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The iPAQ h4150 is Hewlett Packard’s latest ‘slimline’ model of Pocket PC. It follows on from the unashamedly lower end h19xx series in terms of its slimline size, but beefs up the specifications somewhat. It is tiny enough, and thin enough, to fit in all but the tightest of pockets, and its 3.5in screen, while the smallest you will find on any of the current crop of Pocket PCs, occupies pretty much all of the space available to it. And at 132g you’ll barely notice the weight in your pocket.

The 400MHz Intel PXA 255 processor won’t surprise anyone used to comparing Pocket PC specifications. Nor will the 64MB of RAM. What does surprise a little is that only 55MB of this is user accessible. Also, in these days of flash ROM availability for backing up key data while on the move, the fact that there is only 2.8MB of ROM set aside for the user is annoying. This is because the iPAQ h4150 has 32MB of ROM, and pretty much all of it is used up by the operating system: other devices boost the user accessible area by using 64MB of ROM.

There is a single expansion card slot (of SD flavour) in the top of the casing. This supports SDIO so you can add extra hardware. You won’t need to use the slot to add either Bluetooth or 802.11b though, as both are built into the hardware itself. Hewlett Packard provides an application for activating and deactivating the wireless modes, and this allows you to toggle on and off one or both modes with a couple of screen taps. I initiated 802.11b and started using the Internet via my router in a rather impressive 10 seconds from a standing start.

Hewlett Packard sees the primary users of its iPAQ range as being corporate, and to that end provides a series of extra applications designed to enhance its appeal. These applications help sway my favour more towards this iPAQ. Between them they form the kind of bundle that small enterprises and home-based professionals might find particularly useful. It is true that some of the provided software, like the Adobe Acrobat reader and RealOne Player are available as free downloads, but having them supplied makes installation that much easier.

Others, like the iPresenter PowerPoint Converter, and the Westtek ClearVue Suite which provides tools for viewing Word, Excel and PowerPoint documents, are good productivity additions which would otherwise cost money. Also in this category are F-Secure FileCrypto data encryption software and Colligo Personal Edition, a tool for file sharing using 802.11b, a faster option than using the built in infra red port and one which does not require devices to be physically aligned. Hewlett Packard adds in its own tool for printing using wireless too, which will be handy for anyone with a wireless enabled printer.

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