Product Requirements:
Device:
Any touch screen device
If you are ready for something different and a bit more customized for your
PDA stylus, maybe you should take a look at what James Lambert is creating at Woodpens.com.
Realizing that many people are not satisfied with using a thin stock stylus,
James has created a distinctive line of beautiful hand-turned wooden pens,
equipped with what appears to be the PDA panache cross pen refill. Since that
happens to be one of my favorite types of stylus tips, I already figured that I
would be pleased with the writing quality on my PDA’s screen – and I was not
disappointed.
Some of the finest woods available from all around the world are being
utilized to create custom styli made to your specifications. In fact, James
offers over 40 choices of domestic and exotic woods to choose from. I know
we’ve all heard of Maple, Oak, and Cherry, and he does use those woods. But if
you’re into something a little more unusual, what about trying Chechen (from
Central America), Bubinga (from West Africa), or Pink Ivory (from East &
South Africa) – one of the rarest woods in the world?
My first impression of the stylus that I was presented with for review was
very favorable. The wood is beautiful, and the style of the pen is timeless.
Basically, it looks like the classic Cross style, with gold plated accents at
the clip, middle, and the tip.
My stylus is made of Tulipwood, which I confess, I had never heard of before.
Tulipwood is a beautifully striped hardwood with so many colors that it is
quite lovely to look at. In my particular pen, I can see pinks, dark browns, an
almost purple red, and a yellowish tan. It’s all quite pretty how the colors
go together.
Who knew that wood could be so beautiful?
The way his pens are done really shows off the grain of the wood, and makes
your stylus look like something truly personal and custom made, which it
actually is. My stylus also feels so smooth and looks so “silky” that I
actually caught myself rubbing the barrel of the stylus, just to enjoy the feel
of it.
My particular stylus has a titanium nitride finish, under 24k gold plating.
That meant absolutely nothing to me, until I read James’s informative FAQ
page, and found that this basically means that I should never have to worry
about my gold finish wearing off – which is very cool.
I was pleased to find that custom laser engraving is also an option for an
additional $5. What a perfect gift for someone who either has “everything”,
or is generally impossible to buy for.
Speaking of gift giving, the wooden stylus comes with a velveteen sleeve at
no extra charge. This is perfect when you are giving the gift to yourself, and
you’re not expecting a gift box. However, if the gift is for someone other
than yourself, you might want to opt for the upgrade to a wooden presentation
case ($5.00), a leatherette case ($5.00), or a velvet case ($5.95). Personally,
I’d continue the theme, and go with a wooden case.
Something interesting worth noting, is that James will even use your wood to
make a custom stylus or pen from, if you have a particular piece that has
sentimental value to you – at no extra cost.
Truly, this is a great product at a reasonable price. I have actually had to
fight off people that wanted to “borrow” mine, and I imagine that if you get
one, you might want to opt for the personalization, just to make sure that
honest people are kept honest. J
Price: $34.95, with a 30-day satisfaction guarantee
Pros:
Beautiful, custom made styli
Chose from over 40 exotic and native woods
PDA panache style tip
If stylus tip is ever damaged, they will replace it for free
Cons:
None
Product Information
| Price: | 34.95 |
| Pros: |
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This autumn I will be replacing my laptop (I’ll have a new job). I’ll probably be doing a lot of travel, so want something light with decent battery life.
I was looking at the Lifebook.
I am concerned about the screen – “widescreen” computing seems uncomfortable to me, though I’ve not had much practice.
Do you find that the small screen size is a problem? How does it work for full-screen mode, such as when displaying PowerPoint presentations or playing a fullscreen game?
I’d appreciate any insight, as I don’t know whether to get something like this, or something like the Dell Lattitude C400.
Thanks!
I currently have 3 fujitsu’s in the house, a P1120, an S series and a Lifebook (the wife’s main computer). I find that they are great. We’ve had Sony, HP, Dell and Compaq systems before this and I’m most impressed with the Fujitsu’s. The Compaq and HP’s were just OK, not impressive and they did the job. The Dell is great and I use it every day but since it’s a Inspiron 7500 it’s a bit too big to take on the road.
The Sony’s were the cutiest but ran the hottest and had short battery life, substandard video and other nits (I’ve had 505 series, SR17 series and all-in-one systems). Spare batteries for the Sony’s were killer expensive.
I gave my nephews cheap compaqs for xmas/bday and they work but the screens were not the greatest.
They don’t seem to get the press that the other companies get but we are very happy with our systems.
The cute P1120 is my replacement for a PDA, it’s bigger than a true pda (I have a zaurus, clie, handspring and old palm) but with the built in wireless it’s really cool. The screen is 1024×600 and the unit comes up out of suspend in <20 seconds.
Thanks. I knew the Fujitsu’s were good, I was mainly concerned with the “feel” of using one of those extra-small systems. I like the idea of extreme portability, but need to make sure that it’s also functional for what I want to do.
So on the P1000, how bad would it be to edit/display PowerPoint presentations and Word documents? What about minor (infrequent) coding?
I like to travel light, but if the “light” stuff doesn’t actually do what I need, it’s not worth it.
I don’t actually own fujitsu, but I own an old libretto 50CT. I use it for portable Office 97/win95 machine.
It has VGA res 4.6inch screen with p75. It’s pretty small. There might be some similar aspect that could address your concern.
Generally it works surprisingly well. The screen size doesn’t pose viewability problem. I can see all documents clearly with good sense of overall formatting. It’s just like any win95 machine. And since it’s such a tiny machine, if I need to stare at it closely, I just prop it up on bunch of thick library books to make a computer stand.
The biggest problems with these tiny machines are usually the built in pointing device usability, battery endurance, and fragility. think about getting a good case within a case beyond regular laptop bag. Those extra battery and mini mouse will also come handy for long editing. These machines are also usually a short production run, so pack up on those little knick knacks: pointer rubber nubs, have extra copies of drivers stash out somewhere, kow alternate suplier of battery, etc. Don’t be surprised if supports are not as extensive as big laptops.
But honestly I think these little machines are dying breed and soon will be replaced by tablet PCs.
Probably, but I really prefer typing to handwriting recognition. 🙁
The P1120 has a 1024×600 screen and I’ve used it to compose word docs, write code (in vim), configure and query a sqlserver (installed on the machine), run xwindows (http://www.cygwin.com), basically do everything that I can do on my other systems.
There’s a neat forum here: http://www.leog.net/ that you can more questions, it was what helped solidify it for me. I bought the system sight unseen (although Fry’s has the P2000 series).
On my last trip I used the MS video editor to put together a movie of my son skiing (he’s 5 and it’s cute) and that also worked well.
I would recommend getting the longer life battery but do that on all of my laptops.
good luck,
bobm
Thanks! I’ll take a look at that site.
What is the length and size if the barrel?
Thx
garda