Help: I need some advice.

I've toyed with the idea of getting a Blackberry, but didn't want to bother with the $50 monthly access fees. So, now I'm thinking cheapo eBay Palm Pilot.

Why I Think I Need This, or Something Similar:

If I can't keep track of my day-to-day spending via MS Excel, I will shit.

If I don't have a portable source of the travel info I've been collecting, I will not remember it

If I don't have a portable method of writing on-the-fly, I will spend way too much on internet cafes


Specific Needs:

Must be able to use MS Excel and MS Word

Must be small and inconspicuous

Must be cheap so I don't totally shit if it gets stolen

Must be able to upload with it... ie// sync-up with PCs in internet cafes relatively easily to upload my writing


Does anyone have any good suggestions? All I can think of that fits these criteria is a Palm, and I know that the black & white ones are cheap and good on batteries. It doesn't need to have WiFi, but it would be a plus just-in-case as I have yet to figure out how I'm going to do my banking securely while I'm gone, but that's another topic for another day.

I've read on travel forums that some people had some troubles using their sync software with their Palms in internet cafes, is this always an issue?

quote:

Originally posted by ChristineHind:
Does anyone have any good suggestions?

How about paper and a pen?

You can keep track of spending

Portable place to record travel info/notes

Write on the fly - even without batteries!

and

Is small and inconspicuous

It is cheap

You can always take a picture or scan of your writing and upload the image as your blog update. The dirt/oil/grunge will add travel authenticity.

but

No, it does not run excell.

Sadly, does not feature spellcheck.
.

quote:

If I can't keep track of my day-to-day spending via MS Excel, I will shit.

Dude you're wayyyyyyyy uptight.

Consider getting something with an SD card slot. Synching in internet cafés is a complete pain.

If you save in 'rtf' format, any word processor will do as M$ Word can access those documents. I don't know much about spreadsheets, but I reckon it's similar. So it shouldn't matter to much whether the thing runs Microsoft programs.

Despite (at long last) having acquired a PDA/mini-laptop, I still take my notebook along. The battery will run low/out.

quote:

Originally posted by semicolon:

quote:

If I can't keep track of my day-to-day spending via MS Excel, I will shit.

Dude you're wayyyyyyyy uptight.

LOL. Yah, I know. It's more out of interest than anything -- I'm leaving for over 2 years, so if I don't keep track of my finances than I'll have to cut things short which would be a greater travesty than suffering through my anal retentiveness.

quote:

Originally posted by whalewatcher:
Consider getting something with an SD card slot. Synching in internet cafés is a complete pain.

If you save in 'rtf' format, any word processor will do as M$ Word can access those documents. I don't know much about spreadsheets, but I reckon it's similar. So it shouldn't matter to much whether the thing runs Microsoft programs.

Okidoke... SD card thingy slot...

I've been doing the palm (Tungsten T3) thing for about a year while travelling and while I use it mostly for my blog, it holds up well in other areas too (expenses/calender/contacts etc). Tend to do everything on the palm and save it to the sd card, use an adaptor and copy/paste everything across once in an internet cafe. The hotsync, in my experience doesn't always run smoothly but I do tend to fill it up with allsorts of shareware crap. I only have myself to blame. The upside is that it replaces your books, photos, music/mp3, timetables, allsorts - anything to save room or weight. If you take it to Europe with a foldup keyboard then I can't tell you what bliss it is to use a qwerty keyboard that doesn't change with the countries. You can pick up on ebay for maybe £50/$110 Loads of other models all running word, excel and the 'to go' versions (never understood why). Forget lugging the bulky cradle/charger around. You can pick up a hotsync cable/charger on ebay for a few £££/$$$. I copy/paste into 'wordpad' as sometimes the different versions of 'word' lockup on me.
HTH

elv

Just bought a Palm T|X with folding keyboard. Haven't had too much time to play with anything useful yet but I think I've figured out all the functions and configured things like using versamail to grab from my gmail inbox. It's nice to be able to get mail from a random street corner where I can see several wifi spots at once. Hard to find a random strong signal though.

I've got the 14 day return policy to play with the keyboard and Documents To Go suite to see if I can use it for writing. I'll post back here if I end up ditching it, but I think I'll enjoy having it as a lightweight travel option. Even just for things like taking the ferry where I'll have wifi.

Highly recommend going with a Palm, but for more reasons than originally listed. The top three reasons I travel with one are - address book, Metro (a freeware program that allows you to figure out what trains, buses, etc.. to take to get around a city), and e-books. Carrying books around when traveling for an extended period of time is not practical and the availibility of books in English can be very limited depending on where you travel.

The only purpose of syncing is to make sure data on the computer matches data on your Palm. All you really want to do is move data. As Whalewatcher mentioned, an SD card is a very efficent way to do that.

ok, I've been toying with the idea of "going Palm" again after a few years away from them. And after reading this thread, (and using the money I made selling some stuff on craigslist) I bought a Tungsten E2 and the folding keyboard last week.

damn you all. -- I kid, of course.

so far, I am impressed. Way better than the old Palm I had some 5 yrs ago, of course. I like the functionality.

I've installed the DocumentsToGo software - a full version was included free. Seems to work pretty smoothly back and forth for Word and Excel docs.

**-> But Elvie, you say there are other ways to move docs to & from the Palm? And how do you write docs on your Palm? (what application do you use). Thanks.

One last thing: I fully agree with using the SD card to transfer data from Palm to internet cafe -- just take along a USB reader. Many times easier than trying to HotSync at a cafe.

All of my documents are saved to the sd card and then opened in wordpad or notebook or something similiar. The trouble with docs to go is there are many different versions, as there are 'word' and sometimes they just aren't compatible. If everything is opened in wordpad then you can simply cut and paste into whatever you want. I've found this to be the simplest method of transferring text.

Writing docs on the palm?? If you open the documents logo and click 'new' in the bottom left corner then a new file appears. Select the 'word' option (I rarely use word to go) and save to the sd card as usual.

Hope I've understood you on this

elv

I think I got it. See if I'm doing it right:

So I use Docs To Go on the Palm to write a file, but save as a true "Word" doc, not in "Docs to Go" format. Then save the file to the SD card, then simply plug SD card into computer and copy over the ".doc" file (bypassing the whole Docs To Go sync) -- I just tried that and it worked brilliantly.

I can see how that'd be the way to go when traveling - one would definitely want to bypass the Docs To Go format and compatibility problems.

However when at home on my own computer, I think the Docs To Go sync is nice to use - it keeps the files on my laptop (and in their respective folders) and the copies on my Palm is perfect sync. I only have a handful of files I need to port around with me anyway. I've only been using this for a few days though - still lots to learn.

Thanks for the help! brilliant job Elvie.

Happy to help

Haha Christine.

I was in the exact same predicament! Had an old Palm III i never use anymore. And a blackberry device that was kinda useless without data, and it didn't support international sim cards anyway.

But I took my laptop, and opted to take neither handheld.

I put my calendar online, and am going with pen and paper for now.

I was mostly concerned about having a calculator or better yet a currency converter. People told me I could buy "disposible" cell phones over here, so that is my task for today. I'm only 3 days into my trip so I'm not really sure of the verdict yet.

Good luck
chris

blog.chrissipe.com

Hi all, I ended up getting an HP iPAQ Pocket PC which is perfect for my needs because it has Excel and Word, plus an SD expansion slot, wireless, and bluetooth. No folding keyboard yet but maybe I can pick one up cheap in the BKK.

So far, it's awesome!!