Nino - No No! (Philips Nino 300)

Member Name: alukaris

Product:	Philips Nino 300
Date:	26/02/01 (940 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Looks absolutely fantastic, easy to use, instant-on

Disadvantages: Heavy, insufficient memory, poor handwriting recongnition software, poor functionality, expensive, poor upgradeability

This is a Windows CE powered device which came out around 1998. I bought one on the recommendation of a shop assistant in a well known chain store. At the time, I was considering a Psion 5, but totally fell for the "no keyboard; write on the screen" hook, line and sinker! Unfortunately, the machine is expensive to upgrade and the Windows CE 2.0 operating system is memory-heavy, using up the lion's share of the measley 4MB of RAM. After 6 months, I had to buy a new battery as my useage was quite erratic due to frustration with the machine.

The machine has all the usual functions you would expect from a PDA: address book, calender, inbox program to handle e-mails, notebook program, task list editor, voice recorder, solitaire program and calculator. It also comes bundled with SmArtWriter handwriting recognition software, which I feel is quite poor at its job. You have a choice of 3 methods to input data, using either T9 text input (quite difficult to use), an on-screen tap keyboard or a handwriting scratchpad (with or without word completion, where you enter a single letter at a time and the device tries to guess the word as you go along). Whichever method you use, data entry is cumbersome.

The machine come complete with a recharger and a cradle which links up to the serial port on your PC and is able to swap and update information to the latest version added. Linking up to the PC also updates the Nino's clock and date to match that of the PC. The installation software for the synchronisation program and the other bundled software were quite difficult to set up, however, there was no problem once the device was running, except occasionally when I wanted to use the modem on the desktop and I had to manually deactivate the synchronisation program.

For those lucky enough to have an infra-red port on their PC or laptop, the Nino is able to connect directly through this. The connection is line of sight and the machines have to be
within 10 feet of each other, but this is no problem. The Nino also has the capability of communicating with other Ninos and some other compatible devices, but I never found one that worked with it.

A modem is available for direct connection to the internet, but don't hope to use it properly with the 4MB version. I phoned Widget software who warned me about buying this expensive 9,600 baud modem which would not function particularly well!

I am irritated by the inability of the machine to handle printing functions. I am sure that such software is available for Windows CE devices, but it is certainly not bundled with the machine and it doesn't accept a printer cable that I know of in any case. The IR port would probably not function with a printer in any case.

What I actually wanted was a more standalone machine which would function for long periods without needing to be linked up to the PC, with word processing and printing functions and a good deal more memory or more efficient use of what was available. In this sense, the Psion was probably what I needed and the Nino is probably, just like the Palm/Handspring PDAs, just a glorified address book with very little extra real functionality.

I know the machine has a cult following and that there is a selection of available software, both on the net for free and available from Widget Software by mail order, but I think that this is better suited to the 8MB machine.

At the end of the day, as a surgeon, this machine has not been the valuable device I needed to help me in practice, however, I can see how it would appeal to some people.

Summary: