Reading all the posts on this board made me feel a bit uneasy, but, like everyone else, I obviously went right ahead and installed WM5 on my x50v as soon as I got the CD. Fully expecting the worst, I at least wanted to have an excuse to be mad at Dell and Microsoft with the rest of you!
I will admit that the system was ridiculously sluggish immediately after the upgrade. The start menu took 2 seconds to load, every screen redrew sloooowly, etc... but, after a soft reset, everything was snappy... and by snappy, I mean noticeably FASTER than 2003 SE. The start menu pops up instantaneouly like it did back in the days of PPC 2002, the Programs screen draws right away, apps load just as fast and often faster than they did in WM2003, and performance in general is amazing.
As of yet I have only installed Pocket Breeze, Phatnotes and Magic Button, and these apps have not affected the speed at all. I wonder if many of the problems people are having are because they immediately go and install all their favourite 3rd party apps, just to find that many of them haven't worked out all the WM5 compatibility bugs yet.
I'm not saying Dell/MS shouldn't be blamed for prematurely releasing buggy software, but after a day and a half of using WM5 I have honestly found it that it performs better than 2003, is more stable, and has better battery life. I was all geared up to join the 'EVIL DELL AND M$ EAT BABIES AND KILL TEH FLUFFY BUNNY RABBITS!!!' campaign, but I'm finding it hard to hate them right now.
Am I the only one who is happy with the WM5 upgrade? Maybe I got the secret ROM upgrade that Dell will release next week to fix all the problems.
I upgraded last night, fiddled around and downgraded immediately thereafter. I found WM5 painfully slow and poorly supported. I then had a change of heart and upgraded again this morning and found that after a soft reset, WM5 was just as snappy as I remembered my Pocket PC 2000 device being. Nothing has changed about the software support, and I'm irritated by the (exceedingly) poor bluetooth implementation, but I am willing to learn to live with it. It's not really that bad now, and I can still get all of the things I need to do done with it while I wait for a ROM update to solve some of the glitches.
The positives I've noticed so far are the speed in navigating, and the noticably improved battery life. I need to find an uptime app to actually put a number to the battery performance increase though. Right now it's just a subjective feeling.
I'm willing to give it a try, though I don't think I like the soft buttons. They seem to get in my way more than speed things up. It would be nice if there was an option to use the classic interface with more direct menus.
mc 03, I completely agree with you. I am ecstatic! I've also loaded Pocket e-Sword, Pocket Dictionary, Tweaks 2K2 and about 8 skins and all is running swimmingly!!
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Same here everything is snappy except some of the 3rd party apps. Specially SPB pocket plus, it takes a while for the skin to change. No memory error yet, I'll probably wait for the update.
The install went fine, but the first sync after that rebooted my comp. It later turned out to be due to Kaspersky Anti-Virus, but I've used this software for a looong time now, and never had problems with any other program.
I've gotten the memory errors, the slow start ups... and the battery drain even when it's off.
Then it shows a totally unnecessary full screen information on how to enable/disable the wireless using the side button (Jesus tap-dancing Christ! I am using this thing for over a month now can't they think I know how to use it by now?!) Surely I wouldn't mention it if it didn't do anything funny: It does not go away when you "tap screen to continue".. It just stays there until a soft reset..
It looks shiny, so I set up Odyysey Client because campus is fully secure wireless, but it visibly slows down the system..
Though I could not make a test the wireless because after leaving it on the table closed for two days, it refused to open, and when finally showed his pretty face it gave me a memory error which can only be solved with a hard reset.. But that might be caused by SBP Pocket Plus I installed, or Microsoft Reader..
What really drives me mad is: I always keep my PDA on the cradle, and when not in use I send it to stand by.. And it would stay that way, but fully charged till the morning.. Now new almighty tries to syncronize every 5 minutes and doesn't care if its at standby or not.. Which disturbs me a lot because a)I don't want to wear out the screen by keeping it open too long b) it fills my room with an irritating glowing blue light (which is the reason why I am here at this hour) There are no settings to prevent ActiveSync all mighty to keep himself cool in sight.. I use Ctrl+Alt+Del and shut it down, but I didn't test if it would work.. (edit: it doesn't.. now I'm trying Magic Button to see if its AS on the PPC)
I don't want to accept the idea that MS and DELL released a buggy software because these things should be tested for a long time..
First PDA ever. So far I'm happy with it. I'd prefer less lockups forcing the holey-reboot but being an avid windows user it's not too far fetched from those. I'm hoping the next update helps those.
so far I am happy with WM5. Sure it has it's clitch, but it is still bearable at the moment.
It used to refuse the CF card I have from time to time. But after I copied a bunch of mp3s back and forth between the CF card and the internal storage, the system become more stable. Maybe just a co-incident, because I did also removed some trial software. The CF card missing problem seems to be gone now and I only have to reset only when the system hangs - sometimes.
I just found another huge advantage over 2003se: Text Maker and Pocket Slides run fast enough now to be of practical use, which is probably due to the better font rendering in WM5
yes wm5 takes longer to reboot, but on the other hand, I found the reboot frequency is lower than 2003SE
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I am very satisfied with WM5
