I have read through all the threads in this section, but was not able to find the answer I was looking for. I have finally convinced my husband that me getting a palm pilot is a good idea(maybe it was all the papers with important information that were all over the house made him change his mind!! ;))

I do not know anything about palm pilots. Could somebody please give me information on which ones are the better brands to be looking at. I certainly do not want one that is complicated because it would take me a year just to figure out how to use it.

Just some pointers of what to look for or what not to look for would be great. I would greatly appreciate any suggestions

Thank you!!

Hi Minn,
What do you want your PDA to do? You can get Pocket PC that can run versions of Microsoft programs, Palm which can be used for appts, calendar etc. A very important thing to remember on whatever you get is to make sure you back up all of your data back to your pc. My experience with older PDA's is that they would crash and loose all of my data.
Now the real question: Will you remember to keep it with you :)

mainly I want to get rid of carrying around my address book & calendar. I am not looking for anything real fancy, just something to help keep track of appointments, addresses, etc

Remembering to take it with me is another issue............just kidding!!

What you want is pretty basic... so any basic PDA will work... Just check out http://www.epinions.com/cmhd-PDAs_Handhelds or http://reviews.cnet.com/Handhelds/2001-3127_7-0.html?tag=cnetfd.dir for reviews before you buy..

I will do that, thanks so much

Glad to help.. I am actually looking for one that plays music also.. but doesn't cost a fortune.

I have a Tungsten from Palm. I call it my brain. I'd be lost without it..... I highly reccommend looking into the Palm brand.

http://www.palm.com/us/

I had two PDA before, one Palm and one Psion. The problem is that you have be disciplined. Now, I have a cellphone that is a pda too. It has a build-in keyboard (nokia 6820). I love it! Blackberry are cool too.

Save yourself a LOT OF MONEY and get it on eBay.

oohh now why didn't I think of that?! I have bought alot of things on ebay and have been happy

Thanks for the advice

I didn't know whether I would be able to make the transition from a traditional day timer with pen and paper to a pda so I found a cheap used one a few years ago.

I bought an old palm m125 and it's been such a good buy. I paid $60 for this used, but virtually unworn thing. It's paid for itself many times over. I've been most happy that it's been so robust. I've had occasion to drop it a couple of times and it's always bounced back well.

I had a couple of minor glitches with it over rechargeable batteries, but standard alkaline seem to be dead stable.

I've learnt to back up my pda daily as I have so much riding on it now. I especially depend on the repeating reminders for appointments or dates that come up regularly like changing the oil or monthly meetings that I now have the alarm in the pda to catch my attention.

I don't have to forget much if I have entered it into my pda. It has allowed me to let go of a lot of little details I used to fret about and let me focus on the meat of my day without worry about whether I'm missing something important.

I would not like to be without it now, that's for sure.
Cheers!

Thanks Ian. You always have great information to give

Not always Rach, but if I try long enough I get lucky sometimes. :D
hugs ty

well then you "pretend" pretty darn good!!!

I bought a nokia mobile (cell) phone which has an oragnizer built in..that way I usually have me phone, and my friends are AMAZED at my sudden ability to remmeber and txt them on their birthdays :-) I set the alarm to go off at 9am, and if it is a dr apponitemnt etc I set it the day before and the same morning, to be double sure..the phone displays a reminder on the screen until you unlock it, so there is little chance of missing it!! I would never rememebr to take a palm pilot in my pocket every day
I wish I had one years ago

OH, btw, I tried the same thing with an LG phone and it only let me set about 30 reminders, and I had to deletes the old ones to add new...not too good, so I swapped back to the nokia..so if anyone buys a new phone to use as a reminder gadget, make sure it has unlimited reminders

I recently bought a palm TX model to help me out. I'm finding it hard to be disciplined enough, but I'm working on it. I manage to keep it with me most of the time. I even keep my shopping list updated on it.

I used to use my nokia phone to do this, but it just wasn't versitile enough.

The beauty of this model - non volatile memory. When I forget to charge it and sync my data to me pc I don't lose what's on the pda. It's taken a long time for this to be a feature of pda's and it was one of the main reasons I bought it. I had an older palm model that was forever running flat and losing everything.

For those after other features, it can be used as an mp3 player and I also have read of lots of people who have bought it to watch video's and movies on too, although I use it pretty much only as a diary, address book and task manager.

I had a Palm Pilot (a few years ago). It died after 1 year 3 months. Of course it died 3 months past the warranty. I was not happy with it, the battery didn't last long. I had to reset the palm on a weekly basis.

Then again, it was an early model. Maybe they've worked out the kinks by now :)

I miss having a PDA, though. Now, I lug around a date book. I just love that the PDA held so much in it, addresses, phone numbers, calendar, notes, books, games.

I think I'll look into buying a new PDA, but I highly doubt I'll go with Palm. Luckily, I have the 2006 Consumer Electronics Guide. I'll have to peruse it.

I'm using a Palm Z22, and I love it. It's cheap and does all the basic functions a palm needs, and I've NEVER had the battery die on me, despite the fact that I use it regularly.