Toshiba e570 Pocket PC:

  Toshiba has bided its time before entering the PDA market, but it looks to have been worth the wait as the Pocket PC e570 is a well designed and well specified piece of hardware. Specifications are crucial for any PDA--the better they are the more productive you should be able to be. So the 64,000 color display, 64 MB of RAM and eight-hour battery life, all of which are at the top end of what can currently be managed in a PDA, are all enticing.

  The StrongARM processor from Intel fairly flies at 206 MHz, and should be able to cope with video played through the supplied Windows Media Player as well, of course, as riffling through your contacts, diary and e-mails and sending MP3s to stereo headphones (not included).

  The presence of both a Type II CompactFlash slot and a MultiMedia Card (MMC) slot are also welcome. Having just one of these types of slot is useful, but having both means you can choose just about any kind of hardware and software add on, from CompactFlash digital cameras and 802.11 wireless cards to Bluetooth on MultiMedia cards, and of course even more added memory on either format. The device also supports Type I CompactFlash and Secure Digital (SD) cards, through the aforementioned slots.

  On the design front the two-tone gray of the casing looks neat, and you can even buy interchangeable colored side-bars to add a touch of personalization to your e570. The native software is Microsoft's Pocket PC 2002--the latest version of that operating system. It is stored in Flash ROM. Flash ROM is important as it should allow you to administer software upgrades and patches easily yourself allowing you to keep your PDA up to date.

  Pricing matters, of course, and Toshiba has done well to put quite so much hardware into this device for the money. Supplied accessories include AC adaptor, stylus, USB cradle, AC power cable and a soft case. If you are looking for a capable, upgradeable, powerful and neat PDA, this machine should definitely be on your list of possibilities. --Sandra Vogel

Features: 

Technical data:

Display:

System memory:

Interfaces:

Pointing device:

Processor:

Battery:

Physical dimensions

Sound system:

Operating system: 

Warranty:

Multimedia:

Bundled hardware: