Handspring Visor Prism

[Archived in $200 - $300, Handspring, Products]

Manufacturer: Handspring
Price at amazon.com: $283.84
This item is not stocked or has been discontinued.

Product Features:

• Sharp full-color screen displays over 65,000 colors
• 8 MB RAM stores thousands of addresses, appointments, to-do items, and more
• Features address book, to-do list, memo pad, date book, advanced calculator, and world clock
• Fully compatible with thousands of Palm OS applications; supports optional expansion modules for MP3 player, pager, modem, GPS, video games, and more
• What's in the box: Visor Prism, Cobalt Blue HotSync cradle, 8 MB RAM, Internal rechargeable lithium ion battery, USB HotSync charging cradle, Leather slipcase

Product Description:

The Handspring Visor Prism is the first expandable full-color handheld computer. The 16-bit active-matrix LCD screen displays over 65,000 colors so everything is crisp, bright, and easy to read. With the Springboard expansion slot, you can snap a digital camera or global positioning system and instantly view full-color photos and maps. The Prism also features an internal rechargeable battery that is charged when the Prism is placed in the docking cradle. In addition to an address book,... read more


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Description from Manufacturer:Handspring's first foray into the realm of color palmtops, the Visor Prism may not deliver the crispness of displays on the latest Windows CE devices from Casio and Compaq, but it does improve on the Palm IIIc, its main competitor.

While the Prism costs more than the Palm IIIc, its increased color depth and brightness (it delivers 16-bit color compared to the 8-bit color of the IIIc) really shines in gaming and graphical applications. Even the default world map that's used to set geographic location and time appeared more distinct and offered the illusion of 3-D.

Like other Visors, the Prism contains a Springboard module slot, letting users upgrade its capabilities--such as adding an MP3 player, expanding memory, and eventually adding a cell phone (among many options). With the color screen of the Prism, modules such as the eyemodule digital camera really take on new life. With the Prism, the eyemodule takes color pictures, while previous versions of the Visor only allowed users to view them in grayscale.

Further, unlike other Visors, the Visor Prism uses an internal lithium-ion rechargeable battery--a nice touch as the color display would have drained the standard two AAAs quickly. Handspring claims that a fully charged battery should last a week or two with normal use, but we found continuous use of the display, such as with game playing or extended note taking, wore the battery down much faster. However, every time the Prism syncs in the fast-transferring USB cradle, the battery gets charged--and it only takes a few minutes to top off the current level of juice.

Although the color screen only extends the thickness of the Prism by a tenth of an inch compared to previous Visors, it's still twice as thick as the sleek Palm V line of devices. But it is smaller than CE devices such as Casio's EM-500 and the Compaq iPaq, and for its size category of palmtops, it delivers the best colors around. --J. Curtis

Pros:

• 16-bit color (compared to the Palm IIIc's 8-bit color)
• 8 MB memory
• Expandable using Springboard modules

Cons:

• Color display not as bright or crisp as Pocket PCs

Average Customer Rating:

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Comment: Excellent Replacement policy Rating:
(PRISM) Prism is fast. I am running my old Micromoney on this thing and it goes through 3 years of checking account history pretty quickly. Palm Vx takes a century. ActiveSky allows you to play color videos on the Prism. It eliminates the video advantage of Ipaq. Visorphone is available throughout the country and uses GSM which is the standard in Europe and Asia. No other PDA allows for cell phone/PDA configuration. Visorphone can act like a modem and connect to your current ISP(s) to access the internet just like Omnisky. (CONS) Not all Prism screens are created equal, depending on production batch. After I installed the free AlbumToGo and PhotoAlbum, I realized some Prisms have missing colors in their palettes. 3 out of 4 Prisms were not able to render the pictures correctly. 1 Prism screen was very dark. Also some Prisms have dead pixels. Use AlbumToGo to load pictures and examine for dead pixels. If you want an MP3 Player, you have to pay extra. Ipaq plays MP3s out of the box.

I recommend Handspring anyday. I recommend Prism over any PDA in the market. I recommend the Visorphone over carrying a separate Cell phone with hard to see WAP capabilities.

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Comment: WHAT A GREAT TOOL FOR ORGANIZING A CHAOTIC MIND! Rating:
Pros: Great color,easy sync, advanced calculator for converting length, weight or temperatures, plenty of memory

Cons: Poor in sunlight, occasional "reset" crashes, no earphone for future use as an mp3 I used to have a Visor Deluxe and I loved that too- until I lost it in an airport! Believe me- people aren't that eager to return such a great tool (toy!). Since I just "had" to replace it, I decided to get a color Prism instead. Since I carry it in my purse in the case it came with, the size is just fine. Instead of using graphics input, I bought a software program called Silkyboard, which gives me a keyboard that doesn't cover the screen. Then I just type everything in quickly.

The colors are great, and I've even got a photo album on it with pictures of the family. Everyone's amazed when they see this (free) program from Handspring. I've also downloaded some great free programs, because I believe that if you don't use the Visor (or even a Palm) to its maximum potential, you're really missing out! There are plenty of free color games that make this a fun toy as well, and it comes in handy while waiting on line for the Dr. or the train!

Best of all, instead of all the little scraps of paper I used to carry around, I've learned to use the memo functions, the address book and the calendar. There are so many things you can do with a visor once you get the right programs. I keep track of my Quicken account on it and then transfer it through a hot-sync. right onto my PC, I've got a great Birthday reminder list, another program that keeps all the other "lists" that float around in my head, another program that keeps track of my regular shopping list plus plenty of other specific shopping lists - like "what books do I want to buy?" , "what do I need at the Hardware store?" "What things do I want to buy on my next visiting trip?", etc. That's only the beginning- There's so much more potential in this little gadget. I love it and would recommend it to everyone!

The Bottom Line The built in's are very useful, and the availability of other free programs,+ others you can buy, make this an almost limitless machine! I'd be LOST without it!

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Comment: Brilliant value for PDAphone (Visor Prism+Phone) Rating:
I've been using Visor Prism + Phone for about 2 months now, I bought it from a local store which suprisingly still had some stocks and guaranteed the item for 1 year.
Overall, I found it very very useful. I'm not a heavy PDA user, so mainly I use it to read e-books, see photos, games. Visor's 8 Megs is more than enough.
More about the phone, I can't tell how much I admire the modularity of Springboard. Handspring engineer have done great job. The phone and sms function work perfect, compared to the more pricey Tungsten W.
It's better than Treo 270 I assume, on color display (Treo has 4096 while Prism has 65K) and of course using Visor I don't have to worry about flip hinge crack that often happen to Treo user.
Some drawbacks that I found is that battery drained quickly, I also notice that there are some dead pixels in the unit I bought, and last but not least it's quite heavy to carry.
Based on the above, I still think that this product is a great collectible item,worth the price, and everywhere you carry it people were just curious to know. It's a bit rare that to some it's more intriguing than even the popular O2 XDA. Well done Handspring!

Posted at November 11, 2003 07:06 AM | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)