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| Tapwave Zodiac Available For Pre-Order |
by Scott Raulinaitis, Editor - 9/17/2003 - 11:45am EST
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Today, Tapwave officially took the wraps off of the Zodiac gaming PDA that we've been telling you about. Most of the information was already known. There are a few surprises, but the dimensions of the unit are not one of them. Based on the known information we had of a 3.8" diagonal screen and the frontal views that were made available in some early magazine ads, I previously estimated the dimensions back then at 5.6" high x 3.3" wide, much smaller than many had feared. It turns out that I was extremely close. The width will actually be slightly narrower at just 3.1" wide. Pre-released thickness claims of 0.6" were actually on the conservative side as well. The official specs now claim a thickness of 0.55".
As expected, there will be two models, the Zodiac1 will have 32MB of RAM and cost $299, and the Zodiac2 will have 128MB of RAM and cost $399. Previous information suggesting that the higher-priced model would come with a cradle, appear to be incorrect. The cradle is apparently optional for both models. One difference between the two models that wasn't known before is that they'll be colored slightly differently, which probably explains the color differences in some of the leaked photos. The lower price Zodiac1 will be slate gray while the Zodiac2 charcoal gray. Allaying other fears, the screen will be of the more vibrant transflective variety, rather than the older, dust-prone reflective type.
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| Photos looks to be a relatively simple JPEG viewer |
As previously reported, in addition to the standard PIM applications (which should be optimized for use in either portrait or landscape modes), the Zodiacs will ship with two bundled games, Stuntcar Extreme and Acid Solitaire. Other bundled apps include Alarm Clock, PhatPad (a Bluetooth chat/whiteboard app), graphic/scientific calculator powerOne, the WordSmith word processor, Music (an MP3 player), Photos (a JPEG viewer), Video (Kinoma video player), and eBook reader PalmReader. In a disappointing blast from the past, there will be no conduit included to allow syncing with Microsoft Outlook, though you can purchase 3rd party solutions separately.
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| Stuntcar Extreme looks impressive, but how will it play? |
So what about other Zodiac-specific games? Well, depending on your perspective you'll either be pleased or disappointed. The good news is that big name titles like Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4 and SpyHunter are due for release when the Zodiac ships in October and sample screen shots of several of the other games look extremely impressive (though screen shots don't mean a thing if animation is choppy and gameplay stinks, so we'll need to see actual user reviews to make a final judgement there). The bad news is that there aren't a whole lot of Tapwave-specific games that look to be ready in time for release. Only six titles claim a release date of October. Several others simply say "Coming Soon" which could mean October or could mean next year. And while several games look to push the limits of the Zodiac hardware, many others are of the standard Palm OS variety.
I'm still anxiously awaiting this device, but I really want to see some actual gaming videos and hear from some user and magazine reviews. The Tapwave site lists some quick one-liners which appear to be pulled from game magazine reviews, so perhaps these will be forthcoming. But if you're just looking for a great PDA and the gaming capabilities are just gravy, this still looks extremely tempting, offering a lot of bang for the buck.
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