My iMate Ultimate 8502 Review – One of the first in Melbourne!

Did they have any of the 9502′s on display?

Aww, if it was coming out soon after, you could have waited, pwettier and bigger screen.

Too bad the 8502 is only QVGA and has a smaller screen compared to the 9502.

Hi JMann,

QVGA is perfect for what I use the device for. I hardly watch any movies on PDAs at all but I have a suspicion that David in the office will be wanting to view his pirated copy of “Blades of Glory” on my kick-butt 8502.

I’ve been doing a lot of synching lately which means that I haven’t had the chance to properly test the battery but will do in the next couple of days.

No crashes/freezes/etc yet. I’ve only had a slight issue with Microsoft Voice Command 1.6 where is a bit touch ‘n’ go. There are no visible adjustable settings for the microphone so will have to play around a bit more.

In terms of the video, I did notice some jittery movement when taking a small clip of my daughter jumping around. I’ll also confirm this with more testing. The second video I took was smooth.

The MicroSD slot is under the back cover, not underneath the battery. This makes sense as you don’t want your MicroSD card to be flying out with all your precious data on it.

SDHC Patch Support for 8502 & 9502

Out of the box it doesn’t come with SDHC support but you for people who SDHC support, download CAB/ZIP file from this forum. You need to be member but it is free.

http://forum.ppcgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=9434&page=2

Let me know if I can help further. Hope you get yours soon too!

Regards,
Mr.G

PS I’m getting an error for that SDHC patch from that link:

Not Found
The requested URL /show…=9434&page=2 was not found on this server.

Additionally, a 404 Not Found error was encountered while trying to use an ErrorDocument to handle the request.

BTW Jmann, the link is http://forum.ppcgeeks.com/showthread.php?t=9434&page=2

Guys, just uploaded a iMate Ultimate 8502 Video on the blog and on Youtube.

Check it out and let me know what you think.

Haha.

G’day Brett,

Sounds like you’re the same guy on Whirlpool but just in case, NextG has been great for me in general. Took my JasJam with NextG and my Dell XPS M1330 which has a NextG Express Wireless Broadband card to Phillip Island on the weekend and was able to get full signal most of the way.

Going to beach volleyball today I tested out Travroute’s CoPilot 6 which ran fine. My only gripe was boot-up was longer than with my bluetooth GPS receiver. Took a full 2+ minutes till satellites were happily chatting with my 8502. Other than that it was smooth sailing.

Re: Beach Volleyball, the 8502 will not keep me healthy and I’ve decided to play a little less with gadget this year and work on keeping fit so I can play with gadgets well into the future

Thanks for your feedback about the video!

Mr Gadget, thanks for the update. Yes, I am the same as the one on Whirlpool with recent comments. It is interesting that you list your previous handhelds. I too am a palm user for many many years. Going back to the old handspring days then onto the 500 and now the 650 which has seen better days. This is my first step into the WM market and I think I have found the right device to do it with (8502). Same for factor etc. As you know, the palm os allows super smooth video playback – so I get the feeling that this will be the only disappointment for me in the 8502. But to finally have wifi, 3.5g and gps built in is a huge boost from palm. I like you, could not stand opening the keyboard all day when I need to use it. Only one other query at this time, I was a bit confused with the messages above. Did you get the 8gb card working or SDHC or not.

Thanks again and good point about the volley ball – as long as my wife donsn’t read it and want me out there throwing sports balls around!

Brett

Hi, i’m using an 8502 as well. Read about your comment on an additional button for Microsoft Voice Command. A Qs: Does Microsoft Voice Command work with this phone? Can a command be initiated from a bluetooth headset? Thks!

Hi Mr Gadget,

The reset hole is under the battery cover just to the left of the mini USB port (if you hold the device the right way up and not upside down as I need to to remove the battery cover). I had a heck of a time trying to find it- I think it’s a bit of a silly place to put it.

Just a question- any luck with the SDHC patch? I have heard that you won’t be able to surf on WiFi once it’s installed.

People should be aware that the SDHC driver above (SDHC.777.cab) works on 8502 and 9502, but it stops WiFi from working. It is also a little unstable – after some time using it the SDHC will appear full, empty or scrambled, requiring a soft reset to fix.

Anyone find another driver that works better?

Hey Mr Gadget I just posted this on Whirlpool for a further explanation to the cab problem.

I have noticed a few of you are having problems with the SDHC cab. You guys are not alone. I have installed it with no issue when putting it on, and also have not lost WIFI as some have which is good – this is on my 8502. However, I have put music, photos and TOMTOM maps on my 8gb card. Nearly every time I try to use TOMTOM or play music or look at photos, they are not there or so it says – I know the files are there – the card obviously is not being read properly. I can go into card in file manager, as the device still sees it and only into the root directory – so I can see the first folder but then they appear to be empty! Also, I get the same messages about it being full etc although we know it is not. Either, I take the card out or have to do a reset every time to get it to read the files again. Obviously this is a problem with the cab we are using so hopefully there will be a new one out soon – or anyone else have any ideas for us.

On the Video front – I had a treo 650 before this which works perfectly for video – superb in fact. However palm lack next g, wifi, gps etc etc hence the swap to wm6 for me. And I am happy I did – BUT the video is not great. I have use a few programs and the free tcpmp and the paid core player work pretty good – a bit better than I expected after the tytn ii issues. But nowhere near as smooth as the treo – but there is good and bad in all. I have been playing eps of Simpsons in mpeg format.

Overall I am super happy with this device. One question, does Windows Mobile Player have a graphic equaliser so I can loose the tinny sounds or do I need to use another program to change the sound and get a bit more bass.
Cheers

@Brett thank you for your feedback and comments. Yes I’ve researched more on the web and there it seems that there is definitely a conflict with the SDHC patch and WiFi. Apparently they use the same section of the bus? It doesn’t look like there will be any specific fix for the 8502 unless there are some keen techies out there willing to do this. We’ll just have to wait for an official fix from iMate.

Yes, from my side video playback is acceptable, but as mentioned elsewhere, I did notice overall playback suffer when ripping at the highest settings for audio and visual.

@Tiffany, see my above note to Brett confirming the issue with the SDHC patch and WiFi. If we all email iMate I’m sure we can get some action!

In regards to backup, to be honest I have never seen the need to have a dedicated app for this on my pocketPC as I have all files replicated regularly in defined folders. If you do a search on http://www.mtekk.com.au I’m sure you’ll find some good recommendations there.

G’day Dinky, what headset are you using? I also haven’t tried a video call but will try it out.

Looks like there are a couple of minor bugs that need to be ironed out by iMate.

Dinky, follow this link for Cyberon:
XDA Forums
Totally agree with you with the inbuilt speech recognition program. As if I’m going to manually record and assign the 570 contacts I have! Cyberon is better than Microsoft Voice Commander at the moment, even though I have been one of it’s biggest advocates on the web in the past.

I believe it’s Cyberon 1.6.

Goodmorning Dinky, alas it is Version 2.0 Build 611082 that I am using.

How are you finding it? Work with your Jabra?

Dink, I just tried it with the Blueant Z9 Bluetooth Headset and wasn’t able to initiate Cyberon Voice Commander. It seems that it works for some bluetooth headsets and not for others.

In terms of speech recognition it has been great though. Like all these types of programs you have to be in a low noise environment.

Cyberon is still better than Microsoft Voice Command 1.6 imo.

How did you get voice command 1.6 to work with it? I tried it on mine and it doesn’t seem to accept anything. It just seems like the microphone isn’t active.

A little help Mr Gadget when you get a chance:
Button Settings:
If I go into Settings, Buttons – I get a screen to change some buttons. I am aware that button 1 and button 1 (long press) refers to the middle button on the right side of the 8502 (under the volume) and have change this to what I want. My issue is – there is also Button 2 in this list. Out of the box it is set to Telstra Buisness. What button is button 2 on the 8502. I can’t find reference to it in the full manual either. Any help would be great.

Cheers

good luck, i set it up as a connection to word just to try to find it. I have pressed every combination known to man on this device trying to find it! On another note, I am enjoying the change to wm6 from palm and am very happy with the device. Big change coming from palm os but very handy to have the wifi and gps – worth the change for me.

Do you notice that if you start Copilot 7 without the gps enabled first, it freezes at the loading screen? Seems to be the case for me.

Alrighty I think I’ll leave it on. On another note, how are you finding the quality of the camera? I just took a couple of photos, and as you can see here -> http://www.demon-host.com.au/PIC_00005.jpg it’s pretty shocking. Have tried changing a few settings as well and it hasn’t helped. I was getting much better quality out of my Atom’s 2mp camera.

Nope took it off. Have also done a hard reset after quickly talking to someone on I-mate live chat about it. Still no go. Looks like I might be sending it back

I’ll post up a link here. I actually took some photos last night for you – just haven’t had the chance to upload. Putting these up as soon as I find my CABLE!

Before you buy, do your research carefully:

http://forums.imate.com/8502_Version_2_Sofware_update/m_2347/tm.htm

You should note that the thread linked above is no longer available.

I await a WM6.1 update, but I’m really concerned.

The new thread is now http://forums.imate.com/m_2557/mpage_1/key_/tm.htm#2562

I reproduce a list of bugs here for your visitors incase the thread goes missing again:
* device coming up with “low program memory” overnight, despite nothing running. While the device is in this state, alarms do not function, and the phone is useless
until soft reset.
* the handset misses keypresses from the home screen if you dial too quickly – while trying to filter the contacts out, it seems to ignore what you’re typing. You have to
slow right down, or wait for each number to register on the screen before continuing. Particularly when considered with the 3-numbers-missing from the speed-dial list.
It’s not that I have that many contacts either – only 255 contacts stored in the device, and approximately another 200 on SIM.
* Regularly it’s impossible to unlock the device using the Windows lock 4 digit PIN (keeps telling me the PIN is incorrect). I’ve no idea what triggers it, but I’m definitely
not keying in the wrong PIN every time I try. The only way of getting back into the device is to soft reset it (VERY annoying). (NB: Not SIM PIN, but the PIN set under
settings -> personal -> lock)
* The requirement to use the Telstra Proxy Manager to access the Telstra WAP pages, and to disable it to use Messenger and ordinary internet access. While I’m aware
this is a limitation in Windows Mobile 6 Pro, surely Imate or Telstra could work out a way around this in the firmware.
* The device seems to register onto 3TELSTRA (UMTS 2100) despite me manually selecting the TELSTRA network, and UMTS 850 having better coverage. I’ve since set
the phone’s preferred band to US (UMTS 850/1900) to avoid the phone sticking on UMTS 2100.
* During a call I can’t connect to bluetooth if I come into range (i.e. walking to my car to drive somewhere while on the phone).
* A number of times pressing send hasn’t answered the call.
* When Activesync runs, the phone basically stops responding to anything. Makes it nigh on impossible to answer a call.
* I’ve had two occasions where all the keys stop working completely. Touch screen still works. Soft reset required to fix it. Had to use the button under the cover though
since selecting from the menus didn’t do anything.

Please reply if you have experienced any of these problems.

How do I make a Ultimate 8502 work with auto-dial voice recognition,with my supertooth Bluetooth handsfree?