Pocket PC - Vendors

Vendors

Pocket PCs are manufactured and sold by several different companies; the major manufacturers include HP (under the iPAQ and now defunct Jornada brands), Toshiba, Acer, Asus, Dell (under the now defunct Axim brand), Fujitsu Siemens, E-TEN, HTC, and ViewSonic. In Mid-2003, Gateway Computers and JVC announced they would release Pocket PCs, but the projects were discontinued before a product was released. Prices in 2003 ranged from around US$800 for the high-end models, some of which are combined with cell phones, to $200 for low-end models. A $100–$200 model was rumored to be released within 2004 or early 2005, although the lowest price for a just-released Pocket PC never went under $300. Many companies ceased to sell PDA's by 2003–2004 because of a declining market. Major companies such as Viewsonic and Toshiba stopped producing new Pocket PCs.

Before the Pocket PC brand was launched, there were other Windows-based machines of the same form factor made by HP, Philips, and others called Palm-size PCs. These devices ran Windows CE 2.0–2.11 and had an interface that was similar to the then-current desktop versions of Windows, such as Windows 98.

Companies like O2, T-Mobile and Orange are marketing Pocket PCs that have integrated mobile telephony (smartphones). All users have to do is put in the SIM card and follow the wizard, to put their SIM contacts in the address book. An example is O2's Xda, or T-Mobile's MDA Compact. Both of these devices, while bearing the phone operator's logo, are manufactured by the dominant Pocket PC manufacturer HTC.

One of the more popular high-end consumer-market Pocket PCs was the Dell Axim x51v, which was discontinued in 2007. Hardware specs included 3.7" color TFT VGA display with 640x480 resolution, Intel XScaleTM PXA270 processor at 624 MHz, 336 MB of memory (256 MB flash, 64 MB SDRAM), integrated 802.11b and Bluetooth 1.2, integrated Intel 2700G multimedia accelerator with 16 MB video memory. Expansion was possible via CompactFlash Type II and SD slots (supporting SDIO Now!, SDIO and MMC cards). Included is a 1,100 mAh user replaceable battery (est. 4-6.5 hours, 2200 mAh also available).

Some Pocket PCs feature integrated GPS often combined with mobile phone functionality. Pocket PCs with built-in telephony differ from Windows Mobile Smartphone Edition devices in several respects, including the lack of a touchscreen on the latter. Some examples of current Pocket PCs with GPS integrated are the Fujitsu Siemens Pocket Loox N560, a high-end Pocket PC with a VGA screen and an integrated SiRF Star III GPS; the HTC TyTN, a small communicator with integrated slide in keyboard; the HP hw6945 and HP iPAQ hw6515 with integrated thumb-board, GPS and GSM/GPRS telephony; the HTC top of the line Universal, branded as the QTek 9000 (also branded by various telecommunications companies as the Orange SPV M5000, T-mobile MDA Pro, Vodafone VPA IV, O2 Xda Exec, i-Mate JasJar, Dopod 900).

A newer entrant into the Pocket PC market is Palm which sells devices like the Treo 700w/wx based on Windows Mobile 5.0 and featuring integrated telephony. Previously, Palm only produced PDAs running the Palm OS (as did the first versions of the Palm Treo) and still sell versions of the Treo based on the Palm operating system.

HTC manufactures up to 80% of all phone enabled Windows Mobile devices for other companies (including HP and O2), as well as many non-phone Pocket PCs (for companies such as Dell, HP and Fujitsu Siemens). HTC is now marketing Windows Mobile devices under their own brand, as well as that of Dopod.