Windows Phone Thoughts: HP iPAQ 2215 - The New Shining Star in the Pocket PC Galaxy?

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Tuesday, June 24, 2003

HP iPAQ 2215 - The New Shining Star in the Pocket PC Galaxy?

Posted by Jason Dunn in "THOUGHT" @ 01:10 AM


Performance Analysis in Brief
As you can see by the results on the previous page, the 2215 is a top-performer. Perhaps the most shocking difference in speed for me was, strangely enough, ActiveSync speeds. I connected my iPAQ 2215 to the front USB 2.0 port on my Shuttle SS51G, and when I transferred 20 BMP images that were 250 KB each, the entire process only took a few seconds – I was amazed! The 2215 finally achieves real USB speeds and it makes a huge difference with file transfers of all types. This is the first device I can honestly say doesn't need a memory card reader to transfer music – it's fast enough on its own.

Although the 2215 was speedy in most tests, it fell down in a few key areas. Listing a directory of 2000 files, it was 80% slower than an iPAQ 5450. On several of the graphics tests (GAPI BitBlt and the Arkaball test), it really fell behind the zippy 1910 – and what's most curious about this is that the 1910 includes no graphics co-processor, while the 2215 includes the MediaQ dedicated graphics processor. Either the MediaQ accelerates some functions at the expense of others, or Spb Benchmark is flawed in some way. I'm going to investigate further, but suffice it to say that when you're using the 2215, nothing about it will feel slow – this is the fastest overall Pocket PC I've ever used.

Bluetooth – For Those Who Care
Bluetooth is one of those technologies that I keep trying to love – really! I seem to have a 50/50 success rate with it and I tend not to be successful when I really need to be. I was able to connect an iPAQ 5450 to the iPAQ 2215 and transfer a file from one device to another (that was cool!), but I couldn’t get the 2215 to connect to my Iogear-Bluetooth dongle-equipped desktop PC. The worst part about Bluetooth for me is how arcane the troubleshooting is – I never know where to start. I don’t have a spare SIM for my T68 (and right now my Fido SIM is in my SPV Smartphone), but I’m sure it would have been an easy setup to get the 2215 to connect to my T68i and do GPRS data. There’s no headset profile on the 2215, or a keyboard profile, so this device won't be usable in any cutting-edge Bluetooth scenarios. Maybe next year?

So What About the Screen?
The screen 3.5" back-lit transflective touch-screen on the 2215 is great, but it's not quite as good as the screen on the 1910. It's quite bright, but it lacks the depth of contrast that the 1910 has. Side by side with the 5450, it looks roughly on par – in normal lighting, it looks like it has slightly better contrast, which is surprising given the image below. I'm not sure why the 2210 image looks more washed out than the others. The screen is inferior to the iPAQ 1910, but it's still an excellent screen for viewing photos, and I have no complaints about it (although the screen from the 1910 would make this Pocket PC even better).

I shot this using a Canon G2 on a tripod in complete darkness with no flash, then I cut out each screen in PhotoImpact and created the montage below – I wanted to get an idea of how each screen looked at maximum brightness, displaying the same theme. All devices had ClearType turned off. And speaking of ClearType, it's interesting to note that Windows Mobile 2003 displays ClearType on the Today screen and start menu, while on my iPAQ 5450 with Pocket PC 2002, ClearType isn't visible on either.


Figure 14: A screen comparison shot in the dark. Click the image for a full-size version.

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