Palm catches competition with more RAM

Palm is now able to use up to 128MB of RAM in its PDAs (personal digital assistants) as the result of collaborative efforts with its operating system subsidiary PalmSource, the company said Thursday in a release.

Billed as a “breakthrough,” the announcement merely levels the RAM playing field between Palm and its competitors that use Microsoft’s Pocket PC operating system. Users of PDAs with Palm OS had been limited to 16MB of RAM for years, while the very first Pocket PC product, the iPaq, used 32MB of memory when it made its debut in 2000.

With the increased memory, application developers will be able to create richer media applications, said Steve Manser, senior vice president of product development for Palm, based in Milpitas, Calif. “We’ve enhanced our long-term product road map, and [recognized that] the prior limit of 16MB was not competitive,” he said.

“It’s an important step for Palm to move in this direction, however it is something that is an absolute necessity as some of Palm’s major competitors have been able to address much higher amounts of memory for several years,” said Alex Slawsby, an analyst with IDC in Framingham, Mass.

Despite the memory limit, Palm’s handhelds led the worldwide market, with 38.6 percent of worldwide shipments. Hewlett-Packard (HP), which makes the iPaq, was second with 13.5 percent of the market, according to Dataquest.

The iPaq 1910 comes with 64MB of SDRAM (synchronous dynamic RAM), 46MB of which is user accessible, according to information on HP’s Web site.