Simplicity has always been the Palm's greatest asset. Since its introduction, stability and ease-of-use have ensured its position as the dominant digital assistant.
Ironically, that simplicity is shaping as its greatest enemy. With rivals, particularly the Compaq iPaq, now boasting not just bright colour, multimedia and fast wireless connections, the Palm has a lot to live up to.
In January, after a two-year wait for wireless connectivity, Asian Palm users at last got the chance to use wireless modems with their hand-helds, and now we also have voice. But still I feel short-changed.
I have spent the past two weeks carrying around the CarpeDiemV, from Hong Kong's RealVision, the OhFish V51 from Taiwan's Oh Fish Communications, and the latest to hit the market, the Ubinetics GA100, from Britain.
This new generation of Palm GSM modules has been late coming, but it has much to recommend. From now on, any PDA without built in telephony is going to look dumb. E-mail, news, trading and communication are within a few clicks, wherever you happen to be.
The downside is that these three GSM phone/modem modules have arrived just when most of us are gearing up for the arrival of GPRS - the always-on Internet.
Considering the fact that these phones sell for about HK$3,000, it is unlikely they will make a dent in the consumer market. Where you can already see these gadgets deployed is in the sales force, support and other mobile workers.