The discipline imposed by keypad-only input also forced Microsoft's designers to scrub a lot of inefficiency out of the Pocket PC interface. For example, you can look up a contact then return to the main screen single-handedly, a trying task on a Pocket PC handheld.
There are still some awkward moments here, which I can only hope are fixed in the 2003 Smartphone release (it's available on phones sold overseas, but a Microsoft spokesman couldn't tell me when it would arrive here). The contacts view wastes space by using one line apiece for city, state and Zip code; a lengthy settings menu should be condensed to fit on one screen; receiving information from other devices via infrared beaming requires finding a well-hidden "Infrared Receive" application; and the "system busy" cursor pops up a little too often.
Motorola's MPx200 costs $300, but smart shoppers can find rebates that bring the price down to zero.
(The Washington Post)
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This is also the only cell phone I've seen that can't get the current date and time automatically from the cellular network.
The MPx200's e-mail program can synchronize with your Outlook inbox or pull mail down from your Internet provider via the POP and IMAP standards; it sensibly downloads just the headers of messages, allowing you to choose to get the rest of each e-mail.
Attached photos can be viewed in the MPx200's Internet Explorer browser, but a Word file went unrecognized -- the MPx200 doesn't include the Pocket Word or Pocket Excel found on other Pocket PC devices. But if you need to read or edit Word attachments on the go, a device with a screen this small doesn't make sense anyway.
MSN Messenger software is included, but since almost all of my friends use AOL's instant messaging instead, I didn't get any use out of it.
The weakest part of the entire Smartphone system is Internet Explorer. Its "fit to screen" option rarely did that, requiring me to scroll from side to side to read most Web sites (but at least I could view regular Web pages, instead of just the specially formatted sites most phones are restricted to). The AT&T GPRS connection also frequently faded out or slowed to a crawl.
The MPx200's Windows Media Player, which can play back MP3s and Windows Media audio and video files (except for songs bought on the Musicmatch or Napster services), turns this phone into a compact MP3 player with surprisingly good battery life -- 6 1/2 hours. Included are 32 megabytes of memory, and an SD Card slot offers additional room.
In some respects, the MPx200 can feel like a prototype. But overall, it's pleasantly usable as both a phone and a read-only organizer. Between hardware like this and other contenders -- in particular, phones that use the Symbian operating system, which offers contacts and calendar synchronization like the MPx200's but sometimes inferior Web access and music playback -- the competition in this category of smart-if-not-quite-brilliant phones should be interesting to watch.
Living with technology, or trying to? E-mail Rob Pegoraro at rob@twp.com.
