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Windows Mobile 6 Review

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I've just updated my i-Mate JasJam to Windows Mobile 6. Although I was initially skeptical about this, I had to do it, basically. My JasJam checks my email continuously throughout the day, and when I'm on a call, the data check drops the sound for the call which is a major inconvenience. So I looked into some updates - via the Telstra JasJam site and found that Windows Mobile 6 was a free upgrade.

Being an early adopter of technology I decided to give it a whirl (even though it's been out for a while). During the update things went slowly. At one point I thought I'd fried my JasJam, a moment that made me decidedly uneasy. It came back to life however, and things progressed from there. I've been using it for about 14 days now and here are my impressions:

  • wireless connectivity (802.11) is much better and setting up connections is easy and relatively fool proof.
  • bluetooth seems more reliable
  • no more sound drop outs during calls and while phone is checking email (yay!)
  • I like the look of the new interface - pretty!
  • Speed of dialling is faster. Previously the onscreen keys took a moment to register a press - now it's very quick.
  • hanging up happens immediately. Previously, I had to press the "End" or red phone key several times until the phone would drop the call. Annoying if you say things after a call you don't want the caller to hear (oops!)
  • Email interaction with the server is smoother and runs without any errors.
Overall, I'm quite happy with the improved interface. I note that it has it's own "Windows Update" built in. It also has updated versions of the various mobile office applications - Outlook, Word, Excel for example.

Most importantly it still has the block breaker game - my usual boredom killer.

OK, so here are my gripes:
  • the alarm tone still has to be a wav file - large, unwieldy files that rarely seem to work
  • the phone has hung a couple of times
  • battery life seems to have decreased

All in all, not a bad update and fairly straightforward to implement. Works well with both Vista and XP. I should also note that the use of the phone as a modem is much improved. Well worth the time and effort to do.
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