MWg Atom Life

While smart phones continue to thrive, the standalone PDA market is suffering. According to a recent IDC reports. PDA sales have fallen 43.5 percent between Q3 2006 and Q3 2007. In fact, just under 730,000 PDA's were sold globally in that last quarter compared with 35 million smart phones sold during the same period.

Smart phones are handy for those who want their cell phones to serve double duty as contact managers and appointment schedulers.

But these devices will likely disappoint the kind of user who would choose a Dell Axim X51v solely for running sophisticated, CPU heavy mobile applications.

At 5.1 ounces, the Atom Life is lightweight for such a powerful device. Beneath the glossy black plastic Atom Life's touch screen are a five way control pad and six buttons two soft buttons for Windows Mobile, two larger Send and Hang up buttons, plus a Windows Menu and a Media key.

Along the bottom of the device you'll find a USB input jack and a 2.5mm headset jack. The left side holds flimsy feeling hardware volume buttons, while the right side sports the camera and the voice recorder keys. Finally, the top of the unit contains the power button and a mini-SD card slot. My Kingston 4GB mini SDHC card worked fine.

You'll find none of that stripped down Windows Mobile 6 Standard business here. The Atom Life runs the more robust Windows Mobile 6 Professional operating system and features a very bright 2.7 inch touch display and a nice metal stylus.

The screen, though, is the usual 320 by 240 pixel LCD. That's no different from those of most other Windows Mobile devices, but in a high end product like this it would have liked a higher resolution display. By contrast, the Axim X51v comes equipped with a 640 by 480 pixel display.