Released on: 04/13/2005
Starting Price range: $375.00

I am a huge Tungsten series type of person. I have owned mostly all the Tungsten series and this is one of my favorites. I also would suggest a Tungsten T3 or T5 for the expanded screen and the faster processor. Don't get me wrong, the Tungsten E2 still has a lot of features like Bluetooth to sync with another Bluetooth device like a pc, laptop, or another PDA. Even though this has a 200 Mhz processor, the applications run very well. The PDA also displays pictures with great clarity, especially if you like to show off your family or pet photos. I hope this helps in your decision making and if it did, please take the time to vote. Thank you for taking the time to read this review. By the way, if the listing did not post the specifications, I will post them below. Thanks again.

SPECIFICATIONS

Built-in devices Display
Dimensions (W x D x H) 3.1 in x 0.6 in x 4.5 in
Weight 4.7 oz
Color Silver

Packaged contents Protective cover

Operating System / Software

OS provided Palm OS Garnet 5.4

Software included Memos , Tasks , Blazer , Expense , Calendar , Contacts , Note Pad , Favorites , Calculator , World clock , Phone Dialer , PalmOne Media , Palm VersaMail , PalmSource SMS , Bluetooth Manager , Handmark Solitaire , EReader for Palm OS , RealPlayer for Palm , Adobe Acrobat Reader for Palm OS , DataViz Documents To Go 7 Professional Edition
Min Operating system Apple MacOS X 10.2.6 - 10.3 , Microsoft Windows 2000 / XP
Memory: Installed RAM 32 MB
Max supported RAM: 32 MB
Processor Intel: 200 MHz XScale
Input device type: Stylus , Touch-screen , 5-way navigation button
Digital audio: standards supported MP3
Audio input type: None
Audio output type: Speaker(s)
Telecom Modem: None
Display type: TFT active matrix
Color support: 16-bit (64K colors)
Max resolution: 320 x 320
Expansion / Connectivity
Wireless connectivity IrDA, Bluetooth
Port / Connector Type: Interface 1 Headphone Output , 1USB
Connector Provided Mini-phone stereo 3.5 mm , 4 pin USB Type A
Expansion slot(s) total (free) 1 SD Memory Card
Cable(s) included 1 x USB cable
Power: Battery installed ( max ) 1 Lithium ion
Max supported batteries 1
Power supply device Power adapter

I bought this TungstenE\2 as an up-grade to the Palm Tungsten E model I already
own.The first thing I must say is the E model works fine and sinks OK,but it is
loaded with software,games and e-reading books and only has about 6 megs of memory left in it.Also I have two-2gig sd cards full of games for it.I like the E model,However it won't go on the Internet or use one of the Bluetooth GPS
recievers as the Tungsten E\2 model Will!..The E and E\2 model each only have 32 meg of onboard memory.The E is volitile while the E\2 is not!..The E model will read a 2gig-sd card while the newer E\2 will only read 1 Gig.I thought this a downfall as it's harder to buy a smaller sd card of one gig or smaller these days!...Battery life is ok,around 4-6.5 hours without the PalmOne Wi-Fi card. Using the card,battery-life drops to 40min-1.5 hours with a good-battery.
The Palm-One Wi-Fi card has good sensitivity to a.p.'s in range.I'm able to connect to an open a.p. at about 75-80% of what you can do with a lap-top and a
good old oronoco 16bit wi-fi card!...The display of the E\2 model is bright,fairly crisp in color,but won't dim a much as id like at night. I have tried the wireless keyboard with the E\2 and It works ok,not much range and a
little ockward to use.I think it's ok,if you need to use it. Going on to the GPS. I tried one of the bluetooth Holux remote GPS recievers with the E\2.After
fixing the power supply charger which was well used upon my recieving it,I got
the E\2 to take a charge and also the Holux reciever to take a charge.I next ran into a little trouble with the blue-tooth connection between the reciever and my E\2. My tungsten keept-on telling me that I wouldn't connect with the Holux. I decided that some of the bluetooth files for the bluetooth might be
damaged,so I used a third-party PDA backup program to re-load the bluetooth cache files and favorite file on top of the Operating-System. Wa-La!, I got a
connection then and things started to work!..My Holux reciever came with about a dozen map cd's which I loaded onto my lap-top.Than I ran the first cd,which promted me to enter a number of chosen ones into the dvd reader.The program gave me a choice of hot-sinking the maps to an sd-card on the pda or to write them directly to an SD-Card,which is what I did.Remember a Newer 2 or 4 gig card Won't Work!, so get an old One gig or smaller card.Then copy the map files
to the card. You're almost done! Now place the map card into the PDA.It should
turn-on the PDA and Open the Navagator Program. The maps are Tom-Tom maps,by the way.Make sure your GPS reciever shows a blinking orange led,showing the GPS
is recieving several satalights.The blue led should blink about every 3 seconds
showing a "blue-tooth"connecti​on to your PDA.The green led shows the power-supply is charging the Holux-GPS.It will go-out,when the Li-ion battery is fully charged. When this all works you are ready to navigate!..Result...I thought the system worked well with my Tungsten E\2. The day colors are bright,the night blue's and grays are nice,and not to distracting while driving.The biggest negatives are the hassle to get IT-All working!..My maps were 5 years old and need up-grading.In REVIEW...If you can find a Cheap Tungsten E\2 on E-bay and you need the Wi-Fi card or the GPS,it might be worth
getting a used PalmOne-Tungsten-E\2 unit.The Up-Grade to take your soft-ware from the E to the E\2 may be very-hard.All in All,I give the E\2 an Average-Plus Rating

Recently Palm has been integrating Windows Mobile into their devices rather then the Palm OS, when seeing devices like this it's rather to see why. This now being the 3rd palm based device I have owned is the most disappointing.

Pros: Sturdy metal construction that feels solid, functional IRDA, A very nice chrome stylus, came with a full size keyboard.

Cons:No support for SD cards over 1GB, No WiFi (without expensive upgrade), Free memory is not user accessible, absolutely nothing is free for this device and the software included is closer to bloat ware then functional software.

Upon opening the package and charging the unit I am greeted with the annoying tutorial page, upon deletion of this waste of desktop space I decide to utilize one of my sd cards and a great media program called TCPMP but much to my surprise the Palm doesn't even acknowledge there is a card in the slot, turns out palm never tested the device completely for any cards let alone cards over 1GB. The included software is feature stunted by only offering normally included features such as spell check in premium versions only. The included wireless keyboard would be great if the palm supported landscape mode so the palm needs to stand under its own weight instead of resting securely in the keyboards carrier. Battery life is superior but this is probably attributed to the inferior (and outdated) 200Mhz Intel Xscale Processor. The extreme lack of open source support for the Palm os shows why the OS failed in general and choosing from an equivalent PDA catagory the ipaq 1945 wifi is far superior.

I have been using PDAs since the original Palm Pilot (which I still have, and works perfectly!) Although the Windows Mobile based PDAs are more elaborate and powerful, I think their features distract from the real use of a PDA, that being a personal assistant.

The Tungsten E2 is the perfect blend of technology, value and usefulness in my opinion. It is very easy to use, and I mean VERY easy. It has a very nice screen and a sleek compact design as well as high-tech features like Bluetooth and a web browser built in.

However, the most attractive feature is its price. I was considering to buy one of the Zire models which can be aquired under $100.00, but when I considered the fact that the E2 comes with the Full Version of Documents to Go (which is worth around $60 by itself) the decision was a no brainer, especially since the Achelle's Heel of Palm-based devices is its weak MS Office integration. And I can assure you, with Documents to Go, that is a thing of the past, as it makes seamless and easy to carry your MS Office data with you.

One minor gripe, especially for international buying customers: THE TUNGSTEN E2 interface CANNOT be changed into Spanish or any other language. But that's a minor thing (unless you dont know English at all of course).

Overall, the Tungsten E2 is the perfect choice for an entry level PDA, and has enough room to stay with you as your mid-level PDA as well thanks to its great mix of value performance and style.

Giving my Tungsten E2 an "Excellent" because it HotSyncs perfectly with my Windows XP pc, unlike my old Palm m130 handheld PDA (which was just plain out of date and based on Windows 98.) But I also like its: thin, sleek design; screen seems bigger than my m130's; love the space for photos, music & other app's; HotSync chime is quiet and easy with cable only - no need to bother with a cradle any more. Screen is bright and clear. QuickSheet seems to be sufficient for my Excel spreadsheets. Wish these were better: calculator is majorly-basic (no functions beyond +,-,x,/); Hotsync cable must be rocked back and forth to unplug from the unit (per Palm support), so it seems like that would break it, but it works fine. Would I buy this again? Absolutely. Does a lot without being very expensive.

I have used a Palm m130 for about the last 6 or 8 years, but lately only to manage my calendar and address book. It has served me well but is worn out, and some buttons no longer work. I upgraded to the E2 when I won an eBay auction, and I really love this device. I chose the E2 for its long rated battery life and fast processor.

The E2 is very fast, and very bright, and does a lot more than my ancient m130. I have now added a hard case, cradle, and wireless keyboard, all purchased on eBay. I synch daily and use AvantGo to keep up with news, etc when on the run and away from my computer. I also use the E2 as a Bible reader with the free software available on the web. The bonus software for this model is far superior to the earlier versions for the m130, especially Documents to Go. The ability to view smaller text on this unit makes the spreadsheet so much more useful and practical. I was able to transfer some of the compatible software from my m130 by beaming it to the E2, but some cannot transfer because it's incompatible with the newer Palm operating system. Overall, this is a great unit and so far I am really enjoying it.

Another thing I like about the E2 is the battery is user replaceable, and available for around $20. I wondered if I would need a new battery when I purchased the E2 used, but so far, the battery seems to last forever. After one day's typical use, the battery only drops down to about 90% to 95% full. I took this unit on vacation for 12 days, and didn't need to recharge it at all while I was away. If you charge it in the cradle for a half hour or so, often you can use it continuously for 20 minutes and it still registers 100% full.

I have also beamed some phone numbers from the E2 to the cell phones of some family members and that was pretty convenient. I'm a photographer, and I have a depth of field calculator program loaded on the E2. That program works much faster than it did on the m130.

The only negative I know of is that it occasionally comes up with a fatal error and needs to be reset. But I suspect that it's probably caused by some old software I've loaded on it. My device was purchased used, but is in pristine condition, and I got it for less than half the cost of a new one.

Palm One Tungsten E2 disappoints me in several ways:
1. Neither backward-compatible, nor easily shares with other systems.
2. Using, (desktop-wired and laptop wireless), Windows XP, Vista, MS Media Player, Easy Reader, Nokia Synchronizer proved either incompatible, or extremely difficult.
3. Bluetooth connection required almost a 1/2 hour.
4. Wireless connection to Internet through laptop, cell-phone, and desktop stuttered, restarted numerous times and finally completed connection after another hectic 1/2 hour.
5. Handwriting recognition showed terribly primitive attempts in translating letters and numbers.
Conclusion: Having used Toshiba 300, 400, 800, HP HX, various smart-phones, several other palm-tops, I found Palm was least satisfying -- except for one brilliant position: The local school district uses them exclusively, and most campuses are fully-wired and linked, making this particular palm-top indispensible in that particular environment.
Positive Note: Rugged, handily fits into front shirt-pocket. Operates handily as an organizer, but entering a note from palm-top to the network -- or even an individual desktop is sometimes troublesome.
JDILBECK

Sure, there is better handhelds with bigger screens but WHO REALLY CARES? The Tungsten E2 is the dream handheld with an already good size screen. It has the latest version of the Palm OS , Garnet 5.4 This handheld has everything, From Bluetooth to Microsoft office Mobile! You can even get a WIFI chip and browse the internet, or connect it to certain Bluetooth or IR Cell phones and browse the web that way. I’ve hand my handheld for about 5 months now and its good for anyone, If your working you can take notes, or on a trip why not watch a movie on it, (provided you have an SD card then load the movie onto that) listen to music, Play games(palmgear.com) Edit Microsoft Word, Browse the web, Check email and more! Why waste your money on a laptop if you can get a cheaper and smaller version in the palm of your hand.

A++++++++ WELL DONE PALM!

Still a GREAT Palm device -- sahme to watch Palm self-destruct by eliminating these and starting to sell only phones. These Palms are fast, easy to use, and have a huge amount of software available to them, including free software. They run real versions of Word documents and Excel Spreadsheets, and can even display Powerpoint presentations.

With a calendar, phone book, and a search function that all are far superior to any PocketPC, the Palm Tungsten E2 is a great device to own.

I do like the look of it - but I love the utility. My husband and I run a small HVAC business and I primarily bought this so that he could have our customer information and trade/supplier contacts with him, in the field. What I discovered when I started setting it up was that (with documents to go installed) I could also load functional excel documents into it. This enables him to do estimates on it, as well - and this is a huge plus because some jobs cannot be done as flat rate and in those cases, he needs to be able to calculate quickly, based on the specifics of a given job. This is GREAT for that and I am so pleased with the purchase. Likewise, Palm support was wonderful. We have Windows Vista and needed to interface with the Palm OS and Documents to Go. The software on the CD that came with this was not set up for Vista and so, I had to contact them to help resolve it. Their website had the download available (6.2) and they were able to direct me to the Dateviz website, so that I could get the correct version of Documents to Go. The only minus is that I have to buy Documents to Go 11.0 rather than being able to use the free one -- but that is a VERY minor issue that is due to my OS and not any shortcoming on the part of Palm or Dataviz.

The Palm Tungsten E2 may be a little obsolete, but it serves my needs.
I carry it with me everywhere. It is not a phone and I don't use it for surfing the web. I do keep Notes, Phone numbers, Games, My schedule and to do list and a spreadsheet of my time sheet in it. I have two and keep them synced. I carry one while the other is charging.
It has ebook capabilities, but the screen is a little small for me to use it that way.
Netgear has all kinds of apps for it from shareware to expensive. I have gotten some interesting games from Crimson Fire as well.

I love my PalmOne Tungsten E2.

I upgraded to a Palm E2 In January 09 and I love this little thing. There is no better organizer (I used to use a pocket daytimer). I didn't want my organizer to be part of my phone because I need to use it while I'm on the phone... and I don't like having to type on a tiny keyboard. With the Palm I can use the stylus and I've found that I can navigate, even type with my fingertips if I want to. It holds tons of data and music (it's an MP3 player too) and I can quickly jot down notes using the notepad. My only hope is that Palm will continue to support and update software for the E2. It is older technology and it seems that Palm is focused on phone/PDA devices instead of organizers. I don't need or want to use it for email or web although it can do that if you want to buy a wireless card.

I needed something for time tracking, for a small business. It helps me to keep accurate time for billing purposes.. and I enjoy reading a book on it in my free time.

I bought the Tungsten E2 at a good price.. a little under 50% of new cost, about $85 total. It came with the charger and usb cables, so I had no trouble syncing it on either my windows XP or linux partitions. (Download the palm desktop and install it to the windows side of life, and a simple 'sudo aptitude install pilot-link jpilot' took care of my ubuntu linux partition that I usually use.) Both worked perfectly.

Solid construction on the palm, the screen is a little tough to read in bright sunlight, but I can deal with that. All in all, a good purchase for my needs.

I agree with at least part of almost every review so far - in other words, this unit has extreme good points and extreme bad points. It's a good device (feature-wise) but it is definitely fraught with problems, and Palm's service has gone from bad to worst possible scenario (which will eventually catch up with them, so the future of their products is in doubt). I've had several palm units over the years, mostly good, but the Tungsten E2 is perplexing. I agree with the person who wrote "Although the Windows Mobile based PDAs are more elaborate and powerful, I think their features distract from the real use of a PDA, that being a personal assistant." That statement hit the nail on the head, but I might still have to switch to a "Winette" (programmer's term for a Windows version PDA) one of these days because Palm's customer service is quickly approaching that of the airlines (willing to kick their own customers in the teeth). Anyway, the Tungsten E2 is great when it works, but the last couple months this thing has been developing many problems (it's two years old). One I've learned to live with is that the power button on top works only occasionally (I have to push it several times to get it to turn on or off), so I usually turn it on with the one of the four buttons at the bottom of the screen, and just let it turn off by itself (I keep it set to power itself off after 30 seconds, for that very reason). Another is that the alarm sound works when it wants to - sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't (make a sound), so that feature simply can not be trusted. Once in a while it will not power on, but so far I've been lucky because pushing the reset button did the trick. All in all, though, it seems as if the unit is withering away fast. I had a Tungsten E1 before this one and it was too horrid to mention (due to near PTSD). The best one was the M515 I had several years ago, but I accidentally went swimming with it and it's been toast ever since (my own fault, of course). Anyway, they've gone downhill ever since, and judging by the trend, I can not rely on this type of track record for the important issues I use it for (business apps). Five years ago I was Mr. PalmOS and vigorously discouraged people from getting a Winette but now my attitude is changing rapidly because of where Palm (the corporation) seems to be heading. They had the market as far as true effectiveness in a PDA, but due to their brazen greed and belligerence they're losing it fast. I predict it will be all over with them in a few years at most. Ultimately, the options seem to be either (A) switching to a Winette, or (B) buying used Palms frequently and keeping a few backups in stock - the latter option being a pathetic way to keep serviceable equipment in operation.

I bought the Tungten E2 because the *&%*$#*& Microsoft Vista rendered my beautiful Palm Tungsten T into an expensive paperweight. The E2 works well and is a slight improvement over the Tungsten T in a couple of areas. The downside is my Tungsten T accesories do not work with the E2 because Palm decided to change the bottom connector which makes my current keyboard, synch cable and charger useless. All of this because I bought a computer with Vista.
My suggestion to potential buyers. DO NOT GET A VISTA BASED COMPUTER!!! I cannot stress enough my hatred for Microsoft and the troubles I have encounted with the MS Vista OS. My Tungsten T worked great with the Microsoft XP OS. The VISTA program is a POS, figure it out. I suggest buying an XP equipped computer even if you have to buy it used. Then you can use virtually any Palm device you want without problems.

Jeff
maloney1@pacbell.net

The Palm Tungsten is great. It has a large memory so you can have multiple applications in addition to the standard applications that come with it. It is completely compatible with my apple computer and its software. The color and graphics are very sharp and clear. The expansion slot allows me to play mp3s and carry actual documents produced on my computer. The price is reasonable. I would definitely recommend this product to anyone.

I am a third generation Palm user. I received a Tungsten E2 for Christmas last December 2005. I was very impressed with the added functions, the slick design and the long lasting rechargeable battery. I wrote a glowing review of the product on Amazon. The only complaint I had was the 90 days warranty period. I thought it was too short. Four month later, I encountered a problem trying to power up the palm. It just won’t power up. I tried various “reset” modes and none worked. I finally contacted Palm support and they informed me that the warranty period had expired and that it would cost me $149 to repair it. The original cost of the Palm Tungsten E2 was only $199. Obviously I declined. I started searching on the web and I found out there are many others with the same problem. It turns out to be a defect of this particular device. I am positive Palm knew about this and yet they choose to deny any problem and cover it up. What a sad position for a Corporation to take. I later discovered that the battery is defective in my case and I was able to buy a replacement part from ebay for $20 and a special tool (TORX T5) screw driver. I replaced the battery my self and it is working now.
I am writing this follow up review to warn other customers of Palm. They are not playing fair. They will make you pay for their mistakes. This new culture is very disturbing. They have made the financial calculation that it is cheaper to ignore and deny a problem than to offer a recall and an apology. This is clearly a defect of one of their products which they knew from the start. Why else would they only offer a short warranty period? As opposed to 1 year on the other model T2. I will not buy another product from Palm and I would not recommend this to others. Buyers beware!!! It is a shame that an otherwise excellent product should suffer because of bad judgments on the part of their Corp. Executives. I have written a formal complaint to the head office and have not received any reply. I guess it was too much to expect.

-Jack Lee
Yorktown Hts. NY
May 12, 2006

I wanted this because the Palm Hot Sync doesn't work with Vista 64-bit, but I found you can sync using bluetooth. My Tungsten E doesn't have that but the E2 does. Plus there's the 32mg internal memory, which means I can have more programs installed on the Palm rather than on the SD chip. I had a bit of trouble with stylus sensitivity & screen visibility till I realized there was plastic shrink-wrap still on the screen - I think it was replaced & whoever did it either didn't think to remove it or didn't want to risk scratching the screen before selling it. Anyway, I got it peeled off (mostly - still some tiny bits that I couldn't get out from under the bezel) - much better. It was a great deal - $40, and $10 off for opening a Bill Me Later account. And the main navigation button feels better than the one on my old E. I'm happy!

I was looking for a PDA that had some battery life. My Clie` battery lasted a very short time and I wanted something that would last four or five hours at least. It appeared that the Tungsten would fit that need and it has. I can use it several days without having to recharge. I have one game on it and it doesn't run down the battery. I can play it off and on for two or three days before it needs charging. The color is quite good, also.

My only complaint is that there is no indicator showing when the PDA is fully charged. I also had to order a USB cable for connecting it to the computer separately. I understood that everything was included but that wasn't. It may have been my mistake, but it was easy to find the cable and not particularly expensive.

I would buy it again if I had it to do over. It is fitting my needs perfectly.

This is not an iPhone, and it's not a Blackberry, but if all you are looking for is a device to manage your calendar and keep general pda info in, it works ok. The picture viewing and real-player for mp3's is a welcome upgrade from my old tungsten E, and I like the idea of flash memory but have not tested it yet.

Palm OS is the only OS that supports the technical scuba diving decompression profiler from Global Underwater Explorers. This is why I bought a palm. I have found several other uses for it, and the palm website has a ton of download applications. But after fiddling around with everything I still only use the device for the scuba application, and I could have gotten by with a cheaper palm for that, like the m500.

This Palm Tungsten E2 is very solid, good quality PDA, the OS interface is very clean and easy to use, synchronization is also easy, screen is bright, text is super clear, a perfect easy to use PDA to organize your daily life, plus, the battery life is super long, I charged once, and it last two weeks! But as a ex-pocketPC owner, I have found if you are familiar with Microsoft windows, you would probably like PocketPC better, since the windows CE interface is similar like regular windows, and the most important factor for users to choose pocketPC is, you can find tons of softwares for pocketPC, but only a few for Palm. So, if you are not going to use the PDA for multitasking purposes, you only need a good quality organizer to schedule your daily life, then, this is a good choice, other than that, you should buy a PocketPC.

After a little over a month of ownership I'd say I like my Palm enough to use it practically everyday. I like the MP3 features. I also like watching videos from my Palm. Documents to Go is a nice feature. Somethings took me a while to figure out but that's because I didn't read everything in the manual. Dislikes - During my first month I kept getting fatal error/reset a lot. Then finally it would go away. I kind of panicked, but playing around with it I found out that if you push the on/off button and tap the reset button simultaneously that you can do a cold reboot and start from scratch. It wasn't too hard to get everything back on. I did loose some of my games, but they were just trial games that one that was registered came back. Since then though the number of fatal errors and messages have decreased dramatically so perhaps it's something I did. If though I were to need another, I may decide to upgrade to one with more capabilities and more space so that I can view all internet pages. This one doesn't display internet pages very good. Aside from that this a good little tool.

Several years ago I started out with a Treo 90 to use as an address book. Eventually it died and while looking around for a replacement I discovered the Tungsten T2. I've gone through three of them and have just received number four. My biggest fear is that E-bay will run out of them someday.

I'm sure that the T2 does many things that I haven't discovered yet, because I still mainly use it as an address book, and also carry a few e-books on it, for emergencies. But mainly it is, Contacts and Calendar that keep me on track.

I would certainly recommend this fine little machine for those who aren't into "texting etc." Although it does have Blue Tooth capabilities, I'm used to the cables for syncronizing with my PC, so have looked no further, lest I get lost! Hmmmm. Maybe someday.

So, for my two cents worth, Long Live The Palm!

I bought this E2 as replacement for one I had lost. That one downloaded apps and e-books so easily. This E2 somehow needed a super high learning curve to download apps and I spent hours trying to sync info from PC to handheld- needed to use Palm's Help via chat to get started. I still have not been able to download any info into my expansion card- need time.