by Walter Barrett

Created on: February 22, 2009   Last Updated: June 19, 2009

Before you try to identify which pocket pc was worth the wait (and worth the weight) in 2008, there is one fact that you need to come to grips with. There is no such thing- at least, not yet- as the perfect pocket pc. Alas, with all the pros that accompany the very best in today's devices, there comes that list of cons along with them. The screen resolution and call quality are superb, but battery life is poor. The applications work great and the size is actually worth calling it a pocket pc. But... you get the picture. So, don't expect perfection as I list my top 3 favorites for 2008 pocket pcs.

I would say that the 3rd best buy in 2008 would have been the HTC Touch Diamond, running off of Microsoft's Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional. The phone's touch screen is one of the most responsive I have come across, and the screen clarity and color were well thought out. The Diamond's screen protector does just that, leaving minimum prints or marks of any kind on the screen that are usually a big problem for other devices. Batery life is quite good, lasting about 2 days with heavy talk time and even data use. The touch-flo feature which accommodates most HTCs is very accurate, and viewing web pages or video playback on the large screen display is a welcomed experience. Wi-Fi is a breeze to connect, offering accessability to anyone not subscribing to a data plan. However, there is a major draw back to the Diamond. There is no expansion slot for any memory card, and storing anything on the phone goes directly to its internal storage which fills up very quickly, slowing the phone to a crawl, and in some instances freezing it completely. This calls for you to manually transfer every file you download or receive from the phone's internal storage to the decice itself- and you have to do it a file at a time. Other than this tedious flaw by HTC, the phone is a great communicator, e-mailer and even document editor.

Following closely on the heels of the HTC Touch Diamond in my books is the Palm Treo Pro. This pocket pc came as a suprise to many, at a time when it appeared as if Palm was falling out of the race for powerful handhelds. The latest Treo runs on Microsoft Windows Mobile 6.1 Professional, but one of the things that distinguishes it from the rest that run on the same platform is the ease with which you can download programs directly to the device. There are several cab. files and exe. files that although built for Windows Mobile, do not work on many pocket pcs. The Treo

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