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Figure 21-4 Asus Eee PC sitting on a normal laptop

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NOTE At the time that this book went to press, some netbooks had started shipping with Windows 7 Starter OS, a stripped-down version of Windows 7 designed to use resources such as RAM and CPU processing as lightly as possible.

PDAs and Smartphones

Having a few computing essentials on hand at all times eases the day and makes planning and scheduling much more likely to succeed. Several companies, such as Palm, Apple, HTC, RIM, and Hewlett-Packard, manufacture tiny handheld portable computing devices that hold such data as your address book, appointment schedules, music, movies, and more. Such machines are called personal digital assistants (PDAs), or smartphones if they have calling capabilities. All modern PDAs have many applications, such as Web browsers for surfing the Web on the go, some sort of note-taking application for jotting down quick notes, and many more. Figure 21-5 shows an Apple iPhone smartphone.

Figure 21-5 Apple iPhone

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EXAM TIP Sadly, the heavy Windows-only attitude of the CompTIA A+ exams means you won’t get any questions about the Apple iPhone. All the same, the iPhone is a great example of what a smartphone should be; I own one.

PDAs don’t run Windows XP or Vista but rather require specialized OSs such as Windows Mobile, Google Android, Apple iPhone OS, Palm WebOS, and various forms of Linux. All of these OSs provide a GUI that enables you to interact with the device by touching the screen directly. Many of today’s PDAs use handwriting recognition combined with modified mouse functions, usually in the form of a pen-like stylus to make a type of input called pen-based computing. To make an application load, for example, you would slide the stylus out of its holder in the PDA case and touch the appropriate icon with the stylus tip.

Sync

PDAs make excellent pocket companions because you can quickly add a client’s address or telephone number, verify the day’s schedule before going to your next meeting, and check your e-mail. Best of all, you can then update all the equivalent features on your desktop PC automatically! PDAs synchronize with your primary PC so you have the same essential data on both machines. Many PDAs come with a cradle, a place to rest your PDA and recharge its battery. The cradle connects to the PC most often through a USB port. You can run software to synchronize the data between the PDA and the main PC (Figure 21-6). Setting up for a PDA running Windows Mobile, for example, requires you to install a program called Activesync if you’re using Windows XP. Vista and Windows 7 drop Activesync and use the built-in Windows Mobile Device Center (WMDC). This software handles all the synchronization chores. You simply place the PDA in the properly connected cradle to synchronize. Figure 21-6 shows a PDA in the middle of a sync operation.

Figure 21-6 A sync operation

PDA to PDA Communication

Just about every PDA comes with a way to move data from one PDA to another. The original technology for this is called IrDA and the process is called beaming. IrDA uses infrared light just like a TV remote to transmit the data between devices. You can use beaming to quickly transfer contact info or small pictures, but larger files take much longer because of IrDA’s slow speed.

Today, the primary way to move data between PDAs is with radio waves, be it Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, or what CompTIA calls Cellular WAN. Bluetooth can be thought of as the most direct replacement for the old IrDA tech. When you wish to transfer files between two Bluetooth devices, you first make each device discoverable, which allows other devices in the area to see that it exists. On the sending device, you then select the PDA you wish to send to. The receiving device asks you if you wish to accept the file, and once that’s granted, you simply stand there and wait for a moment while the PDAs transfer data. Slick!

With Wi-Fi and Cellular WAN, your PDA acts just