Audiovox PPC4100 (AT&T)

Pros: Great as PDA, nice screen, and off the shelf storage space

Cons: Battery life, phone drops calls and freezes up, phone doesn't work well at all without a headset. Problems with Active Sync to my computer, lack of buttons.

Summary: In my first month I went through 6 of these! I should have read that the product was not intended to be used as a phone without using the headset. At first that was a major problem, but now I always use the headset when using the phone feature, and it has stopped about 99% of the dropped calls and the phone freezing up. At first I could not believe that someone would produce a product with such a limitation and I still have a hard time with that fact. So my recommendation is to ALWAYS USE THE HEADSET when using this as a phone.

The battery life sucks and I would highly recommend that you check the option in Active Sync that will back up your PDA on every connection. The problem with using the headset with the phone is that if you carry the phone around in your pocket with the headset attached you will stand a chance of making a lot of calls that you don’t intend to because if you accidentally hit the button on the headset it will redial the last call you made. This happened to me while I was out of town and it ran my battery down and I lost all of my information on the PDA. Fortunately I did have it backed up but it still sucked.

This product is superior to other PDA/phone combos I have had in all other regards. I do have a problem with active sync at times because I will plug it in the USB port and my computer will crash. Still working on that problem. I like the fact that it had a little extra memory and the Pocket PC software keeps getting better and better and they have made significant improvements since it was first introduced.

I highly recommend Microsoft Voice command for this phone, you just have to learn how to use it and it can ONLY be used with the headset on since the phone lacks any buttons you can use on the phone itself. I also really like Battery Pack Pro, it is great!

Overall I really love the product but am very frustrated with the phone feature at times. If I don’t have my headset with me then I always have to make a disclaimer to anyone who calls that my phone will most likely hang up on them. I really wish they would fix this problem because it will probably cause me to look at another PDA/phone combo a lot sooner than I would have normally.