Hardware: Palm LifeDrive

Well in returning to my field analyst position and since I'll need to be a little tighter with my daily organizing, I opted to say goodbye to my defunct PocketPC and picked up a handy little Palm LifeDrive. Granted this thing is overpriced, but with 4Gigs (ok ok 3.7Gigs) of storage and SD expansion, the device fit _my_ needs very well.

Priced at $399.99 the LifeDrive doesn't come cheap. A step up from Palm's Tungsten TX, the LD offers more storage, slightly more robust screen and in my view, a slightly better wireless integration. Software wise they look very similar.

For myself I mostly make use of 4 key features of the LifeDrive, 1) synching with Outlook and still being able to get my attachments, 2) DocsumentsToGo conversion for Word, Excel, and the Adobe reader, 3) extra emergency storage for reference documents like technical papers and manuals (Drive Mode) and 4) WiFi hotspot access to my gmail :P

The LifeDrive wouldn't suit _everybody_ for most of the synch functionality you can get by with a $200 PDA from HP or Palm, or a BlackBerry, but for some of the storage options, additional viewer support and media capabilities, the LifeDrive can serve as a good accessory for the busybody IT person.