The Low End Moves Forward

Grid’s PalmPad and GeoWorks’ Pen/GEOS bode well for the low end marketplace

While most of the attention is currently focused on the PenPoint and Windows for Pen announcements, the lower end of the pen market has also contributed some interesting products in the past few months.

The Grid PalmPad

Grid Systems has introduced a substantially smaller version of its GridPad 8086/NEC V.20-based system called the PalmPAD. Grid calls the PalmPAD “The First Wearable Pen Computer.” The 2.8 pound machine comes with a wrist band for strapping the machine to your arm. The battery pack is detachable and can be worn on your belt, bringing the weight of the main unit down to 2.2 pounds. Grid plans to offer other belt-mounted peripherals such as bar code readers, extra battery packs, printers, and so forth. The hand grips of the unit are designed to accommodate a fax modem or spread spectrum radio.

The PalmPAD is the first machine on the market to use Logitech’s Gazelle Graphics digitizer, which is packaged with a 6.5 inch diagonal backlit 640×400 pixel LCD, and also the first machine to support SunDisk 20 Mbyte flash memory cards. The housing of the PalmPAD is a sturdy co-molded plastic and rubber case.

The PalmPAD starts at $2895 with 2 MBytes of RAM and a slot for a PCMCIA card or SunDisk storage card (the cards themselves are extra). The machine is still pretty expensive for a V.20-based system, but its lightweight and rugged design will make it a strong contender in the mobile market. The PalmPAD will ship next month and we plan to provide an in depth review in a future issue. Contact Grid at 510-656-4700.

GeoWorks Intros Pen/GEOS

One of the most interesting recent announcements came from GeoWorks at the Technologic Partners’ pen conference in February. The company will introduce later this year a pen-based version of its popular PC/GEOS graphical operating environment (GeoWorks claims to have sold 400,000 copies of PC/GEOS in the past year). Called Pen/GEOS, the graphical interface is targeted at low-priced Intel-based palmtop systems, in particular 8088 and 8086 based systems. GeoWorks demonstrated a prototype version of Pen/GEOS on a PoqetPad pen computer (see our February, 1992 issue for more on the PoqetPad). The demonstration showed the GEOS user interface being operated by a pen and included a handwriting recognition application from a new startup company headed by former Grid VP of research, Jeff Hawkins, called Palm Computing. Hawkins said his company plans to introduce handwriting recognition software as well as other applications for Pen/GEOS.

GeoWorks plans to release an OEM version of Pen/GEOS in the fourth quarter of 1992. Initial hardware platforms will include the PoqetPad and the GridPad. Contact GeoWorks at 510-644-0883. Contact Palm Computing at 415-854-8600.