Treo 600 vs Tungsten C, T and Zire 71 in
PalmCommander Benchmark
The Treo 600 runs on a 144Mhz OMAP processor,
which is similar to that found in the Tungsten T and Zire71 from PalmOne.
Benchmarks show the Treo generally out performs the Tungsten T by 10 to 20%. For
a real world example, the Treo 600 handles playing background MP3's whilst the
core applications are still fully usable at the speed of a traditional Palm
device. However the Treo 600 does not have enough CPU power to play MP3's whilst
playing processor intensive games like Astraware's
GTS Racing, or
Warfare Incorporated - if this is
what you have in mind then you need to look at either a 400Mhz X-Scale device or
even one of the older Clies with a separate audio coprocessor. Unlike previous
Treo's with color screens the Treo 600 scores highly on screen write benchmarks
making graphically intensive applications like games and video players a
pleasure rather than a frustration. Games like GTS Racing and Warfare
Incorporated when given the CPU to themselves are smooth and fast . The only
bottleneck in the Treo 600 seems to be in memory access, although this doesn't
seem noticeable in normal use. I did find that over time Benchmarks would fall,
but that a soft reset could improve them by up to 10%.
Of the 32 Mb of Ram 8 Mb is reserved for system
heap, which is used by memory intensive applications like the Blazer web
browser. This means that 'Page too Large' errors like those found on some OS 5
sony devices with only 5 Mb of heap are seldom encountered. For any connected
multimedia palm powered device a decent size heap is essential and the Treo 600
has plenty. 24 Mb is also plenty of memory for Palm OS applications which tend
to be smaller than those found on Pocket PC devices, especially for low density
devices like the Treo where application graphics take up much less space.
Battery life seems good, however I am back and forward from my desk throughout
the day, and keep the Treo plugged in to its charger cradle. Handspring claims 6
hours talk time from the 1800 MaH Li-Ion battery.
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