HP iPAQ 211 Enterprise Handheld

7 out of 10 - Very good
IPAQ 210 is an excellent PDA but with some problems
I got my 210 about a week ago. I wanted this PDA mainly for reading technical documents, for power point ...
I got my 210 about a week ago. I wanted this PDA mainly for reading technical documents, for power point presentation, and writing notes on the road. The screen is really nice. OS is fast so that the letter recognition goes very smoothly. This makes hand writing very smooth, much better than Palm LifeDrive, my wife has a LifeDrive.

My main disaapointment is on the up and down buttons. You can not use them easily. I am an engineer by training and know that at this time an age how much effort goes into the design of products to make them practical and usable. I do not know what HP engineers have been smoking to come with this button design. Also, it is the failure of the management that did not check the product before OK it. It is really difficult to push the up button and use it effectively. I had to program other buttons to do the up & down job.

Overall, IPAQ is an excellent PDA if you don't mind stupid button design. However, to be honest evrytime I think about this stupid button, it makes me angry. Read more
by MM#8 (see profile) - February 18, 2008

6 out of 7 users found this user opinion helpful.

8 out of 10 - Excellent
Where's the rest of it
Well of course the bulk of the praise (as hard as this is for me to say as a Microsoft ...
Well of course the bulk of the praise (as hard as this is for me to say as a Microsoft critic) goes to Microsoft for Windows Mobile 6.0. It works perfectly, and the options for add-on software are almost endless. That is what makes this device great. Everything from music to travel maps can be accessed from this goodie. Connecting new programs is a breeze. Remember DOS and how easy it was to load a program to work with DOS. This is almost that slick. This software should go in the Microsoft Hall of Fame.

From the HP side, having 128MB of RAM makes this device work. I had 64MB in my previous PPC. It was never enough. Also the fast processor is essential for smooth operation. Bluetooth and WiFi work very well. 802.11g is nice to have. Previous device was .11b and the lack of range was troublesome. The two card slots are terrific too. One has music. (32GB of music baby! Who needs an MP3 player.) One has all my specialty programs. Battery life is okay not terrific.

The lack of a cradle, a decent case and even the inability to purchase a spare battery are very annoying. Not having those ready at 210/11 liftoff was pathetic marketing by HP. Hopefully we will see them soon.

I have a cellular phone for talking. I have the 211 for everything else when I am away from the office and don't want to haul out the laptop. Also there is no extra charge for internet access with free WiFi being almost everywhere. Why pay extra phone charges? Read more
by vic delta (see profile) - March 10, 2008

4 out of 4 users found this user opinion helpful.

9 out of 10 - Spectacular
Best Phone-less PDA at the moment
First of all, please note this is a non-technical user review. Here goes..
After a looooooooonnng wait, HP finally got
...
First of all, please note this is a non-technical user review. Here goes..
After a looooooooonnng wait, HP finally got its act together and brought out the 200 series. This is my 4th PDA, the last one being a PDA-Phone, of which I was getting sick and tired! I am a medical doctor, who uses the PDA for various medical software; studying/refering-on-the-go..and in case of my new iPAQ 200, as a portable media player. I was in the market for a phone-less PDA..and was getting disappointed with the bandwagon of the do-it-all devices (what with the slow performance; poor battery life, and the "all eggs in one basket scenario")

The iPAQ 212 is BIG...seriously BIG!Contrary to reports/specs on various websites, the actual size of the 200 is 75.4 x 133.8 x 17.4 millimetres
(3 x 5.3 x 0.7 inches); Weight 192g. And its FAST...seriously FAST. The PXA 310 624Mhz processor's performance is noticeably better than other 624MHz processor of the previous gen PXA. The RAM is a respectable 128MB. The storage is a measly 256MB though. Dont know why HP has cut corners. I would have expected 2GB at least, The good news is it accepts SDHC cards in addition to CF cards so you could theoretically have a storage space of 48GB!! (32GB-CF + 16GB SDHC). Running relatively heavy medical applications such as UpToDate and Thomson Clinical Xpert simultaneously is a breeze - all the while listening to music!! The Multimedia performance is excellent!! I have thrown several high quality videos at it and its played it flawlessly (using TCPM player). The VGA screen, oh my god...the SCREEN!! There is nothing like it! Its beautiful! But then, this is my first VGA device, so I might be biased.

The Audio quality is much much better than many reputed MP3 players. This iPAQ thankfully takes the usual 3.5mm Headphone jack, and the sound is excellent, full range and clear. So you can "ebay" your MP3/PVPlayer (albeit after buying the 32GB card). The in-built speaker, unfortunately, is pathetic. You can barely hear it at the loudest of volume. So, bye-bye to any plans of using this as a voice-instructing GPS/or even as an alarm clock/reminding device.

The "upward" direction of the Navigation D-pad is restricted by the structure of the device. This is a BIG design flaw, coming from a company like HP and that too in such a high end device which aims to re-invent/resurrect the phone-less PDA. I have often had to rotate the screen to landscape mode just because that way its easier to scroll up/down the pages using the sideways buttons of the D-pad.

Another 'defect' is the low sensitivity of the touch screen - especially in the centre of the screen. It requires higher-than-previous-devices stylus pressure to register a command. But this is something which one can get used to..I hardly notice it now

Wireless Connectivity - both Bluetooth and to WLAN is easy and stable. WLAN even supports WPA2 security. I haven't tried VoIP yet.

The 2200mAH battery is a longevity monster and you can get by days-on-end without recharging.

Overall, one of the best devices ever! I wonder if the digitizer touch sensitivity and the low speaker volume could be addressed to as a ROM upgrade. The Navigation pad design is another matter though.. and the only reason I am not giving this device a perfect 10 Read more
by kartikatre (see profile) - February 29, 2008

3 out of 3 users found this user opinion helpful.
1 comment posted to this opinion

1 out of 10 - Abysmal
not good for me
Where I formerly worked, I had an iPAQ given to me by the company upon my promotion and loved it. ...
Where I formerly worked, I had an iPAQ given to me by the company upon my promotion and loved it. When the company was going under, I was forced to resign and the company owner's wife demanded my iPAQ for herself. I decided to replace it with the iPAQ 211 Enterprise and have had nothing but trouble. After spending three hours on the phone, totally frustrated, the HP consultant told me if I were him he would use it as a hockey puck. Read more
by nanna4mine (see profile) - July 3, 2008

10 out of 10 - Perfect
Great Features
I have upgraded from Dell Axim X51v and found this PDA better then the old one. Great display screen and ...
I have upgraded from Dell Axim X51v and found this PDA better then the old one. Great display screen and resolution with power packed features made this device a nice upgrade. Read more
by salmanzk (see profile) - June 28, 2008

8 out of 10 - Excellent
Delights, but separate keyboard is useless
This is my first wifi connected device and I like it very much. I like the ease of turning on ...
This is my first wifi connected device and I like it very much. I like the ease of turning on and off lan and bluetooth. The applications are useful and the screen is a good size. I love the pdf viewer.
I wish the large key on screen keyboard was large enough to use my thumbs. You must use a lot of pressure to push on the screen which can be particularly annoying in tight spaces when using your finger/nail. It is quite large especially with the case. I use this to take notes in meetings because of the paternalistic no laptops trend. BUt the HP keyboard is useless. THe iPaq is too heavy for the holder which means using it on your lap is precarious and pushing on the screen is impossible. The lock on the keyboard is flimsy. When you turn off the ipaq in between interesting tidbits to note then the connection is lost and you have to start from the beginning to reconnect which means I am managing my device not my meeting. Useless and it's high priced at $129. You must install the keyboard software.
I did have some trouble setting up the iPaq with active sync and was about to give up when the IT guys couldn't figure it out either. I did a hard reset and started from the beginning and the setup worked. Read more
by desharri (see profile) - June 25, 2008

7 out of 10 - Very good
Needs a few improvements to become a hit.
The battery is 2200mah and should last quite a while yet it does not last 4hrs even with minimal use ...
The battery is 2200mah and should last quite a while yet it does not last 4hrs even with minimal use of wi-fi or Bluetooth. With all functions shut down and the unit turned off the battery will drain 33% a day. On the third day of being off it will require a charge.

Anoter irritating issue is that the USB cable will not charge the device, you must use the serial cable, what is with that? A cradel would also be nice.

Customer service is seriously lacking. On-line you can only locate the iPaq 211 for sale. If you try to locate it for service or questions you can't find it, using their search function brings up some other PDA and printer cartriges. Calling customer service for warranty service or tech assistance is the only way to go but you will have to spend about 20 min just to get to the right person. Even then with the units model# and serial# they sent me the wrong battery. Oh and they do not have batteries for sale for unit. They tell you to search on-line for third party sales for a battery.

The device for its size should have had a GPS built in. My Garmin iQ3600 was smaller and had a great GPS built in. The system does work well with a Bluetooth GPS and 3rd party maps installed. It connected in about 30 sec. through Bluetooth.

This unit should have had at least 1G of internal storage. It is nice that the unit will accept large capacity storage cards, though the CF card will drain the battery some if not removed even if the unit is turned off. The operating system also has a default setting that has it automaticlly looking for the ActiveSync, so you need to set that to the manual setting to keep this too from running down the battery.

With all these issues it is still a very good PDA. HP needs to take into consideration what users are looking for and then they will have a great PDA. Read more
by cnetmv (see profile) - June 1, 2008

10 out of 10 - Perfect
Cool display, Fast and Reliable
I bought one of these few weeks ago, the first one had a tiny dead pixel, I wanted to keep ...
I bought one of these few weeks ago, the first one had a tiny dead pixel, I wanted to keep that one, but that white dot on the screen was bugging me , cuz i paid 420 dollars for it. anyways, so the 2nd one arrived, and I absolutely love it. Its fast, display is Cristal clear, way faster than any other pda.
windows mobile 6 is just great...you wont be dissapointed, its just a lil bulky , screen is bigger that any other model,

overall this unit is just great and you wont be upset.

thanks Read more
by tamzid507 (see profile) - February 21, 2008