Table A, below, provides a short summary of the winners and categories. Be sure to check out the Product Availability section, at the end of the article, for contact information and Web URLs.

Handy hardware devices (and the software that loves them)
The products that won the award in this category are those that integrate the Palm device with new and interesting hardware.

BeamLink from JP Systems
If this isn't a Rube Goldbergian gadget, we don't know what is (and if you don't know who Rube Goldberg was, see http://www.rube-goldberg.com/). Here's how BeamLink, shown in Figure A, works. First, you need a two-way pager with an IR port. Then you need an IR-equipped Palm device. So far, so good. Now, you write your email on your Palm device and then aim it at your pager. Using BeamLink, your Palm email is now in your pager and uploaded to the paging company, and then off to its intended recipient. It also works in reverse, bringing email in from the paging company into your Palm device.

FIGURE A

It requires some serious manual dexterity, but it's cool making your Palm computer email through your pager.

Minstrel from Novatel Wireless
If you don't have the dexterity for BeamLink (or you want to surf the Web and take advantage of other IP-related activities), you need to check out the Minstrel wireless modem from Novatel Wireless. This is a rig that snaps around the Palm computer (it makes the Palm computer about twice as thick), and gives you complete wireless email and Web access.