Handtops, UMPC - Why the OQO 1+ rather than the Sony UX

Hi all,
After three weeks living with the OQO, I thought I might share my opinion as to why I bought an aging technology rather than the latest, wiz bang device.
Let me start of by stating for the record that I am of the opinion that the Sony UX handtops are wonderful, and that I am in no way trying to convince anyone, least of all myself, that they are inferior to the OQO.
It has taken me well over four years to finally buy a handtop computer. I have struggled on with a heavy, large laptop while watching with disappointment the lack of progress on the Flipstart. I have lugged a shoulder bag of kit around while reading every article I could on the OQO, the Sony U series, the Sony UX series, and all the other Origami or like devices. I have cursed the inconvenience of having to carry a laptop, while even seriously considered the Toshiba Libretto U100 and the Fujitsu P1510D. Up until recently, I have used a laptop, as it seemed to me that there was no one single device out there that met even most of my criterion.
The problem was that I was looking for a desktop replacement machine with an adequate screen resolution, powerful enough to work on as a primary machine, but small and light enough to be carried in a pocket. It had to have a built in keyboard, I would have preferred a clamshell design, and the list goes on and on.
All that changed when I upgraded my cell phone to an I-Mate K-Jam. Within a couple of days, I realized that the built-in keyboard on the phone was just too small to do any kind of serious work on, and the screen text was a problem for my eyes after long periods of use.
At that point, I realized that, as things stand at present, it was not going to be feasible to replace my primary laptop with a handtop. I needed to re-evaluate my criterion and look realistically at what I actually needed, rather than what was nice to have.
Starting from the point that the handtop was not going to be my primary machine, I suddenly had two options, The Sony UX and the OQO 1+. I also looked at the Raon Digital Vega, but the lack of a built in keyboard eventually eliminated it.
Since the handtop was not going to be my primary machine, several factors that had not played a major role in the decision process up until that point became relevant. Cost became a major consideration, as I would have to also buy a laptop to work on, and it was going to be difficult to justify spending considerably more on a secondary machine than I would on my primary machine. (Also, I do not have an unlimited budget) Factors such as the speed of the machine and the size of the HDD became less important than the overall portability of the unit. And for the first time, the screen resolution became less important than the size of the text. (Aging eyes!)
Living in South Africa means that one has to import machines like the OQO and the Sony. They are not available, and I have not met anyone who owns either. Since I did not have access to either of the units, I built cardboard mockups of both, filled with lead shot, with printed screens. Two things became immediately apparent: The Sony would not fit into most of my pockets, and I had to wear reading glasses to see the writing on the screen. Price, size and screen resolution aside, (and looks, although this was not a major factor) the Sony seemed to be the better option, but I just could not live with the size and the screen. What about the OQO? Would it get the job done?
I primarily need a machine I can carry with me to run the programs my company develops, and to receive and answer e-mails. An external USB HSDPA card solved the e-mail problem, but could this little machine handle the programs? I dug out a very old laptop that was gathering dust in our office, a 400 MHz 256 MB RAM 20 GB HDD relic from the Windows NT days. We keep it around as a spare in case we have several simultaneous disasters with laptops, as has happened in the past. I loaded the various databases and programs that I would need onto this little machine, and sat and played with it for a few hours. I was surprised. While disk space was cramped, the 20 GB disk held the operating system, the Delphi programming language, several large databases, the entire code base for the programs, the programs and a full installation of MS Office 2000. The boot up speed of the unit was irritatingly slow, but once the machine was up and running, and a program had loaded, everything worked at a satisfactory pace. Not speedy, not even close, but satisfactory.
I tried hibernate as a solution to the slow boot speed. It does not work as well on NT as it could, but it solved the boot speed problem. The only question that remained was whether or not the Transmeta CPU would behave with our programs. I contacted a friend who has a Transmeta based laptop, and sent him a couple of out app’s. They worked.
At this point, OQO dropped the price on the 1+. It seemed like the timing was perfect. I ordered a unit from the UK, and after the inevitable problems with South African Customs, took delivery of my very first handtop computer.
I have a few gripes about the OQO after three weeks. It gets hot. Not too hot to hold, but still hot. The standard battery life with the screen on its brightest, and cooling set to maximum is dreadful, I will have to get an extended battery (or two). The pointing device takes some getting used to, and the screen resolution of 800 x 480 is sometimes not enough, and I have to set it at 800 x 600. The built-in speakers are, well, sad. Other than that, the OQO has exceeded my expectations.
The OQO 1+ runs a very large database based program on a 2 GB database without any issues at a reasonable speed. E-mail through Outlook on Office 2003 using the HSDPA modem is great, and surfing the Web is doable. The Wi-Fi is slow and a bit short ranged, but adequate inside our offices. The thumb keyboard is better than I expected, although I would not want to write a book on it. And best of all, it fits into my shirt pocket.
In all, the OQO 1+ does the job that I want it to do, and is small enough to carry with me when I am not in the office. In the office, it is my e-mail machine, and plugged into an external screen, keyboard and mouse, makes a perfectly good test machine as well.
Will the OQO replace my laptop? Not a chance! Will I upgrade if OQO comes out with a new machine? Maybe, but I am not sure that there is a need to do so. Once I was past the idiocy of wanting a handtop as my primary machine, I found that the OQO 1+ was indeed good enough. And the Sony UX? Well, I am not sure that, for what I want, the Sony would be any better a machine. It is indeed faster, can be loaded with more RAM, can have a larger HDD, and should be able to run VISTA. But it is expensive, arguably ugly, too big for my pockets, and I probably would not be able to read the writing on the screen.
For a super PDA that one can carry with ease, that runs XP and windows programs, and does the job at a price the OQO for me is a better choice than the Sony UX.