In this month's edition of Letters to the Editor, we received some interesting thoughts on what Palm can do to improve. Naturally, we also got quite a few responses to last month's editorial by David Gewirtz entitled, "The morbid fascination that is Palm, Inc.," at http://www.palmpower.com/issues/issue200209/ppeditorial0902001.html.

A better PDA
This is intended as a letter to the editor to address hardware developments at Palm. I own a Palm Vx handheld PDA, which I think has been a fantastic tool. Several friends have now gotten Compaq iPaqs as they run Windows CE and are easy to use. However, they are bulky, and I suspect Windows CE is a lot slower and less robust than the Palm operating system.

I now want to get the next generation Palm handheld with the following improvements:

• Color: Why? Because I want to display photos from my digital camera on the Palm handheld. Ideally, it should have a reasonable color display (say 420 x 360 minimum and a large format).

• Sound: I want to play MPEG files with high quality.

• A lock: This is so I don't accidentally turn it on when it's in my pocket--the Palm m515 still does this.

• Good battery life: Ideally, it should be as good as my Palm Vx, not bad like the Compaq device.

• Compact flash 1 and 2 compatibility: Basically, I want to be able to use memory cards from my camera in the PDA (and transfer images from the camera on the move). Also, Compact flash 2 means I could go whole hog and put a microdrive in the PDA and expand the memory to gigabytes.

• Good communication: This would be via infrared and Bluetooth (when available) and connectivity with the Internet.

• Good included software.

• Small size format.

I have recently seen the Sony CLIE PEG-NR70V with 16MB memory for £449. This is just the sort of thing I want. It displays photos fairly well, has a keyboard I don't need, and has a lock. It also allows you to use the full display to show pictures and includes Documents To Go. However, I'm unsure how good the MPEG playability is on it and how good the battery life is. It uses Sony Memory Sticks, and I would rather not have to purchase Memory Sticks if I can avoid it.

So come on Palm, give us what we all need, a better PDA, before the Pocket PC takes over the market!

Regards,
Terry Cakebread