HP Pursues Business Travelers With Five New iPaqs

iPaq PDAs: Not Dead Yet

Stand-alone PDAs--personal digital assistants that aren't cell phones--have become an endangered species, but for business customers who still use them, HP has introduced two new ones.

The iPaq 210 Enterprise Handheld (part of the 200 series) features an oversize (4-inch-diagonal) 640-by-480-pixel-resolution screen, built-in Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, and several hardware connectors (including mini-USB) that allow it to work with peripherals such as bar-code scanners. It can also be used as a voice-over-IP handset.

HP plans to sell these rather large (for PDAs) devices primarily to specialized industries such as healthcare and food services, and to government agencies. Company officials estimated the iPaq 210's future street price as $400 to $450.

The iPaq 100 Series Classic Handheld is a plain-vanilla Windows Mobile 6 PDA for people who just want a skinny (0.5-inch) organizer that supports basic data connectivity via Wi-Fi and Bluetooth.

HP expects this relatively bare-bones model to go for something in the neighborhood of $200.

Three New Laptops

HP's new Compaq notebooks vary in screen size, and some of their features and specs differ, but they all sport a sleek and shiny new silvery finish.

The 6520s, the low-end entry, has a 14.1-inch-diagonal wide screen; the 6720s has a 15.4-inch-diagonal wide screen; and the 6820s boasts a 17-inch-diagonal wide screen as well as dedicated ATI Mobility Radeon X1350 graphics. All three carry Core 2 Duo CPUs.

HP also announced that it will be offering 64GB solid-state hard-disk drives to purchasers of its higher-end Compaq notebooks (the 2710p, the 2510p, the 6910p, and the 8000 series). These drives promise improved performance, better battery life, and superior reliability.