Plus lets not forget Psion's early contributions to the Sinclair machines.
They also had a trademark on the name Netbook.
Motorola Solutions - the profitable bit of Motorola that wasn't gobbled by Google - has completed its acquisition of Psion PLC, and can now start integrating the company. The purchase was announced in June, but it's taken a while to complete despite the £129m offer being unanimously recommended by the Psion board. Motorola …
I was temped to downvote you. Unless it is faulty, it should be in use like mine!
I did find some time ago on the Internet an article that compared a Apple airbook laptop thing with a Psion Series 7. IIRC, the only bad thing it said about the Psion was lack of wireless, but I presume if one had a compatible mobile that wouldn't have been a problem?
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Personally, I found the Psion "I" useless. Things kicked off with the Psion II, though - that was simply awesome. I still have 2, but one is starting to have display problems, and without spare zebra strips I don't think I can repair it (zebra strips connect the display edge to the PCB).
Actually, I think I'll flog them. I have a gazillion data packs (amongst which 2x 256k Flash), the swipe reader, the barcode reader and even an interface for a Mitutoya digital calliper which I built almost 25 years ago (must check if I can still find a program that uses it - I remember I had to include some assembler into an OPL program to read it :) ).
I got a 3c and later got the 5mx and boy was it awesome. Not only the keyboard and touchscreen but also the stuff you could do with it. I even ran Norton Commander on my 5mx. Still, from there on it went downhill pretty fast where consumer products were concerned.
With a little more innovation I can't help wonder if things couldn't have been different.
Of all the companies to end up owning Psion, it had to be Motorola, the company there at the very beginning of Psion's decline. Thor and Odin must be turning in their graves.
To this day, I will not buy a Motorola phone, though admittedly it's not as though they're good enough for me to be missing out on anything...
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I still use my 5mx, backed up by the emulator running on WINE on Linux. Incomparable battery life, unbeaten by any smartphone today, Agenda and Data applications simply just work, and a fabulous keyboard. No decent replacement yet, in my book.
I am tempted to try an Open Pandora, but my ideal would be something that runs the 5mx applications with the 5mx keyboard, and with some updated technologies: and e-Ink screen, for example, USB mass storage host & client, and (possibly) low-power Bluetooth. I definitely don't want an IP stack, or anything that allows outside crackers to crack into the machine - hence the (possibly) around Bluetooth. Having decent encryption of user-entered data would be good too.
I hoped that the phonebook functionality would be divorced from the phone telephony side of things, so that I could look up a contact in the database, the hit a key that would communicated via Bluetooth with a (dumbish) phone to dial the offered number, but that was not to be.
Ah well, I'm just a bearded and sandal wearing techie with dreams.
I think saw a Compaq iPaq PocketPC (tm) of some flavour but I don't think I saw an HP95LX (early days, DOS and Lotus 123 in ROM, where I started with handhelds) or a slightly later HP Jornada 720 (nice hardware, decent touchscreen for the time, OK keyboard, shame about Windows CE). Or did I miss them?
Lucky guys, all of you... *mutter*
Never had a chance of owning (or using) any of those early devices, but it is understandable that those just *works* unlike today's hi-tech gimmickry gadgets which tend to give issues whether these be battery life, wifi (yes, I'm pointing at iOS6 specifically) or just plain usefulness.
Had the 48k ZX Spectrum though, does it count? :D
Seems that old-tech still have the upper hand regarding reliability and usefulness over today's fancy bling.
On my way to play Manic Miner and Horace in the Park.
Like most people, you seem to not be aware that Motorola Solutions has NOTHING to do with cell phones at all.
The whole consumer side of the business was split off and became Motorola Mobility and was promptly bought by Google.
Motorola Solutions has a portfolio including public safety radio systems and RFID and POS solutions for industry and retail, this latter part being where Psion fits the picture.
If you have a look you'll see a Sony UX50 in there.
Now _that_ was a PDA ahead of it's time too.
Came out nearly 10 years ago in 2003.. now remember this is just the same year the first colour phone came out.
bluetooth
GPS
hardware accelerated video playback
camera
480x240 colour touchscreen
expandable memory
keyboard
the weird thing is - it didn't sell well because it cost over 400 quid.
and yet now, we thing nothing of paying 600 quid for an iphone.
it's a strange strange world.
In my opinion, the best PDA I ever had was a Sony Clie NX70.. Small, usable, multiple, in those days already capable of video and audio recording and the most awesome feature I VERY much miss in modern smartphones: the ability to act as a universal remote control.
In those days, my son was ill quite often so I spent many evenings in A&E wards in hospitals - with the Clié, I could at least change the channels of the TV in there :)