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Moving to compete with the latest slew of Pocket PCs as well as other upscale Palm-based handhelds, Palm is announcing two new models: one with a built-in camera, the other with built-in Wi-Fi (802.11b) networking.

Both the camera-equipped Zire 71 and the Wi-Fi-enabled Tungsten C run the latest Palm operating system, version 5.2.1. The Zire 71 is available now, Palm says, and the Tungsten C is due to ship in early May.

New Zire Ships

The Zire 71 is the second entry in Palm's consumer line of personal digital assistants launched last fall with the $99 Zire. But the original Zire was designed to appeal to a mass-market crowd; the $299 Zire 71 was created with a more upmarket multimedia buff in mind.

Slide up the metallic slate face plate, and the Zire 71 turns into a camera. The lens is on the top rear of the raised face plate, and a hardware button for snapping photos is on the inside bottom of the main unit. In camera mode, the 320-by-320 transflective 65,000-plus-color screen functions as an LCD viewfinder. It also displays thumbnails when you slide the faceplate back down to conceal the camera lens.

The unit captures images measuring up to 640 by 480 pixels. Initial tests find image quality to be fair but not great; low-light shots suffer in particular, because the device has no flash. Included software lets you create photo albums, transmit images via the device's infrared port, and move image files to a Secure Digital card in the unit's built-in port.

Digital music buffs can listen to MP3s or Real Audio files via the Zire 71's built-in speaker or stereo headphone jack and the included RealOne Mobile Player. Videos can be played with the Kinoma Player and Producer software, along with a free QuickTime app. The unit's included 16MB of memory won't store many tunes, photos, or videos; 13MB is usable. However, you can put those on an SD card (not included) and pop it into the built-in expansion slot.

The Zire 71 is based on Texas Instruments' 144-mhz OMAP310 processor and has a rechargeable lithium ion/polymer battery. It weighs in at a modest 5.3 ounces and measures 4.5 by 2.9 by 0.67 inches when the camera isn't in use.

The new Quick Install app supports drag-and-drop transfer of files and applications from a Windows desktop to the handheld. The Zire 71 also comes with more than 30 color themes to change the look of the screen.

Wi-Fi Palm Debuts

The Tungsten C, priced at $499, is the latest top-of-the-line corporate-oriented PDA from Palm. The new series launched last fall with the Tungsten T. A more recent member of the family is the Tungsten W for GPRS/GSM cellular networks.

Besides being the first Palm with an integrated 11 megabits per second Wi-Fi adapter, the Tungsten C is also the first to ship with Microsoft Office-compatible productivity software. It comes with DataViz's Documents To Go Professional 5.1, which supports Word, Excel, and PowerPoint.

Also bundled is PalmSource's Web browser, which supports HTML, JavaScript and other Internet formats. It comes with the VersaMail 2.5 e-mail client and software for printing over a Wi-Fi network. Also included is Graffiti 2, an update to Palm's handwriting recognition software, which is useful for those who don't want to use the integrated QWERTY thumb keyboard.

The Tungsten C provides several functions for security-conscious corporate users. It comes with virtual private network software from Mergic, application-level 128-bit encryption, and password-character blocking that protects your passwords from nosy bystanders.

The Tungsten C weighs 6.3 ounces and measures 4.8 by 3.1 by 0.65 inches. It features a generous 64MB of memory, a powerful 400-MHz Intel XScale processor, and a 320-by-320 transflective LCD screen with more than 65,000 colors. Its rechargeable lithium ion/polymer battery is more robust than the one on the Zire 71. Palm says the battery will last for a full day of use with Wi-Fi connectivity, or a week of normal unconnected use.

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