Rating: 
Summary: Good but limited
Review: The address, email, memo functions work well for me. The calendar function is a bit less useful. I like to see the week in full and the month in full. The Palm cannot substitute for a paper-based system in that regard. (Had tried the calendar function for about 6 months.) Was annoyed with the inability of the Palm to schedule an every-other-week appointment although other repeat scheduling worked well. Also, have had my Palm for about a year and a half and strange things are beginning to happen--the on and off switch is not very responsive; the "today" setting is continually changing to an earlier day despite my resetting it. Other weak points: No expandable memory. Problems using/downloading the Palm with multiple computers (work, home, laptop). No ability of Palm to offer a consumer upgrade or trade-in when the Palm is on its deathbed of usefulness after only a two year life. It is a handy product but limited. There needs to be more intense product development to meet the needs of this user.
Rating: 
Summary: Pretty much perfect
Review: This is a great product. I've used mine for a year and a half and never had a single hard reset (which causes all data to be lost). Its small size allows you to protect it with a hard case and still carry it everywhere comfortably in your front pants pocket. This is great because it means you always have it with you when you want to use it.For people who write a lot of papers for work or school it can be a cheap, tiny alternative to a laptop. In my opinion this requires three additional purchases: a palm portable keyboard [price], docs2go software [price], and flashpro backup software [price]. The keyboard folds up to be slightly larger than the palm itself. You couldn't really carry it in a pants pocket, but you could definitely carry it in a jacket pocket. It folds out to a full size keyboard. Docs2go software can be purchased [on the internet], and allows you to create, view, and edit word documents on your palm and then save your work to your computer automatically when you hotsync (it also allows you to view and edit excel spreadsheets, but I haven't found this as useful). Flashpro software can be purchased [on the internet], and allows you to backup your work to the palm's flash memory (like having a 500k hard drive on your palm). As I said above I've never had a hard reset, but if you wrote a five page paper and your Palm did crash you wouldn't be very happy, and the software's pretty cheap. I've used all three of these products for several months and been very happy with all of them. One thing that might be worth considering is that 8 MB is a lot of memory for the Palm operating system. I use my Palm Vx a LOT, write papers on it, store pdf files, etc., and I never use more than 2 MB memory. So if you can find a cheaper new Palm V [...] or something it might be just what you need. From what I can tell the extra memory is only useful if you plan on storing large databases (like interactive maps, dictionaries, etc.). But hey, for [price] this is a great product. For a total of about [price] this is a whole laptop that fits in your pocket.
Rating: 
Summary: A Classic and Still The One To Compare Others To
Review: I've owned my Palm Vx for about a year and a half now. Despite the hype over much higher priced units, I still think it's one of the best PDAs out there. What I Like 1. Memory, and lots of it. If 8 Mb does not sound like a lot, think of what you're using a PDA for. There's plenty of room for the phone book and appointment book. That's 80% of what I use my Palm for. I've never run out memory. 2. Lots of freeware and cheap shareware add-ons. The most useful is the new Palm PDF Reader from Adobe. I can take important documents with me as a PDF and have them as a look up document. Other nifty utilities I've picked up include a travel alarm clock with World Time Zones, IP Calculator and some neat games to pass the time. Coming on strong are text document readers and databases. 3. Good monochrome display with adjustable contrast. Sure color on PDAs is a hot topic, but from what I've seen, color is not worth it on a PDA. The color is poor and it really decreases battery life. 4. Built in rechargabe power and long battery life. No hassle with batteries: drop it in the cradle and it recharges. I've gone as long as three weeks without recharging. What I Don't Like 1. I had to add PocketMirror to synch with Outlook. When I upgraded my desktop, the Outlook synch was lost until I purchased a new PocketMirror. I have no gripe with the performance, I just wish this was a standard feature 2. No expansion capability. I know I said it has enough memory, but I wish I could add an MP-3 player or use SmartMedia for archive storage. 3. It looks so nice I have to watch out someone dosen't "adopt" mine! PDA's are what most people really need when they say they need a laptop. If you really do need portable spreadsheets or data bases and total e-mail management capabilities, you *do* need a laptop and no PDA is going to fulfill your needs. A PDA is a handy electronic version of the old standby appoinment book with some adapatability to other tasks. As for the current crop of hype topics: Wireless? It's a solution in search of a problem. Color? Keep it on the big screen where it belongs.
Rating:
Summary: Can't beat it in most categories
Review: I must concur with most of what the previous reviewer has said. In just about all of the categories that are important to me for a PDA, this model is the best. It has the most stable OS; it's small, slim, light and easy to use. The Palms and others like it have traditionally been touted as being small enough to fit in your shirt pocket, but this is the only one that really fits comfortably. The battery life is still the longest among rechargeables with around one week of constant use and two weeks or more of occasional use in my experience. The only handhelds with longer battery life are the Palm or Palm OS based PDAs using AAA batteries. There are still more third party and freeware applications out there for Palm than any other OS and new applications are being created often. The 8 MB memory has proved to be more than enough for me to store all of my notes, appointments and address plus several web sites in abbreviated form for the Palm using the AvantGo application, AND a 1.5 MB database I downloaded! The color would have been nice but I didn't want to sacrifice the battery life. Also, the expansion slot would be nice in the future but I don't see much application for my needs right now. So for my money this was definitely the best choice. If you decide to get one you might like the hard case for protection and a nice clean look. Also, check the Palm web site to see if you received the most current desktop application. If not, the updates are usually free and the newest version has some nice features.
Rating:
Summary: You won't understand how you lived without one!
Review: I've owned a few palm pilots over the past several years. I switched to the Palm Vx because my Palm III gave out after months of abuse riding in my back pocket. The Vx is solidly built, very reliable and never needs batteries. I use mine heavily and sometimes forget to recharge it in the cradle. I've found that the battery lasts about three weeks with heavy use as long as you don't use the backlight. I now use my Palm Vx with my laptop running Windows 2000 and synchronize my data using the infrared port. The cradle is just a charge stand for me! If you're nervous about buying this product... relax! I teach computer skills to executives in the Chicago area. The learning curve for Palm devices is about 20 minutes. There is a shorthand called "graffiti" that you will need to learn to write in your information, but you can also use your computer or a separately available keyboard to enter in your data. Newer and more powerful palm devices have been introduced since I bought mine, but the Vx is an excellent value now that the price has dropped. And it's still the smallest! If you're looking for a PDA to handle your personal and business information and do not need to display color photos, videos or play MP3s, the Palm Vx is perfect.
Rating:
Summary: HOW DID I GET THROUGH WITHOUT IT?
Review: At first I thought that the Palm was just a showoff tool to impress co-workers. But when my sched got pretty hectic, i decided to get one to organize(yeah) my sched. How did it work out? WELL I CANT LIVE WITHOUT IT NOW AND IM WONDERING HOW I MANAGED LIFE BEFORE IT.
Rating: 
Summary: Palm Products a Design Failure
Review: The Palm V is the second Palm Product that I have owned. (After purchasing a Palm Pro and experiencing numerous problems, I upgraded to the V, hoping to salvage my large database of entered addresses.) And, for the second time, I am EXTREMELY disappointed with the Palm Products. BOTH Palm devices displayed the same problems, specifically: (1) after a few months of ownership, the screen response begins to fail, requiring almost daily recalibrations of the Digitizer; (2) many attempted recalibrations of the digitizer simply fail, because the screen become SO far out of alignment, that the user can NOT enter necessary menu selections to even request a digitization; (3) attempted Full Device Resets become impossible, since repeated Full Resets begin to no longer properly reset the device; (4) as the screen begins to fail, the ability to enter keystrokes in the Graffiti language begins to decrease, forcing a user to rely on the screen's slow and tiny "QWERTY" keyboard; and (5) the Operating system still lacks simple security, such as permitting a user to set the device to automatically power off with a password lock (if a user wants a security shut-down, a user has to step through several screen strokes in order to EXPLICITLY shut the device off with a password...no automated lock is available on power down).
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful tool, but don't expect too much.
Review: I've owned my palm vx for almost two months. By all accounts, it was well worth the price.. I went from using an internet-based calendar and address book (which I couldn't carry with me) to using the Palm Vx for all of the things most people would buy an organizer for. In addition to using the calendar and address book, I sync my Palm Vx with my e-mail at work so that I can read newsletters that I subscribe to at my convenience from my palm. Writing an e-mail is slow, but possible. I was very gung-ho about using third party apps, such as a spreadsheet application to interface with Excel, because I use spreadsheets a lot. But I've given up on that - the spreadsheet software for the Palm is somewhat confusing, and the screen is really too small to be able to use a spreadsheet effectively, at least in my opinion. Still, it was a good investment, and I have no regrets. The desktop software is an incredibly powerful program that I would be tempted to use even if I didn't own a Palm. I sync my Palm with the desktop software at least twice a day, and I can manage my calendar, address book, to-do list and memo pad all from my desktop. Now that I have begun using my Palm, I would be hard pressed to ever again be without an electronic organizer. I am much more organized, and much more productive with everything on my palm.
Rating:
Summary: My first Handheld
Review: I've only had my Palm V for 3 weeks and I don't know how I ever managed without one. It's perfect for synchonizing my crazy home & office schedules into one place. It was easy to get started, synchronized my Outlook files, had a clear display (although color would be nice), played the fun games while waiting in traffic, etc. I also bought the leather case and it's become the most important thing in my purse (other than drivers license and money, of course!).
Rating:
Summary: Palm Vx is great
Review: I love my Palm Vx. I thought of buying the M500 but decided not to due to the cost and not currently being supported by Omnisky Wireless. I like the M500's screen better than the Palm Vx but not enough to justify the extra $100. As of now I didn't see any need for the expansion slots but I'm sure over time there will be a number of usefull extras that come on the expansion cards. Overall I'm pleased with the Palm Vx and would recommend it to anyone.
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