Yesterday afternoon in the new office MakTsentr held a press conference on the major events of the PDA market, as well as trends in and development of this promising trend in Russia. This event has already become traditional, was built as a kind of semi-annual report of the company on its work and future plans. In short, yesterday the press was introduced, firstly, with the current state of affairs as at the Russian Pocket PC arena as a whole, and the statistics MakTsentr in particular. It is curious that the domestic market "behaves" differently than the world, but more on that below ..
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Second, the prospects of a new operating system Windows CE.NET and the first results of sales of the first PDA based on it - Wincent 320 - said the project manager www.palmstore.ru - Alexander Eremeev. Further, the first Pocket PC 2002 from one of the largest manufacturers of computer hardware company Mitac - Mio 528 - told the PR-manager MakTsentr Dmitry big, and after reviewing the new products in the Compact Flash format from the manufacturer of accessories for PDA company Pretec made head of sales, Dmitry Serezhnikov. Completed their report of the Director of Development Andrew MakTsentr Kuznetsova on the status of software for handheld computers at the end of 2002 and the company projects.
Common yardstick can not be measured ...
Opened the event director MakTsentr Dmitry Havzhu review the status of Russian market of handheld computers and outlook. According to him, despite the participation of small setbacks, the world's handheld sector has good positive dynamics. These figures can be rightfully attributed to Russia. Thus, the projected MakTsentr, sales in the current 2002 will be about 40-50 thousand units, which is approximately two times higher than in the past 2001 (25-35 thousand units).
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MakTsentr remains strong leader in this field. By its own estimates, the company occupies about 20-25% of the market at the stage of distribution, and 8-10% in retail and corporate sales of PDAs. Sales trend shows steady growth - about 30% a year, as well as PDA-direction as a whole. For example, other firms have begun with smaller numbers, can now boast of a higher rate of growth. In this part of the statistics MakTsentr generally coincides with the world, but beyond that begins the discrepancy. Discrepancies, which can even be called ideological. At the time, like all progressive humanity chooses Palm OS PDA, the domestic user is increasingly preferred device based on WindowsCE. In August 2002, more than half (53%) sold handheld computers listed for this OS. The situation changed in 8 months, which is clearly seen on the charts.
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However, the projected Rapporteur, PalmOS will soon restore ustrachennye positions with new models - Zire and Tungsten, which we have repeatedly told in our news. Meanwhile, among the WindowsCE devices undisputed leader - iPaq and folk Cassiopeia BE-300. New vendors Fujitsu-Siemens and Toshiba have so far are the weak and the real competition iPaq and the Cassiopeia BE-300 does not account for. IPaq firmly occupied the niche high-end devices, BE-300 out of competition in the niche devices, about $ 200. However, MakTsentr going until the end of the year significantly change the balance with two new vendors - Mitac and DOT, which have signed agreements on distribution. New from these manufacturers and were devoted almost all subsequent performances.
Debutant Wincent 320
On the first PDA-based WindowsCE.NET and prospects of this platform, vyzvavashih keen interest in all present, told the head of an Internet project www.palmstore.ru Alexander Eremeev.
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Windows CE.NET - operating system, based on which works Wincent 320 - a new project Microsoft in the market of mobile equipment. The operating system is built on the core Windows CE 4.0 (core of one of the most popular operating system for Pocket PC 2002 - Windows CE 3.0). Wincent (DOT) 320 was the first handheld computer based on the new OS, which is predicting a great future. The fact that it can be used in any devices that may require the operating system. The thing is a modular system so that device manufacturers can "hang" at the core of just what they need. Wincent officially began selling in Russia in August, but has already achieved good results and tight fit in my clan - Windows CE, along with the iPaq, Casio E-200, Toshiba, and BE-300. Wincent now has 5% of sales of all devices on the Windows CE and this figure probably will rise. However, Wincent 320 most interesting is for the corporate market. The fact that DOT is very easy to "grind" for specific tasks, optimize a set of embedded applications. Now through the efforts of Microsoft development tools under Windows CE.NET virtually identical to those used for desktop versions of Windows, so that a professional programmer, with minimal training can easily write necessary for a particular application. Said Alexander, and the efforts being made by MakTsentr, promoting a new handheld on the Russian market. Thus, programmers development department of the company fix minor software flaws Wincent. Of the latter can be noted an improved driver infrared port, which allows working with IR modems, cellular phones. The bottleneck of any device on the Russian market - it's Russification. In this issue of MakTsentr already gained some experience, but the localization process Wincent moves, unfortunately not as fast as we wanted. It was expected that by the time the release of a new handheld will get a fully localized user interface, but so far only available to buyers light version - support for Cyrillic and virtual keyboard. At the present time in testing the second version of the full localization made on the basis of MUI, that is, the localization system resources. Yield the full version is expected next month. MakTsentr not going to be limited to one model from this Korean manufacturer, because the company's website Dream Of Telecommunication stated quite a lot of interesting devices. Here, however, the timing of their release has not yet entirely clear. And more about the debutant Wincent'e 320 you can learn from our article in two parts (iron, program stuffing).
New Mitac Mio 528 ...
... Was the next program number. Sleek Pocket PC the size of a Palm to debut on this market, the manufacturer Mitac - was greeted by a friendly audience. Of this remarkable handheld we told you recently. At a press conference he was taken to introduce the assembled PR-manager MakTsentr Dmitry Large.
Successful Completion (Delux kit includes: a quality carrying case, USB-cable, and puts "jacket" with the expansion slot standard, Compact Flash), excellent value for money ($ 445) - money (all the features Pocket PC) certainly help you catch the brand.
On the periphery of the card ...
... From the well-known American manufacturer Pretec, which in January this year MakTsentr signed a contract on exclusive distribution of products in Russia, told the head of sales PDAs Dmitry Serezhnikov.
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Today it is the Pretec offers the most comprehensive range of modules in the form factor Compact Flash (CF) for Pocket PC, most of which can be used in portable computers with PCMCIA-interface (via the appropriate PC-card adapter). Among the most relevant: the world's smallest Ethernet-Adapter Compact LAN, 56K Fax / Modem, Bluetooth-card form factor Compact Flash, full-featured digital camera "on the map and GPS-receiver. Last forbidden fruit called a natural interest in the audience, since Russia is still forbidden to use by individuals of devices that work with satellite transmitters. However, MakTsentr invites interested persons, and those of many, the navigation set at the base of the iPAQ 3970. It consists of - the actual PDA itself, Pretec Compact GPS-module on the CF-card, car holder, for a short fixed design and power-charger from the cigarette machine. Interested in gathering as an opportunity to transform the CCP from the expansion slot Compact Flash into the mobile phone using the corresponding GSM-cards. Dmitry promised that such a module will appear in Russia by the end of this year. Pretec Corporation and known as one of the leading manufacturers of solid-state modules for data storage. Memory Cards Pretec differ Long-storage, improved ability to rewrite, low-power, the ability to fully emulate a hard disk. Cards are available Compact Flash, MultiMedia Card and SmartMedia. Until the end of the year Pretec should move to release the new Compact Flash memory (a type of Lynx), which will differ from the current (type Tomcat) higher speed (1.5 times) and low-power (also about 1.5 times). However, all information and comparison charts can be found on the Russian site Pretec.
Software for Pocket PC in late 2002
Situation on this front works MakTsentr described Chief Development Company Andrey Kuznetsov. He vividly acquainted the participants with the realities of the Russian software market for PDAs - from the problems faced by developers Russifiers to major events in 2002 and projects department.
The main event in the localization of the emergence of a Pocket PC 2002 and later in Windows CE.NET built-in support (Multilanguage User's Interface).MUI is built into the system to automatically change the interface language the OS and any applications. Files with russified interface elements at the same time can be in ROM, and in RAM.
Currently, the development department of the company MakTsentr under development two localization project platform Windows CE:
- RussKey NET for Wincent 320 - creation of ROM-oriented localization
- Pocket RussKey for Mitac MIO 528. In this case the crack is located in RAM, ROM is not updated. Localization of devices based on Symbian OS and Palm OS is a more difficult task. If the first task of Russification of the Nokia 9210 Communicator MakTsentr successfully managed this year on its own, the problem of adaptation Palm OS 4.x solved several Russian companies offering their products in this area. The most recent major achievement was the complete localization firm Fiztekh-Soft trendy handheld Sony Clie NR-70. However, it is possible that Russian developers no longer have to struggle with this problem, because according to unofficial information, the following versions of Palm OS, you may receive hardware and firmware of the Russian language (!). A separate item as a matter of particular pride Andrey Kuznetsov introduced introduced just published version of the dictionary Lingvo 8.0 for Pocket PC for Pocket PC. Indeed dictionaries and translators are the second largest (after localization) applications for handheld computers. This bestseller from ABBYY allows you to translate 4 languages (English, German, Italian and French), also includes a set of case-specific dictionaries. At a very reasonable price ($ 39), a pocket dictionary Lingvo 8.0, plus desktop version included provides a very great opportunity for the user device. Report by Andrew got a long and detailed. He is still a lot I could tell, and talked about wireless standards and the prospects of these technologies, the development of enterprise applications and plans MakTsentr on development of this market, but on the tables nearby were exhausted from lack of attention fruits and huge sandwiches ...:) PS All materials and audio reports this press conference can be found here. The authors, translation:
HPCru
