I've just posted this at aximsite. Seeing as the smartphone forum here isn't exactly busy (and due to the advice I got here) I thought I'd post it here too
OK.. I've had the MDA Compact for a couple of days now. Some people said they were interested to see how I got on with it, so I've put down some info and a few thoughts. Will add more as i get to know it better, but lets start the story at the beginning.......
So here’s the story. In February, a plain cardboard package arrived at my office containing the brand new Axim X50V I’d ordered. I fell in love with it immediately. I’d done my research and was convinced that it was the closest thing to my perfect PDA that I could possibly get. Last Saturday I arrived home with a shiny box containing an MDA Compact. Have I fallen out of love with the Axim? Did I make a mistake in buying it? Well the answer to both questions is no. What happened was this.
My mobile phone contract from the 3 network has just expired. It wasn’t a bad deal but the one thing that they don’t (and won’t) do is data services to the internet. So my plan was to look around for a phone with Bluetooth and a nice data tariff, So I can do a little web surfing, email etc…This proved to be harder to find than I thought… until I found that Tmobile were offering a free MDA Compact with a discounted data package.
So at the moment I can see this going one of three ways
1)I fall head over heals in love with the MDA... divorce the Axim and ebay it.
2)I decide the MDA isn’t the device for me, it goes onto eBay, and I use the proceeds to buy a ‘normal’ handset.
3)I get to keep them both and get them to play nice together
So what is the MDA Compact?
The MDA Compact is the same physical hardware as the Imate Jam and HTC Magician. The difference is the software installed in the Rom.
Basically what you have is a fully featured Pocket PC device (running WM2003SE) with the Microsoft phone extensions so you can use it as a GSM phone with GPRS.
You get Bluetooth (but no wifi)
GPRS
Text/MMS messaging
Email
1.3 Mega pixel camera
Polyphonic ringtones/MP3 realtones
SD card slot
416MHz processor
64mb Ram
8Mb BIS
And some bundled software.
All wrapped up in a package that weighs 170g and is 58 x 106 x 18 (mm)
The size was the biggest factor for me. It’s small enough to be used as a regular cell phone… and large enough to be a decent pocket pc
What do you get in the box?
1 MDA Compact
Stereo Hands free kit
1 slip case (nicer than the Dell one, but I’m still going to get a Proporta one)
2 Styli
1 Charger (which is phone charger sized… not Axim Power brick sized
1 USB sync charger (mini USB sized, but no cradle)
1 Screen protector (pretty awful but will keep me going until I get a better one)
1 Quick start manual (for people who don’t read manuals)
1 Full manual (for people who do)
1 CD containing Outlook (2002) and Active sync (3.7)
1 Bonus CD containing Clearvue PDF and presentation viewers
SPB GPRS monitor
Fonix Voice Dial
KSE TrueFax
What do I think of it so far?
It’s still very early days, but having made some calls I can say it seems to work well as a phone. There are about 4 ways of making calls, Contacts, Tmobiles photo contacts app, phone button view and voice dialling and I’m not sure which is best. GPRS works and I’ve had a sneaky peak at aximsite. I think I may use netfront as I can turn off graphics and save a few MB.
I’ve been using it all day to take notes with and it seems to work nicely as a pocket pc. Handwriting recognition is pretty good and the small screen is something that I thought I could get used to. I picked up my Axim at the end of the day though, looked at the screen and couldn’t believe how big and clear it is. Gotta love that VGA screen
More to come in part 2 and I’ll put up some pictures too
part 2 made it to aximsite but not here. I'll dig out a copy 
