feedback
on the PDA, but not really necessary since you can hear the
Stowaway keys as you type), assign applications to 9 command
keys, enable the Jog-Dial on the Sony Clié, select
between Dvorak and normal keyboard layouts, and you even
have the option of having an on-screen pointer display by
pressing the Alt key (ever lost track of your cursor?).
Pocket PC: The "stowaway" application
installs into your Programs group. It's a 4-tabbed interface
which allows you to enable the keyboard driver, enable Hot-Docking,
set key repeat and repeat delay, assign 10 Hot-Keys which
can launch the applications of your choice, and set keyboard
layout (normal, Dvorak, French, Japanese, German, Italian
and Spanish). Unlike the Palm, there's no help tab, but then
again, everything is pretty self-explanatory.
Conclusion:
As one of the most usable, portable and durable
PDA keyboards available today for many popular PDAs, we strongly
recommend the Stowaway family. Awesome driver software, closest
to real keyboard feel and folds up quite small. Our favorite!
