Tungsten T5 - Complete Review!

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ilalaloveit12

New member
My T5 finally arrived! *cheers* Yes, it's finally here, for all those suffering with me during my USPS problems. I'm still ticked at them, but much happier now! :D This review will come in several installments as I use the PDA, so bear with me please. I won't lock it or anything, so feel free to ask questions if I miss something.



First Look
The T5 is somewhat similar to the TE, yet at the same time, quite different. While the E looks and feels cheap, the T5 is weighty (but not heavy), and looks like something out of a CEO's office. It doesn't show fingerprints like the TE does.

The screen is as promised. It's VERY bright and doesn't glare much. It is somewhat hard to read outside (unlike our m505s), but if one must use it outdoors...it can be done.

The stylus feels good in the hand. It's solid, and basically the same thing as what the TE's came with.

Sound isn't bad, especially with headphones. My MP3s sounded great on the T5. I even decided the speaker in the back was a good thing when the unit was paired with a hard case. The case reflects the sound, more or less amplifying it and giving it a fuller sound.


Software
Here's where palmOne has been getting the most flak. Everyone has been on them for the supposedly quirky OS 5.4. I have to disagree. The new OS seems pretty solid. It took the device about a minute to boot up the first time, and about 10 seconds whenever a soft reset was required. Resets are NOT always mandatory after hotsync. You're only required to reset if you've installed some sort of new system database, or application that has to hook into the system. The device has crashed once in the day or so I've used it. This crash was USER error, though. I was following the instructions for installing PocketTunes on a T3. The T3 requires two extra databases: StatusBarLib and AppSlipRotate. After installing these, the T5 crashed, and when it came back...there was no status bar!!! I immediately figured out what happened and put Filez on to resolve the issue. We're back to perfect working order. The reason for the incompatibility is that the T5 ships automatically with those two libraries. No need to install them any longer.

Overall the apps are good. I've had no troubles with any of them, although I haven't tried the Calendar bug yet. It doesn't really matter anyway, as P1 has already released a patch for that issue. Check the T5 support pages for more info. The Files app was slightly dissapointing, as it only controls files on the INTERNAL Flash and any EXTERNAL memory. It won't control or view the system RAM. You'll still need Filez or FileMan. Everything else seems to work great, including Docs2Go. I was impressed. (It does only have 4MB dynamic heap, or it's being misreported by TealMemBrain, one of the two. Not sure if this is going to be an issue yet.)

Okay, so it does have some down-sides that I'll mention in my next posting. However, I'm late leaving on a trip right this moment, so once I'm at my destination, I'll see about getting more details in, rather than a summary.

Overall so far...a great device.
 
sorry Matthew but Ive read virtually every post on this machine on pdastreet, rabroad, palm1src and PalmInfo and I certainly dont think that 'great' is a good description of it....a built in filemanager that doesnt...go figure!! Reset after installing everything new...wahh!! 4Mb dynamic heap (I told y'all!!), USB 1.1, major software incompatibilities, already a report of digitizer drift (albeit on an early review unit) and this odd memory configuration that, apart from being non-volatile, is a total mess and hardly any advantage over 64Mb DRAM, an SD card and missingsync/card export IMHO. Dont forget that flash RAM has only a certain number of read/write cycles - for storing and maintaining ever changing datebook, phone, memo, todo etc databases this may not last very long. This in combination with the fact that none of the old accessories will work, no included cradle and all of this for $400.....I just dont get it. Jezz, even the OS5.4 SDKs havent been released yet...aaaarrrggghhh.

Having said that, if you are happy with it, then that is, indeed, great! Look forward to hearing the rest of your experiences. I would love to get hold of one of these but at the moment, I cant see any reason to buy one over the T3, or even, heaven forbid, a PPC....

Cheers

steve
 
First off:
"Dont forget that flash RAM has only a certain number of read/write cycles" (SOS)

I DIDN'T KNOW THAT! I wonder how many. That's certainly curious, and I wonder how many JackFlash "rewrites" of updated apps I'll get, with compaction, et cetera - I've never heard that before.

Mhamann: Short and sweet and "stalled" by your trip as this review is, I must thank you for something interesting I saw nowhere else . . . "TealMembrain . . . . ."

Now I know TealMembrain (which worked in OS4 but only has partial functionality in OS5 under TealMaster - you can't boost dynamic stack, for example) will AT LEAST RUN on the T5. That means that TealMaster has to run, too. And that means TealLaunch will probably run . . . so as brief as your review is so far, my eyes jumped out when I saw that!! At least THAT's something. Cool beans -- every little bit of info helps.

Otherwise (what a shock) . . . I'm with SOS . . . it's just a "non-event." At least AppSlipRotate/StatusBarLib come included. Too bad they replaced that gaffe with some brand new bugs, which as Jim Cooke and the Datebk5 review pointed out, haven't all been FOUND yet.

SOS: I'm interested in the "finite number of rewrites" thing regarding flash -- do you mind me asking where you heard that and is there some sort of "ballpark" amount of rewrites? I have a ton of stuff in flash, as you know -- and when apps are pulled out for UPDATING and then moved back to flash, that would constitute a "rewrite," correct? After a few of those, JackFlash automatically COMPACTS the flash to save contiguous space . . . so that's probably ANOTHER rewrite.

Hmmmm. Wonder how many of those bad boys you get? I'd like to email Brad Kish and ask him, but I'll wait for your knowledgeable and non-biased 2 cents beforehand!!

I will of course expect you to fill out some sort of legal form and GUARANTEE me in writing that MY FLASH will last forever!! HA HA HA !!

Thanks for the "heads up" on that . . . I'm skeptical, but you've obviously come into information that I haven't . . . and information is power!!

\Cheers
 
Woooohhh you said USB 1.1 !!!!!!
I cant Believe that. I was trying to get the specs from Palmone and nowhere does it says which USB it has.
Where did you get this info?
I believe you, but I cant believe that Palm would release something that uses a USB 1.1 and not a 2.0.

mas
 
I would need to be convinced that Flash RAM has a limited number of read/write cycles. After all it's just a few transistors and electrons moving through a thin oxide layer, with control and floating gates to determine if it's reading or writing. Like everything else, I suppose there is a thoretical time to failure but I suspect it would be measured in decades with Flash RAM. I'm willing to be proven wrong, however. :)
 
to clarify...

"Sector remapping takes into account the limited number of updates supported by flash memory. This is rarely the entire flash-memory array that's repeatedly updated. Instead, the typical mode of operation is to change one or more sectors on a regular basis.




Without sector remapping, the chip essentially becomes useless when a sector can no longer be updated. With sector remapping, a different sector can be used for each update while unused sectors are recycled for later use. This form of wear-leveling significantly increases the overall useful lifetime of the chip. The same technique is used to handle bad sectors as well'

this is from the 'diskonchip' system write up that the T5 uses....essentially the RAM is not SDRAM but NAND (like an SD card). These dont require continuous power to preserve info but the cost is that they dont last forever...They do take a LOT of write/erase cycles before the sector is exhausted (Ill try to find info as to how many times) but you dont get something for nothing and this is the cost of non-volatility...stay tuned for more info...


HTH

steve
 
update courtesy of foghead on 1src

'Actually, the life cycle isn't anything that you should be concerned about. It has always been overemphasized and it is less of a problem now than ever.

The flash in the T5 is good for over 100,000 writes per block (location). This is probably more than will be done in the life of the device because even if you change data while an app is running, it is only written back out when the app is terminated. There may also be some timed writeback, but I don't know (don't even really care). If you were to change a data location every ten minutes, twenty-four hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks per year, it would take two years to just wear out that single location.

Wearing out a single location isn't even a concern because the flash also has write balancing built-in. This means that as data is written to the flash chip, it is always written to the locationson the chip that have been written the fewest times. This way you get the life of the entire memory chip rather than worrying that some areas might be getting maxed out by constant changes.'

I thin SD cards have ~10-20000 cycles...things may not be as bad as I feared...Man this is fun!!!
 
That's a relief because I'm going to order a Treo 650 that also has flash RAM.

BTW OT. Ed Colligan, P1's president categorically states that the Treo 650 will eventually support the P1 Wifi card and one of his top engineers thinks otherwise. Film at 11.
 
Hey MooseMan, good to know that true harmony exists at P1!!!!LOL

good luck with the 650..it certainly looks great and I think this 'novel' memory setup is better suited to the smartphone.


...between you and me, I may still check out the T5...keep it to yourself...Im now off to beat myself repeatedly with a blunt kitchen utensil.....and brush up on my 'soft reset meditation regime'...
 
SoS,

What you've written is much more in line with my knowledge of Flash RAM. Because of the write balancing built into Flash RAM, you'd need to do the maximum Mean Time Between Failure writes to each block before you'd have a chance of total failure. A Flash RAM is generally good for at least 100,000 write operations before you start experiencing oxide degradation. I don't know how many blocks the T5 Flash RAM has but I would guess it's in the hundreds. You'd have to do the maximum MTBF writes to all blocks before failure became likely. If we just assume that the T5 has one hundred Flash Ram blocks and that you were to write to Flash RAM 500 time a day, which would mean using the machine more or less 24 hours a day, it would take 200 days to get to 100,000 writes, which still may not be enough to cause failure. Now multiply that by 100 blocks and you're looking at 2,000 days, or 5.5 years. As I said, I'm sure the Flash Ram has many hundreds of blocks so now we're up in the decades again before you'd likely experience a Flash RAM failure from excessive writes.

I'm a lot more worried about Mad Digitizer Syndrome reappearing in the T5 than I am the Flash RAM. :)
 
If YOU GUYS are worried about "number of flash writes," imagine HOW I FEEL?? I'm already committed (and should probably be in more ways than one) . . . 100,000 seems right to me. If the flash I'M USING (ahem, not P1's, tee hee) . . . compacts once every month, then I've got 100,000 months. Yippee skip.

Thank you SOS and GrandMaster Jim for THAT comforting news . . . I had already ordered new shorts, and a case of tequila AS WELL AS the blunt kitchen utensils. "Flash" shouldn't mean "poof - your stuff's gone." TO THINK I DOUBTED BRAYDER??!! Maybe I should be "committed." They're the only handsome souls that have made ANY flash for Palm, if you ask me. A souped up SD Card "ain't no flash." As they say in the South, "that dog won't hunt."

As for Mooseman's FANTASTIC LINE:

"BTW OT. Ed Colligan, P1's president categorically states that the Treo 650 will eventually support the P1 Wifi card and one of his top engineers thinks otherwise. Film at 11."

You mean those penny pinching pinheads can't even agree amongst THEMSELVES?? No wonder we've all been dancing on the head of a pin with our opinions . . . they RUN the deal and can't make a decision over quilted/non quilted toilet paper.

Hilarious. They're rowin' the boat, real hard, 7 days a week . . . problem is they're headed for the RAPIDS. ON OUR DIME!! You just couldn't WRITE better comedy.

SOS: Do the T3 thing my Brother. Spratty Sprat Sprat Sprat, and then that "other thing."

Or do the T5 . . . which is more of a "Dratty drat." Put the rolling pin down . . . . .

I'm begging you, you wonderful BUNCH OF FOLKS on this forum: Don't get taken. I've learned a lot here, and made some long-term friends -- and I happen to give a damn about YOUR collective wallets. If I'm wrong in 6 months I'll gladly admit it -- for now,
p l e a s e trust me!!
 
PTL and et al:

Here is the Question and Answer regarding comments from Ed Colligan of P1

QUOTE

Q: No WiFi? Are you Crazy?

A: palmOne may seem crazy for not having a WiFi solution available, but at least they now seem more open to the idea then previously. During the press conference, the first question to Ed Colligan was why they did not built WiFi in. He replied: "We put things in that we think that are absolutley critical to the device".

When pushed for information about adding WiFi later, he added "We do have a wifi card that will work in the SD slot, but we do not have the drivers yet." Colligan continued to say that palmOne will be working on creating the necessary drivers.

This is opposite of what Greg Shirai told us in the pre-briefing conference call earlier this weekend. Shirai said that palmOne will not support a WiFi card for the Treo 650, as it was more complicated than drivers alone. Along with staff from mytreo.net and InfoSync World, we asked Colligan about this discrepancy.

He replied that it was a matter of resources, and yes palmOne will be indeed working on WiFi for the Treo 650. Colligan seemed serious about this, even in spite of the challenges that were demonstrated by Shirai. It will only be a matter of time before something happens.

At Mobile Focus, I ran into a representative from C-Guys. C-Guys spent six months trying to get their 802.11b card working for the Treo 600. They gave up, due to power constraints and the sheer complexity of trying to get a working driver made for the Treo 600.

However, they are now working on an 802.11g card and have attempted to change the process in which drivers will work. C-Guys claims that within a year we should be seeing some sort for Wifi card working with at least he 650.

END QUOTE

You want to read more go here for the rest of the info.

Moderators - don't ban me just for bringing this in. I'm sorry, truly sorry but I don't want PTL ending up like SoS without a "blunt" kitchen utensil.

If he did, we'd have no one to point out the finer points of quilted versus non quilted toilet paper........I crack myself up. :D
 
I haven't forgotten everyone, but this trip has me busier than I first believed it would. I'll continue my review sometime either Saturday, or the first of next week.

Just noting, I've been using my T5 a whole bunch (especially today), probably around 1 1/2 hours Tues-Wed, and 2-3 today(Thurs). My battery is at around 60%, so I've already gotten the 5-6 hours that most of you have guessed it would last a total of. A lot of this probably has to do with the RAM (being Flash) not having to be powered at all while the unit is off. My activities have included using the Drive Mode with a friend's laptop, playing a bunch of MP3s, and then general note taking, contacts, documents, etc. Everyone's giving this device negative comments, but most of you have never touched one, much less used it extensively. No, I don't have a whole lot of stuff on it yet, but I've got enough to have a feel for what it's going to be like. As far as I'm concerned, this unit is not going back to Palm.

I have had one problem over the course of this week, and that's with Docs2Go. I loaded some Word 2002 docs through my PC before I left NC. The Docs2Go conduit was able to convert some of them to MS Word format, but others it wouldn't do for some reason. Don't know why. Anyway, the ones that weren't converted to MS Word crashed the software, and basically crippled it. Docs2Go wouldn't come back up without crashing. I'm guessing there was something that Docs2Go 5.0 inserted in my Word Doc that prevented its conversion to native Word on the T5 itself, therefore resulting in an incompatibility with DTG itself. I deleted my Saved Preferences file and everything worked again. This sounds more like Dataviz's problem than P1s. Once I get back home, I'll re-save these files to make SURE they're in MS Word exclusively, and then use the File Transfer util to send them directly to my SD card or the Internal.

Hate to tell you this guys, but I'm truly loving the T5. I could seriously use Wi-Fi right now, and occasionally a voice recorder, but to me, those trade-offs are practically irrelevent. Maybe not to some, but that's me.

Before anyone makes final judgement...hit Best Buy or another store and check one out for yourselves. You can even put YOUR SD card in and try your own programs if you're discreet! :cool:
 
We want it now or not at all. :D


Gee go figure.....Matthew actually has a life outside of this forum and it's getting in the way of his review. :D

Take all the time you need buddy, my Treo can't even be ordered yet and there may be a new twist to that...........film at 11.
 
I am a "proud" owner of a new T5 and so far, my adobe won't work because of the hslog20.dll error and I've been all over trying to find a fix, and alas, I'm here, hoping that someone knows how to fix it :) I have to read a report for work within 72 hours and keep getting this error!
it is a cool little toy though & the graphics are great, the colors are brilliant & if the glitches fix easily I will be happy! otherwise, I'm putting it in a return box & buying a new Nintendo DS so I can play games while I work on my handheld!
 
Well, after an uneventful trip, I've returned home with my T5 by my side. My battery, after approximately 7-10 hours of use was at 30%. Not bad, eh? Bluetooth was off most of the time, so that may have had some effect on battery longevity. I've heard that having BT on really doesn't impact power much. Someday I'll have to find out for sure.

As I've been away, I haven't had time to test much in the way of software, although I did find out that many games don't work quite right. I believe this to have something to do with the new OS5.4. I think that perhaps the 5-way navigator code was changed slightly. Games I tried were Sonic, 6th Gear, and RifleSlugs. Slugs didn't seem to work at all. I'm checking into that at the moment.

DateBk 5 works fine so far. I've heard that Agendus DOESN'T work yet, but I believe there was a patch just around the corner. Could even be out by not, I'm not sure. Docs2Go works great, but just watch your files carefully. Some of mine seemed to get corrupted during conversion. If possible, use native MS Word. By way of productivity apps, I've noticed no problems. I believe the TealSoftware apps should work for the most part, as TealMaster and MemBrain ran with no problems. I don't use many Teal apps anyway, so unless there's a huge demand that I test some, I'm going to forgo those mostly. (Note, TealScript does NOT yet work. Check this link for a big list of apps that do and do not work: http://www.1src.com/forums/showthread.php?t=71634&page=5&pp=15)

With the time I have left tonight, I'll try to outline features, pros, and cons for those still undecided about whether the T5 is for them.

Features

Memory: I've found the 160MB of Flash to be very useful. Contrary to what we've heard, it doesn't seem to slow the T5 down at all during normal use. Resets take about 7 seconds, but otherwise it seems really fast. PalmOne just introduced an update to the T5's OS, and some of the fixes include performance updates. I noticed screens were loading faster after I installed the update. Check their site for details.

Battery: The battery upgrade from 1100mah in the T3 to 1300mah in the T5 doesn't seem like a whole lot in theory. But after using the device for a week without recharging, my opinion changed. I used the T5 in total around 7 hours and still had 30% of my charge remaining. That's as good or better than my m505. Happy me!

Screen: The screen on this baby is awesome. It's incredibly bright on its highest setting. On the lowest setting (where I keep mine in order to convserve power), it's still very readable and works fantastically. There is a high-pitched noise that comes from the screen when it's on. It's kind of annoying, but I assume I'll get used to it? I've heard people say that this is a side effect of their T3 screen as well, or perhaps this is just part of the "wearing in" of the screen. If it has any detrimental effects, I'll let everyone know ASAP. So far, it works fine.

Misc. Hardware: This feels and acts like a rock-solid device. The Intel PXA270 XScale processor is blazing fast and not at all power hungry. This is almost a dream processor. The only thing that could be better is one that didn't use any power at all. Hmm... Buttons feel solid, 5-way navigator works great and as promised, although there are still some apps that don't work quite right with the left/right navigator. I think this is due to some sort of code-rewrite or API change. Hopefully there'll be an SDK soon?


Pros
I've outlined the basic features without delving into lots of OS specifics. Maybe I can do that later. This is basically a "list" of the high points of the device and why you SHOULD buy one.

The T5 is for you if:
-You want a top of the line model.
-You hate the T3's slider (not everyone does!)
-You're somewhat adventurous (there are software glitches out there. More in 3rd party apps than OS 5.4 itself.)
-You like to feel like you're holding a $400 peice of equipment (for those wanting to feel like they're holding nothing, try a Zire 21)
-You need/want Bluetooth, or don't care either way.


Cons
The T5 is in no way perfect. Here's what it lacks:

-No Wifi (if you would use it a lot on your handheld, don't have a laptop, or just have to have Wifi just 'cause, wait awhile or get a TW. Don't go to PPC because that's the wrong thing to do).
-No vibrating alarms (The closest thing the T5 has to a silent alarm is to turn itself on at the proper time and blink at you. Not for insertion into pocket.)
-Compatibility (as I stated before, you should have an adventurous spirit. Developers are scrambling to update their software for the T5, and it's rolling out rather quickly. If this is the only thing stopping you from buying one, wait till the first of December and grab one then.
-A new connector (sorry, but as has been said, you can't use Universal Connector devices with the T5 and Treo 650. The UC wasn't USB 2.0 and it might not have been capable of that speed, we don't know. I do like the new Multi-Connector and the fact that you can charge the unit without needing the USB cable, or you can hook the two together. In the past, there's been adapters made for Vx connector to UC, so there might be hope yet...)


Well, there you have it. I want to make a few final notes for this post, and I'll try to get some more data on software at a later time. There's been a rumor that you have to reset after every hotsync. This is a myth. You'll need to reset after you install any "Hack" utility, system upgrade/update, or an app that has to put 'hooks' into the OS. Installing games, DateBk 5, AvantGo, etc has not required a reset. It's pretty much the same rules for previous versions of OS5. Maybe it has to be done slightly more often, but not much. Acrobat Reader has caused users some problems on the PC side. I haven't had time to test it yet, so I have yet to see.

Continue the questions, I'll continue the postings...
 
Thank you for testing & finding bugs with the T5 :)
I'm loving mine except for this Acrobat .dll missing ~ nothing is totally perfect in life I suppose, we're just expecting perfection !

I appreciate your time in finding faults & pleaseures with the T5 because everything you share only expands my source of well being!!!

Blessings & Peace,
Deonna
 
Hey strick, lost your way?? PPC forums are over there somewhere...;)

In fact, the T5 is growing on me so you never know. Need to see one in action first. They are just starting to arrive in UK....
 
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