O2 XDA Mini s (HTC Wizard) (O2 xda II mini)

Member Name: firefox111

Product:	O2 xda II mini
Date:	13/10/08 (446 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Windows mobile Operating system & great range of software

Disadvantages: Using wifi leads to poor battery life

O2 XDA Exec Mini s (HTC Wizard)

I have had this phone now for 12 months on a contract with O2. The phone is a slide design with pullout keyboard keeping in line with the majority of designs of the traditional PDA phone look.

The size is not bad with the dimensions being approximately L x W x D 108 x 58 x 23 mm. It does however appear a bit on the "chunky" due to the slide out keyboard. The screen displays at resolutions of 320x240 so it's not that bad but lacks the clarity of other pocket pc resolutions of other PDA's that have been produced.

The phone runs Windows Mobile 5 Pocket pc. It includes software to allow you to SMS, MMS, Email, and Instant Messaging.The XDA Mini s includes pocket office applications (Pocket Word, Powerpoint and Excel) so you can create documents that are compatable with Microsoft Office and Open Office.

The keyboard is small but very usable even with my big fingers although to type numeric entries you have to press a function key to access these as they share the same keys as the top line of a qwertyy keyboard.

The phone can sync with Microsoft outlook via Microsoft Activesync although I recommend you use activesync 4.5 or greater as there are known issues with this pocket pc with prior versions of Microsoft activesync.

The operation is pretty much like other windows mobile devices there are programs that user of Microsoft Windows and Office will be familiar with. There is a start menu from which you can launch applications such as Word, Excel, Outlook and Internet explorer so you can get your email and SMS/MMS on the move. There are also other programs such as contacts which you cam enter phone number, addresses and contact details.
The phone charges via the mini usb port located on the bottom side of the phone which also doubles as the data transfer to another pc.

You can use Wi Fi to connect to a local hotspot to do some internet surfing at home/work and the display is ok although the screen does feel a little small. It's also better to use pocket opera rather than pocket internet explorer as I find it renders the pages much faster and the look more like the site as you would view it on a laptop of descktop pc.

The software titles available for pocket pc is immense there are loads out there most of the types of software such as databases and small applicatios are freeware and relatively straight forward to install. There is also a mini SD card socket to increase the size of storage vailable for the xda mini s to use.

Pros
A nice compact QWERTY keyboard which is functional although can become tiresome if typing long documents due to its compact size.
Pocket Word
Pocket Excel
Pocket Outlook
PDF Viewer
Bluetooth
Wi-Fi
USB Mini input/output port

Cons
Its feels quite a thick phone but this is because of the slide out keyboard.
The web browser is Internet explorer I prefer Opera it's much faster at displaying the pages.
When the Wifi is turned on the battery will drain rapidly.
The keyboard can be a bit fiddly at time to use but in my opionion its easier to use than the traditional keyboards available to most phones in my opionion.

Summary: Overall its a pretty good pocket pc but other phones out there are better

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