PDA

Personal Digital Assistants were originally intended to replace a diary. However the rapid development of the technology has meant that they have become computers in their own right. The main choice when buying a PDA is the length of use you want between charging. Black and white screens have much longer battery life.

Palmtop

The main difference between a plan top and a PDA is that the palmtop has a full keyboard. However the keys are often very small and have to be pressed with a special tool. The PDA does data entry by a stylus and the user learns a special form of writing.

Advantages

• Small, Lightweight easy to take with you
• Simple to use
• Long battery life compared with laptop (up to 30 hours)
• Power up immediately when they are turned on, no need to go through boot up sequence.
• Many have cut down versions of common office software
• They can be connected to a desktop PC or Laptop and the files can be transferred over.
• Many (but not all) Palmtop's and PDA's are much lower in cost than PCs or Laptops

Disadvantages

• The screen and keyboard are small
• Where a stylus is used to handwrite, a new language called Graffiti needs to be learnt
• They cannot be easily upgraded
• They cannot be used for such a wide range of tasks as the laptop or Desktop.
• They are easy to steal
• They have a relatively small amount of memory and cannot store large amounts of data.

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