This Thread Shouldn't Exist - BUT IT DOES!

[sakkas]

I am not a computer guru. Rather I consider myself a reasonably proficient user who relies on my very competent IT staff for real issues.

I recently purchased a x51v and was looking forward to using it. We run an Exchange server and fairly new Dell workstations in my office.

To begin with, I was disappointed to see that WM5 does not support public folders natively. This is truly ridiculous given that one of the basic functions of an Exchange installation is to allow collaboration. I resigned myself to patching together a solution with a third-party application, like something from Chapura.

The installation of Activesync and attempting to get my Axim to communicate with my Exchange server was a nightmare. Initially Activesync would not work with the server for supposed expiration of my server's security certificate. I, then my IT staff, began by reading the posts at this site and others and we eventually licked that problem.

However, that was just the beginning. This was followed by no fewer than 3 other errors, each increasingly difficult to remedy. (I'll spare you the boring details, as that is not the real point.) Eventually the entire enterprise ended in failure. It simply costs too much to attempt to complete this installation for the expected gain that success might bring.

The point: it is simply stunning that in 2006 Microsoft cannot deliver reliable technology for so simple a task as synching a PDA to a PIM database on a server. I am of the belief that a reasonably competent user should be able to undertake such a task. Instead it stymied my IT personnel, and several levels of Dell technicians all of whom have vastly superior knowledge to my own.

I have absolutely no interest for or against Microsoft or any of its competitors. I am a lawyer and my only interest is in making technology work for my office. Microsoft has delivered to this user in its Activesync and Exchange Activesync technology the absolute worst experience possible.

The Dell Axim appears to be a very nice little machine. Kudos, by the way, to Dell for readily agreeing to take back the Axim after several levels of escalation to tech support who also could not solve the problems. Too bad that it is crippled by flawed software from Microsoft.

Microsoft, it is pathetic that you cannot market a reliable product for so simple a task. Someday your reign will end.

[edge777]

Oh the days when a Microsoft monopoly will end... *sigh* Microsoft may be the worst thing that happened to modern technological advancement.