Sound recording
The Palm Tungsten T features one-touch voice recording so you can capture and record voice memos. You can then later email them from your desktop computer. It also features a headphone jack, as seen in Figure C.

FIGURE C


The Palm Tungsten T features voice recording and a headphone jack Roll over picture for a larger image.

Wireless communication
The Palm Tungsten T handheld has built-in Bluetooth connectivity, so it can communicate with other Bluetooth-enabled devices, such as phones, printers, PCs, or other handhelds. The Palm Tungsten T handheld includes a suite of phone drivers for the major Bluetooth phones on the market.

Battery life, memory, and expansion
The Palm Tungsten T has an internal, rechargeable lithium ion battery, which Palm says should last up to one week with basic PIM usage at default brightness before recharging. The device comes with 16MB of memory with 14MB of actual storage capacity, but you can use expansion cards for additional applications and storage.

Like the rest of the most recent Palm handhelds (excluding the just released Zire), the Palm Tungsten T handheld comes includes the Palm Expansion Slot for SD Cards, SDIO, and MultiMediaCards. It also utilizes the Palm Universal Connector for connection to the HotSync cradle and hardware add-ons.

On the subject of hardware add-ons, to accompany the announcement of the Tungsten line, Palm, Inc. also announced the Palm Ultra-Thin Keyboard. The product hasn't yet been released but a tiny teaser picture of it is available on Palm's Web site, as you can see in Figure D.

FIGURE D

The Palm Ultra-Thin Keyboard is a new type of foldable full-size keyboard.

The Palm Ultra-Thin Keyboard was designed and manufactured by Think Outside, makers of the previous foldable Palm Portable Keyboard. The case unfolds to a standard QWERTY keyboard, with 18mm key spacing and 3mm key travel. The new keyboard has an aluminum design 30 percent lighter and half the thickness of the previous Palm Portable Keyboard. Another improvement over the previous model is that the Palm Ultra-Thin Keyboard is rigid enough when open to use on a lap or other uneven surface. The Palm Ultra-Thin Keyboard is $99 (estimated U.S. street price) and scheduled to be available in limited quantities beginning in late November in the United States. Volume worldwide availability is expected in early 2003.

The Palm Tungsten W handheld
The Palm Tungsten W handheld actually has more in common with the Handspring Treo line than its Tungsten T cousin. In particular is the fact that the Palm Tungsten W handheld only runs Palm OS 4.1.1 on a Motorola Dragonball VZ 33mHz processor. Similar to the Treo 270, it's an integrated GSM/GPRS wireless handheld with a built-in keyboard and a color screen. It does resemble the Tungsten T, however, in that it features the one-handed, 5-way navigation, a 320x320 resolution screen, and integrated Bluetooth connectivity.

The Palm Tungsten W ships with Palm VersaMail, new personal email software for POP and IMAP email accounts. Features include the ability to download and view the text of Microsoft Word documents and HTML email attachments, advanced folder and filtering capabilities, the ability to delete many messages at one time, and common tasks such as forwarding email and moving messages. There's Windows PC synchronization support, and you can synchronize email with Microsoft Outlook, Outlook Express, Lotus Notes 5.0, and Eudora.