Robespierre, robjame are you willing to answer ANOTHER question about PDAs? I tried some technology websites that I googled for forums, but they speak a language I don't understand.
I have read all the info on 2 travel forums after doing a search for PDA, but I still have some questions. You 2 have contributed a lot to my knowledge in what I have read already. That's why I am not buying a Palm product. I feel I need the Windows and Office capability I can get on the Ipaq or Pocket PC.
Have priced Ipaq model rx1955 ($306), but I am not sure I can use this for GPS. The 1 gig SD card at Best Buy is $79.
Also, How many places will I have Wifi access( the Ipaq works off that, I've learned) when travelling in Dordogne, Provence,Luberon, Italian Cinque Terre, Rome, Venice?
I need to be able to access internet for email, area maps to download and to find places to stay , maybe forum questions etc.

Someone told me I should look at buying an unlocked quadband Pocket PC. I looked on the plemix.com site, but all are on backorder and they start at $559. Plus, I guess I would pay monthly charges for that and would I buy some sort of service in Europe or would a Pocket PC use Sim Cards like my quadband cell phone does?

Maybe my little bits of knowledge gained from reading all the stuff about PDAs on the travel sites has confused me more than helped.
However,I am excited about the possibilities of using the PDA while travelling. At age 63 I'll need at least a month to practice using whatever I get before we leave on 1st May. Therefore, I'll need to make my decision and purchase SOON!
Thanks for answering(I hope) my rambling questions.
Carol, South Carolina, USA

Hi Carol,
Certainly Robespierre is better able to answer many of the technical questions that you have especially when it involves phones or pocket PCs.
I think you are justified in being concerned about the number of places that you will have WiFi service. I had to search out specific spots in Paris and, once we went to Burgundy and Alsace, they were few and far between. If you find these (usually internet cafes) you might as well use their machines to access email.
I don't know why you would want to download area maps as you will want to upload these for your GPS prior to your trip to an SD card. As for running a GPS I am quite sure that this PDA will do this if it has a slot for an SD card AND a Smart Media slot into which you will put the GPS.
You are right to want to practise with your PDA as the learning curve is steep (I am 60 and got my PDA only last year) - especially the GPS function as it involves making the GPS work and making the mapping part work and both work together.
For what it is worth, I think the other uses of a PDA (rather than GPS and WiFi) are far more valuable - storing documents, dayplanner, store books, maps, music, scheduling, language dictionaries, menu readers, itineraries, tape recorder, travel books, Metro schedules, word processing, diary, etc. This is only my point of view. The WiFi and GPS functions I found to be the most complex and something I really needed to practise.
You will want your PDA to have 2 rechargable batteries with decent life.
Good luck.

Carol and Robert James:

I am thoroughly ashamed of you two! What the hell is your being 63 and 60 years young got to do with your ability to comprehend something technical? Or anything else, for that matter! Most of the great scientific theories and NObel prizes of this past century have come from the Senior element, for godsakes!

Stu T. (77 and I still like to run circles around 40 and 50 year olds...especially
Yuppies!)

Ah yes Tower. Your criticism and spanking are well deserved.

Robert...I do not spank...I just use the same baseball bat I use to get into the Batting Cages a dozen times a year and smack out 60-70 mph balls (I was a college ball player back in the old days)...on the serious side, I hope Carol gets her PDA in gear.
By the way, I rally liked your pix on Paris the opther day...I think I wrote you on that.
Stu T.

Ok, point taken on the age thing-but I am "technology challenged"! I am self taught on the computer stuff and so my knowledge and ways of doing things often is limited to trial and error- hence the need to practice with a new PDA. Thanks for reaffirming that for me Robjames. See-I thought I had to download maps-I guess I just store them on a SD card. As for the GPS, my husband uses one on our boat, but I am not sure if that will help me with the learning curve.
I think I may need to "rent a geek" to get me started when I finally decide what to buy!!!!
My husband talked with a colleague who showed him a Dell Axim X51v that worked by "sync-ing" with his quadband cell phone(bluetooth?) when he travelled outside the USA.
So now I am looking at that option as well-no need for wifi in the countryside...
Thanks for the replies...
Carol

Carol - I have the Dell and am well satisfied with it. I think they sell a GPS that goes with it now but be sure that you choose a program (I use Mapopolis but I think Tom Tom is even better) that works in Europe.
There is a forum like Fodors that is dedicated to Dell PDA which really helps.
Internet capability will be part of the Dell so you will have the option.

Oh glad to hear you have the Dell and are satisfied. One forum (travel)had some comments not favorable to the Dell.
I will try to locate the Dell forum for PDA and see if I can understand the "chat".
Thanks yet again!
Carol

Carol
It is
http://www.aximsite.com/

I know it's late in the game but who convinced you that a Palm device wouldnl;t easily do all the things you want to do?

You can get these with wireless, GPS, documents to go,etc., that give you full Microsoft Office compatibility for less cost and a shorter learning curve.

Oh well, sorry to have made the waters any murkier and suppose it is too late now.

WiFi connectivity is ubiquitous throughout Europe. In big cities, you can hardly find a spot that isn't hot.

Pocket PCs don't actually have any discrete GPS functions <i>per se</i>. You run Microsoft Pocket Streets, load the map of the part of the world you're in, and the software takes it from there, displaying the map so you're in the middle of the screen. $19.95, city maps free.

Michelin Maps &amp; Route Planning do the same thing, but take it a step further by allowing you to define where you want to begin and end a trip, and it draws the route on the map for you. 89&euro; for <i>all of Europe</i>.

I don't like the integrated phone/pda at their present stage of evolution. I want more flexibility than they provide, and the ability to swap CF cards and hard drives and SD cards and I/O devices is something I won't compromise on.

I forgot to mention that my iPAQ can use my RAZR quad-band GPS phone as its internet modem connection via a shared Bluetooth link. The T-Mobile service costs $5.99 monthly in the US.

Robespierre, thanks for all your helpful information. When you use your phone as an internet modem and connect to read email or just surf, how expensive is that? And who bills you for it -- TMobile? Or (assuming your phone is unlocked) do you buy SIMs and pay-as-you-go in France?

I subscribe to T-Zones, which is a stripped-down Wireless Application Protocol (WAP) service intended only to provide sports scores, headline news, that sort of thing. It's $5.99 per month for unlimited connect time, and does not count against plan minutes(!)

It will actually access any web site, but if the page sent from a server exceeds a certain size, the browser in the phone chokes on it. All I did was to send those larger pages¹ to my iPAQ, where the browser has adequate capacity.

I don't use it overseas, because the carriers there charge data service against your airtime - so I use WiFi.

¹ A WAP site would be like http://wap.abcparislive.com
For a PDA-sized display, see http://mobile.fancyapint.com