Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 PDA

by Sharp

Product Details

Product Manual [1.24mb PDF]

• Item Weight: 7 ounces
• Shipping Weight: 2 pounds
• Shipping: This item is also available for shipping to select countries outside the U.S.
• ASIN: B000088EDE
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (31 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #115,925 in Electronics (See Top 100 in Electronics)
• Discontinued by manufacturer: Yes
• Date first available at Amazon.com: March 7, 2003

Product Description

Amazon.com Product Description

The Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 combines state-of-the-art Sharp technology and Sharp innovation to deliver a unique and compelling PDA solution. The Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 offers everything from mobile communications to mobile multimedia; keyboard integration and dual expansion delivering one of the most versatile and flexible PDA solutions on the market today.

With its replaceable 1700mAH Lithium-Ion battery--larger than any other battery in a smart handheld device--the Zaurus provides extra long battery life so you can be mobile longer.

Display
The SL-5600 has a 3.5-inch, 65,536, color reflective TFT front-lit screen with a 240 x 320 pixel resolution for outstanding graphics and clarity, indoors or out.

Operating System
The Zaurus SL-5600's Linux- and Java-based embedded OS Qtopia Linux, provides a powerful and open operating environment--allowing many Linux and Java developers to write applications for the SL-5600.

Expansion
The Zaurus features both a Compact Flash and Secure Digital slot to offer the best of both worlds. Two slots allow you to add two peripherals simultaneously such as a Compact Flash modem card and Secure Digital memory card. This seamless design makes upgrading easy and simple

What's in the box

• Zaurus SL-5600
• Handheld device
• EA-70S AC adapter
• Docking station (USB)
• Power cord
• Rechargeable Lithium-Ion battery
• Stylus
• Display protection cover
• CF slot-protection card

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

29 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Very, very cool! A PDA for UNIX geeks, April 18, 2003

By 

W. H. Jamison, Jr. (Burien, Washington United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 PDA (Office Product)

I've been using Palm PDAs for about five years now and wanted to upgrade to something new. I had seen the Zaurus 5500 and was going to purchase one before I heard that the 5600 was being released. The 5600 is fast, applications load quickly and the OS seems to be very stable. I haven't had anything crash yet. Setting up wireless networking with a CF card is trivial, plug the card in, run the network config application and type in your WEP key and you're on the net. Surfing with Opera is excellent, you can zoom in and out on web pages and I haven't found any pages that it won't display. I have yet to try the Hancom applications for reading and writing Word and Excel docs but everything else works very well. Now I just need to find an SSH client for it and I'll really be in business.

20 of 21 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This PDA is for anyone, not just us geeks, June 25, 2003

By 

Jami Garrison "JamiRae" (Peoria, AZ United States) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 PDA (Office Product)

My first PDA was the Zaurus 5000D (developer version of this 5600). I really wanted to like it but it was limited on space for installing apps and I had trouble synching it with my Outlook. But enter the 5600... as soon as I heard it announced I had my eye on it and finally broke down and bought it. What a dream! Straight out of the box I plugged in my Linksys CF WAN card and in no time I was connected to my wireless network and surfing the net with the pre-installed Opera browser. I even checked and sent email. For about $ I was able to enter complete geek-dom and downloaded tkcJabber, an instant messenger package that connects to AIM, MSN, IRC and Yahoo chats. (this and many free software for the Zaurus are available at [website].) And within minutes I was chatting online as well.

The true test was then the synching feature. I installed the Intellisync software on my machine from the CD that came with my Zaurus, plugged in the docking station, put my Zaurus on there and hit the synch button. It all Synched without one problem! What a breeze!

The battery life on the 5600 is much improved over the 5000D and the 5500. Other things I love about the Zaurus: I can read and edit Word and Excel documents on it; can view PowerPoint presentations; the sliding QWERTY keyboard is convenient and, although it looks small and hard to use, it really is quite handy and easy to use. I also like the fact that you can use a compactflash card (CF) and/or a SecureDigital (SD) card. I could list more but I think my word limit is about up for this review! Bottomline: Highly recommend!

17 of 18 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Exactly what i Want, April 9, 2004

By 

Brook Patten "Brook" (Cincinnati, OH) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Sharp Zaurus SL-5600 PDA (Office Product)

This device is almost perfect for the linux user who wants something smaller than his\her laptop. In order to appreciate this device, you really have to like linux. If you have never used linux, dont bother, get yourself an M$ windows pda.

If you're like me and love linux, you'll love the zaurus. You can get virtually all main stream linux apps for it (gcc, make, apache, mysql...the list goes on and on). I especially like that fact that it has a java runtime, and with the addition of compiler (try ibm's Jikes compiled for zaurus) you have a pocket java development environment.

The fact that it has CF and SD slots means you can have your wifi and your extra storage in at the same time, which is a great plus.

The fold out keyboard is slightly slower than a full size, but still light years ahead of stupid handwriting recognition on other devices (although the z has that too)

There are tons of different roms availible, from sharp and others. One that fixes the pxa250 cache errata is definatly required, as you may have heard this is a bug which affects performance. But if you flash with a special kernel it fixes this bug and allows you to clock the device up to 471 mhz! NICE!

The Only thing I would add to this device is a built in DOWNSTREAM usb port, so that you can plug in usb devices. A Compact flash Usb card is availible from ratoc (for $150). I bought that too and now i can connect external HD's, Gamepads, Keyboards, Extra Wifi's, and maybe even printers or cd burners.

While Pocket PC Users can say things like "my Ipaq is LIKE a pc!" The zaurus user can say "my zaurus IS a PC".
There really isnt anything you cant do on the zaurus since its a full linux OS.

I would whole heartedly reccomend this product to EVERY linux user