For some time I have been considering getting a PDA or hand held computer of some sort and recently I acquired an HP iPAQ hw6945. This is a device that seems to have quite a few features and be able to do almost anything you would want it to do.

I haven’t played with it too extensively yet and at this point am still kinda trying to decide if it will be worth having or not. It is basically billed as a smartphone that will do everything. I will not be using the phone functionality of it but using it simply as a PDA/hand-held computer.

The reason I chose this particular unit is because it was the only one that I have come across that had everything I wanted (wifi, bluetooth, qwerty keyboard) and it even had a few features that I consider to be bonuses such as the fact that it has a built in GPS receiver.

From the experience I have so far, it seems to function quite well and while web pages take a few moments to download, the programs load almost instantly. The keys one the keyboard are small, but yet they are set-up well enough to be quite usable. While I don’t think I’ll achieve 80 words per minute on them, I should be able to type out a post using them fairly effectively.

Most of the websites I have browsed to so far seem to appear in a manner that makes them legible and easy to use. While some people might find it beneficial to optimize a version of your page for use on a device such as this, it is not really necessary.

Microsoft Pocket Streets came pre-installed on it but it didn’t come with any maps. I have looked online a little bit and the only maps I can find are city maps for probably the 100 or 200 largest cities in the US but that’s all. Hopefully I can find some maps that will work for it to be able to give a little more complete review of that feature.