Palm Zireā„¢ 71 Handheld

Pros: Screen size, color, and brightness; updated Palm OS 5.x; built-in camera.
Cons: No front cover.

The Palm Zire 71 is an excellent successor to the Palm III, V, and VII series. Like them, it has a screen larger than the M series cell-phone-like screen. But it also has gorgeous color and a built in camera. No built-in wireless communications, but I bet an accessory will be along shortly if it doesn't already exist.

The Zire 71 takes a memory card too, where you can store MP3s or an entire library of Gutenberg text files or basically anything you want up to 128 megs.

Rechargeable battery. To an old IIIxe user it's unnerving to see the battery gage drop as you watch. However, you can get a slim, lightweight power pack for about $50 which extends battery life to twice the normal time.

I paid $299 for the device. The store also included a 128 meg memory card, normally $79 to $89.

The snapshots you can take with the Zire 71 are somewhat low resolution--they look like old Brownie pics taken with early color film. Personally I think it's a charming effect. I'm extremely satisfied with being able to take pictures in any light level, with a non-bulky device that I'd be carrying anyway.

Pros: Good value for the size, capacity, and price.
Cons: The screen doesn't response well to the stylus.

I like this little PDA. It fits into my pocket easily. The date book synchronizes with my MS Outlook Calendar, which is important to me (I only have to enter dates one time). The camera takes nice photos if you need them to be small. When you blow them up, they lose resolution very quickly. I use the Note pad function frequently as an actual note pad, taking down short notes, instead of using a scrap of paper which would inevitably get lost.

The only thing I have against it so far is that when you use the stylus on the screen, the writing is not directly below the tip, which makes it hard to write a straight line or click on tabs or buttons on the screen.

Pros: Color screen, handy camera, speed, and Mp3 compatability!
Cons: Delay of camera shutter, incompatibilty with older Palm accessories, and Graffiti 2

I upgraded from a Palm Vx and wow am I impressed! The color screen is awesome, its like a totally new experience. I love the camera and the ability to take and store photos so easily. I like being able to have an Mp3 player with me all the time, too. The speed of the unit is really great, it makes playing games more fun and some of my other applications much faster.

I am not wild about Graffiti 2, having used Graffiti for 3 years, the transition has not been smooth. Get ready to be frustrated if you are making the transition.

I highly recommend the Zire 71 to anyone looking to upgrade or even if you are new to PDAs.

Pros: features; bright screen; Palm OS simplicity
Cons: battery life (when using camera or MP3 software; a little bulky

When Palm discontinued the Palmnet wireless service for the Palm VIIx, I realized it was time for me to upgrade. Not wanting to spend the (then) $300 that the Zire 72, which had just come out, was being sold for, I purchased a new Zire 71 on Overstock.com for $125.
The Zire 71 handles all of the standard organizer functions capably. With its SD expansion slot, it also allows me to use it as an MP3 player (using RealOne) and an audiobook player (using Audible), as well as to load other software available for this format.
Sliding the back down exposes the lens of the built-in camera as well as the shutter button. While the resolution is not in any way exceptional, it's a capable snapshot camera for anyone who does not have a cameraphone (and can even take shots indoors without a flash!)
The screen is exceptionally bright, sharp and clear: as good as any I have seen on a Pocket PC organizer

Pros: Great screen, terrific form factor, intuitive controls, good battery life.
Cons: Requirement to slide open case to expose camera.

I've owned them all going back to the days of the U.S. Robotics Palm Pilot and the Zire 71 is the best PDA you can get. It has by far the brightest and best color screen - much better than any Sony Clie product. It has great battery life for a bright color screen. The built in camera is handy. The rounded edges fit the hand much better than other PDA's. (I read an e-book a week on my Zire and it is very comfortable and the toggle stick is great for changing pages). It slides in the pocket easy. Its very durable - I've accidently dropped mine two or three times and no problems whatsoever - Try that with a Clie and you will find that your memory sticks no longer stick in place. It uses SD memory cards which you can swap in and out with your card reader on your computer. Buy it and you'll like it.

Pros: Decent processor and screen. Gimmick camera for emergencies.
Cons: 16MB RAM only, camera is slow.

The Zire 71 does its job well. The 144MHz processor is fast enough for most all tasks thrown at it, the screen is very usable even in bright daylight, the SD card allows for expandability, and the camera is a nice gimmick.

About the only thing I didn't like about this Zire is what's supposed to be its "killer feature" -- the camera. The Tungsten E is cheaper, has the same processor (more or less), has more RAM, but no camera.

Unfortunately, the Zire 71 camera is slow. When you press the button, the clicking fake shutter sound happens maybe 0.5 seconds later.. but wait. The photo isn't actually taken when the clicking sound happens, it takes another 0.5 seconds or so. Making the camera just about useless for candid shots. The low-light sensitivity is awful, and there's no flash. In other words, the camera is a cheap gimmick that doesn't work very well.

But better to have a gimmick camera than nothing at all, at least with the Zire 71 you have a (sort of) camera all the time. But then if you have a camera phone.. it becomes redundant.

Pros: Nice big display. Embedded camera. Decent sound. Good to impress friends.
Cons: Not reliable. Unforgivable mechanical and firmware design flaws.

At first I was impressed by its features.
However, soon, problems arrived:
- buttons got accidentally pressed in my pocket. It powered up, consumed the batteries and lost everything! (and yes it has a hardcase)
- there's no firmware to set up a combination of keys to power it up, and neither for backing up to card
- the display has some lose contacts inside - at power-on it often shows a white display. I have to slide camera in/out to get the display back
- the power button is near the stick. When I get the stick out, I often press the power button
- clumsy I/O interface. Why not having a normal jack for power supply and another one for communication?
- shuts off after 3 minutes at most, no matter what. I can't use it on my bike (with a GPS) because of this "feature"
- can not turn off display
- bulky, plasticky case

I was amazed at how professional is their customer support. Wish their design team was equally professional...

I you plan to use Zire 71 to store critical data, forget about it! I got burned. Buy an agenda and a pencil instead.

Pros: Nice screen, fast processor, digital camera, relatively low price
Cons: Battery dies frequently!

This palm had a lot going for it. A nice color screen, fast processor, digital camera, MP3 playback, SD memory slot and a pretty good price. . .

. . . there's just one hitch- and it's a big one.

The power gets turned on inside the case and the battery dies on me at least twice a month! When this happens I loose everything since my last hotsync. This is a huge hassle which makes the great value more of a headache.

I don't really enjoy missing appointments and asking people for their phone numbers over and over. The problem is the joystick sticks out a little and functions as a power button, so the case presses on it and drains the battery.

There is some software called "disable buttons" that is suppossed to fix the problem, but it still allows the unit to try and turn on when the joystick is pushed, so the battery still ends up dead.

If anyone knows of any other way to fix this, please email me at pizqueta@hotmail.com

Thanks.
Mike.

Pros: It has a camera
Cons: It is heavy

I think the zire is one of the best palm pilots #1 because
it has a good camera.#2 because It has the best color screen that palm makes at the time.I think It is better than the tungsten because It has a camera and because it is more sturdy. It is also a lot cheaper.

Pros: Not many
Cons: See review

I gave this PDA to my husband last Christmas. The battery lasted about two weeks. When the battery went out so did all the memory. He then called Palm several times before they told him to send it in. When he got the PDA back, it was still having the same problem. Now the battery stays charged but the memory keeps getting wiped out.

My husband has called Customer Service several times but has not gotten anywhere and basically was asked if he was charging his PDA daily for a least three hours. I have an older PDA that I can go without charging for up to two weeks.

Would not recommend buying this product or any product from Palm just because of their customer service.

Pros: screen, weight, camera, mp3, stereo headphone jack, OS5.2.1.
Cons: Initial RAM (16M), slow processor, no wi-fi yet (waiting on SanDisk).

I loved it from the beginning. Its color, smooth touch and ease of use.
Most of applications can be put on the expansion card (I have SanDisk 256Mb) with good launcher application (like ZLauncher) and it works great (especially after installing the SD patch from Palm).
I started having performance problems when I loaded heavy applications on, like AvantGo (web pages loading is very slow).
Still waiting for SanDisk to come up with wi-fi SD card for Palm so I can use "web pro 3" and access all web sites.

Pros: Screen, case, battery, lot of software available
Cons: Colors - A slight shift to the blue side of spectrum, installed software too skinny

I found this gadget to be a great value for cash. If you need a PDA with superb screen and lot of cheap software available, look no further. The battery is excellent and lasts about 2 weeks on average use.

Pros: Ease of use, camera, great software, good handwriting recognition.
Cons: Needs a good case.

The Zire 71 could very well be the best purchase I've ever made in my life. I've had pda's before, but after a few months of use I found them to be more work than they're worth. For instance changing my handwriting style to get the pda to recognize it was a problem for me. The 71 on the other hand, has great handwriting recognition. And with the notepad, I can scrawl my own note in my own handwriting when I'm in a hurry. I use the 71 for everything. I'm a teacher and use it as my gradebook. This is huge for me. I'm not always in the same room so I wouldn't otherwise have access to a computer gradebook. And I can email the kids their grades with a quick tap of the screen. I take pictures for my school website (the kids love to get posted), it's my notepad (no more sticky notes!), my datebook, my alarm clock, my shopping list, you name it. Ah, and it makes me look attentive during long staff meetings when I'm actually playing a game :)

Pros: SD Card expandability The LCD is beautiful
Cons: Camera is low resolution quality.

I've owned 2 PDA's in my life. The First was the US Robotics Palm Pilot, the first truly successful PDA Platform. The second is the Zire 71. I've had the Zire 71 for well over a year and it continues to meet my needs well.
Stability of the OS is good. I've never lost data.
I like the compatibility with Windows XP. Sync works great.
The Form Factor is good and feels well made.

Pros: For basic PDA purposes, this has it all.
Cons: None for my needs. It has it all.

I had a primitive B/W Sony Clie as my first PDA. It was a disaster. Thought seriously about going back to a paper datebook. Gave the Z71 a try, and I'll never, ever go back to paper. As a substitute for a datebook, there is nothing missing here. Even the built in memory has been more than adequate for me. I have a memory card, but I never use it. Battery life has never been a problem for me, as it was with the Clie. Really, if you want something to store appointments, schedules, lists, directions to various locales, addresses and phone numbers, you really can't go wrong. I guess that makes me a low end PDA user. If you are like me, you'll love the Z71.