The Pocket PC celebrates its 5th birthday this year. In the last five years we have seen the evolution of the Pocket PC in features and form. Originally tethered to a PC for synchronization and communication, most Pocket PCs now have the ability to communicate wirelessly, via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth. The Pocket PC brand has been renamed Windows Mobile, and has moved into the world of cellular phone technology with the Pocket PC Phone Edition and Smartphone platforms.

People often purchase a product based solely on the feature set advertised by the product vendor. Their rationale: the more features, the better the product. However, they end up not using all the features on the device. I freely admit that I've fallen victim to this approach and have bought products with features that I am still trying to find uses for. The resultI paid extra for features that provide value to me.

The goal of this article is to help you select the Windows Mobile device that best meets your needs. By carefully analyzing the potential uses for a Pocket PC or Smartphone, you should be able to look at each device's features and functionalities and see how they can benefit you.

In order to select a Windows Mobile device that provides you with the capabilities that you desire, ask yourself a simple set of questions (Fig. 1).

Fig. 1: The overall decision process

What type of user are you?

When beginning the process of choosing a Pocket PC or Smartphone, the simplest (and first) question you should ask yourself is, what type of user am I? Generally speaking, users tend to fall into one of two categories: professional or personal. While both categories of users may perform many of the same tasks on a daily basis, the frequency of use may be significantly different.

If you plan on using your Pocket PC or Smartphone for both professional and personal purposes, I suggest that you focus on the professional category for the purposes of your decision-making process. The reasons for this will become clear as we progress.

How do you plan to use your Pocket PC?

The next step in navigating through the decision-making process: determine what you plan to use your Pocket PC or Smartphone for. In attempting to avoid the "buying for features" trap, it is important to define your usage needs first, and then translate those needs into actual hardware requirements.

Fig. 2: Typical Windows Mobile usage.

Fig. 2 lists some examples of common uses for both Pocket PCs and Smartphones for both professional and personal users. These two user categories differ in the time they spend on particular tasks: this impacts hardware requirements. Some simple examples include:

• Personal Information Management (PIM). A personal user of Contacts, Tasks, and Calendar might use each program only minimally. For instance, a personal user's contact list might contain 50 important addresses. The professional user, on the other hand, may have hundreds (if not thousands) of contacts.
• Documents. The personal user may have a few documents (including eBooks) on his or her Windows Mobile device. The professional user, on the other hand, may have spreadsheets, memos, documentation, or other large documents numbering in the hundreds or even thousands.
• Web browsing. A casual user might be satisfied with viewing a few pages of Web content offline (by synchronizing Web content while attached to a docking cradle). A professional user, however, may demand real-time wireless access to content.