Rating: 
Summary: PalmOne gets cheap.
Review: OK, the people that designed this baby, should be fired, or given a crash course on not getting cheap with a product of this price.I love this little baby; mp3, buttons, video fx, pictures (fair at best,). But, I have my distaste for certain things which may sound trivial, but are important to many of us. 1-Can't Palm supply this expensive device with a quality belt carrying case? I paid 20 bucks for mine at Staples, and the button is starting to become loose. A 4 dollar product for Palm, if they decided to buy them and including them with the product. Instead, they give you this piece of crap cover, which is the most impractical case you can see. 2-The blue paint on the side, peels like a banana. What the hell is that made of? 3-The power on button is awkward, somtimes turning on when the case touches it out of random motion. Couldn't have placed it on the bottom of the unit? Apart from the aforementioned, the unit is pretty good. But why would Palm get so cheap, and not address these petty problems which could of been rectified with some practical designers? Next time I buy a PDA, I will do my homework, and see if the competition can offer a solution to these petty problems. Otherwise, I'm somewhat satisfied. I hope not to encounter the battery life nightmares that some people have. Not able to replace the battery, is like spending $$$ on a car, and not being able to replace its battery. Makes you wonder if Palm wants you to replace them every year. Disposable Palm is what the message is conveying.
Rating: 
Summary: Good for 18 months, then went belly up.
Review: The Zire 71 was a pretty good PDA for the first 18 months of its life. The camera was kind of a "wow" feature when I first got it, but the picture quality is poor. I haven't found much use for the camera, but overall the Zire 71 worked pretty well.
The problem is that the touchscreen has gone haywire. It no longer responds appropriately or predictably to the stylus and the PDA has been rendered useless by this problem. Unfortunately it is not worth the $125 that palm charges for non-warranty repair.
Rating: 
Summary: terrible software and terrible support
Review: I am quite pleased with the handheld itself and have never had any major issues with it. The desktop softare, however, is downright terrible. I can't switch to a yearly or monthly calendar view without having it crash. I have reinstalled several times to no avail.
I contacted tech support but they never seem to understand the problem, insisting I reinstall their software even though that is what I have already told them I've been doing. I filled out a survey telling them I was unhappy because they hadn't been able to solve my problems and never heard from them again.
If a decent competitor arrives on scene with better software, and better tech support, palm will quickly be a thing of the past.
Rating: 
Summary: FRUSTRATING!!
Review: I loved this when i got it for xmas 2003-- then about a year later, the trouble started.. i had many problems hotsynching with my mac at work, finally worked that out, and then the battery must have been running by being in my purse (the joystick must have been pressed in) and i lost everything on my palm. i had backed up fairly recently and was able to convert alot of my info back on to the unit... then the fun really started! some phantom appeares to be playing with my palm, i will hear click click click and it will be in a loop of toggling beetween functions, or in the calandar it will highlight an event over and over again, and i can not get it to stop. I will turn it off and turn it on, and still the same issue - we did a restart and now it is unusable- the stylus will not respond and it just clicks all over and it is a waste.
I am sad because i really enjoyed the camera function and used it a lot for quick pics to friends and family via email of things that were new in my life.
i will have to find a new pda, and i do not see myself getting another one of these, beware!!!
Rating:
Summary: Palm has a dirty secret...
Review: This was my first venture into the PDA world and I am sorely dissapointed. For starters the unit is rather large in terms of thickness and adding a protective case only makes it worse. Also the built in software is almost useless, necessitating 50-100 dollars worth of software purchases just to get this thing to do what you want. And lastly, the dirty little secret is that all your data, programs, everything is lost when the battery dies and doing a hotsync will not restore your programs you have to reinstall them from scratch. There is no backup battery!!! I must have lost my data five times before giving up on this piece of trash. Even when the PDA would warn me about power consumption I would turn the unit off and plug it in the next day only to have my data whiped again. I am very surprised that there are no class action lawsuits over this, as I would never have purchased the unit had I known of this flaw.
After having this unit for a month I went out and bought a Dell PDA and have never looked back since. Unlike the Zire it does have a backup battery, so my data is safe for extended periods. I will never buy another palm product again.
Rating:
Summary: Good handheld.... poor design
Review: The design flaw on this handheld could be the cause of the Zire 72. The Zire 71 has a little joystick to navigate. The issues is that when it is in the slim carrying case and in my purse, the joystick gets pushed and the handheld comes on and stays on. This has run my batter down so many times. When the battery is totally dead, you have to reboot which is kind of a pain and you have to reset some options. My advice is to HotSync often to save valuable information.
Other than this flaw, I have loved my Zire 71. I have almost had it for a year. I have purchased the dictionary/thesarus card and a memory card so that I can listen to MP3s.
Rating:
Summary: Horrible unsupported product
Review: I had the same experience as many with the screen intermittently freezing up just after 1 year. I never used it ruggedly and it was protected in a hard case the whole time.
If the product didn't have mechanical problems it would be ok but these seem to be quite frequent on this model and from what I've heard on many of the other Palm brand models as well.
Rating:
Summary: Zire 71 is Junk
Review: I bought my Zire 71 back in march and the thing is junk. It's a good palm if you only have it in the sync cradle on your desk. They have no belt clips and with in the first 2 weeks the palm froze and I lost all info. It still does this periodically and the screen does not respond just the buttons. After a few weeks of jumping from program to program and freezing it will work well for another month and then do the same. I will not buy another palm. PalmOne service is not good and takes forever to send and receive for repairs. I plan to only have this expensive ball and chain for a year. All the accessories are expensive but made cheap. I paid 25 bucks for a leather belt case from Palm for the Zire and the rivets holding the loop ripped within a month. As I speak the digitizer is jumping all over the screen and I can't even hit the dot with the stylus to tap the target! I got ripped off!!
Rating:
Summary: Makes a nice paperweight.
Review: I've had this product for less than a year, and have babied it carefully. I purchased a nice "rhino skin" hard case, and I've never dropped or abused it. At about 6 months old, the screen intermittently freezes up and either won't take input, or the input is goofy - as if the digitizer is waaaaay off. I sent it in to get repaired, but I wonder if they even looked at it. When I got it back, it does exactly the same thing it did before sending it in.
This is the second palm product that has given me close to the same problem. I will never buy Palm again.
Rating:
Summary: speaker
Review: everything is cool except for the speakers. after a while it doesnt seem to make any kind of noise. only when i put in my headphones i can hear the noise. is there anything i can do to fix it???? somebody help!
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