Customer Reviews
Defective battery cover design 
2004-02-06
The AAA battery cover slips out easily - causing battery mispositioning & complete data loss. Recommend frequent Hotsync.
The rest of it is not too bad for the price.
battery life is awful 
2003-11-11
great display, looks, etc. Terrible battery life. Don't buy this PDA.
Great PDA! 
2003-08-10
SL10 is very lightweight, small in size, reasonably fast for most PDA tasks, low priced, runs stable Palm OS 4, very well designed with silver casing and great is you don't need multimedia on your Palm.
I have been using this for about 2 weeks now and like it very much. Lots of people here claim it has dark and unreadable screen, which is not true. You will need to install a free Palm application called ThinFontFix to make font more readble. Here's the breakdown,
Sunlight/cloudy outdoors or bright conditions : good readability, use of backlight(BL) makes no difference.
Indoors (medium light) : average readability, BL is a must, some reflection on screen but acceptable.
Dark conditions : excellent, BL must, perfect for your eyes.
I think that the reviewers who claim dark screen didn't turn on the BL all the time or enable ThinFontFix. I installed X-Master and KeepLitHack (both free Palm applications) to keep the BL always on irrespective of lighting conditions.
Now people who are used to 2 months battery life on old low-res Palm's will claim it has poor battery life. 5-6 hrs on rechargeable batteries (w/BL on always) is good enough for atleast 1 week. Its no big deal to put in freshly charged NiMH AAA's, say every Sunday evening. Its better than LiIon rechargeable batteries since they die within 2 yrs of manufacturing date and can't be replaced.
Another advantage of SL10 is that it comes with no cradle or others propreitary items to worry of. Only a *standard* USB cable, metal stylus and very well designed flip (eliminates need for a case). Jog dial is very useful when reading something & memory stick expansion slot is excellent.
Included SW bundle with Documents-to-go, MobiPocket Reader and other memory stick backup utilities is good. More importantly there are tons of free Palm application on the web like DiddleBug HR, Plucker, NoahLite, ThinFont, Shoplist, Runtime, etc.
Yes this won't snap pics, play mp3's or color pics, games or movies, but I don't those things in my PDA. PDA has to be simple, reliable, easy-to-use, good battery life and not-priced-as-much-as-a-new-Dell-PC. Overall for double digit price I paid I am pretty happy.
Last PDA made to run on AAA batteries. 2003-08-06
That's correct, this is the last PDA made to run on AAA batteries. All future ones would be running on a propreitary Lithium Ion battery. LiIon dies in 2 yrs time leaving you with a dead PDA. And replacing LiIon batteries is not easy or economical either. Yeah I know the technology changes a lot with time, but to throw away a working device just because its battery died is stupid. (All cell phone & laptop makers sell replacements for their battery packs, why not PDA makers?)
So after that rant about LiIon batteries back to the PDA review. The major pro's are,
1. Low price and still good build quality.
2. Looks good, small size, light weight and a very nice flip cover included.
3. Jog dial and memory stick expansion slot.
4. HiRes display and backlight (unlike Zire).
5. 6-7 hrs of battery life on a pair of NiMH AAA with backlight on all the time. AAA batteries can be found in easily in most stores for replacement.
6. Runs Palm OS 4 which has zillion free apps available and is very easy to use unlike Windows based PDA's.
7. Good set of bundled applications.
8. Comes with a simple non-propreitary USB cable. No bulky charger, cradle or other stuff to worry about on trips.
Con's,
1. The LCD is a bit dark for use in medium lighting conditions (although good in bright and in dark).
2. Eats batteries much faster than old Palm's which ran like weeks on a single set.
3. No other fun stuff like mp3 or color screen, but then look at its price!
In short if you want to get a PDA which will do basic stuff and keep running for a few yrs get a SL10 (found only refurbished or on ebay). All the new color PDA's will come with a LiIon battery which becomes a pain after one year of use when their charge capacity decreases. (Other AAA based ones that can be still found are Visor Edge/Deluxe and Palm iiixe.)
GREAT 2003-04-30
THIS IS A VERY GOOD PRODUCT, ALTHOUGH IT DOES HAVE ITS HIGHS AND LOWS
Highs
-great screen resolution- view pictures and watch short movies
-small compact size
-AAA batteries
-memory stick
-looks good
Lows
-paint fades away after time- "Back" button stopped working after extended use
-AAA batteries
-software expensive (as with all palm os devices
Verdict
-A great value for the money you can get a free case at sonystyle.com with purchase. This is deffinently better than the sj-20 considering the fifty- dollar difference. If you are young like me and dont have the money or dont want to carry a four hundred dollar device around- this is the product for you
4 1/2 Stars- Very Good PDA 2006-07-31
This PDA is very functional and easy-to-use. It stores quite a bit of memory, and the features are very nice and useful. The only things that I disliked were that it is black & white (though color PDAs were hardly on the market when I bought it), and that sometimes the font is very small and I couldn't find a way to change that. It provides a great memo pad, Paint program, and photo viewer. You can also add creative touches to your downloaded pics using the paint program, which proved to be entertaining. You can also get great features and downloadables for this PDA, which is a slightly older model. I would definitely reccommend the sony CLIE PEG-SL10 Handheld!!
Great PDA...Disadvantages though 2004-07-12
I bought this PDA a few months after it was released. I was happy with it except a few things. I didn't like that it was B&W or that is was not rechargable. There was alot todo with it until almost all the pda's on the market went Color then the software was limited. I really like the functionality and the features. But now I have updated. I would recomment going for the Song SJ22 for a little more money. Tis color and recharagable and alot more funtional.
Combines Basic Organizer Functions With A Hi-Res B/W Display 2004-06-13
This is the third PDA I've owned, but my first CLIE. After my Palm Vx's screen broke, I decided to upgrade to the color Palm m130. About 6 months later it stopped functioning and I decided to just forget about returning it and throw it out because I really didn't like it all that much anyway. So I decided to shop for a third PDA. I wanted something small, light, and inexpensive; something to use just as an organizer. I was thinking about a Palm Zire, but while looking on eBay I found the CLIE PEG-SL10 in brand-new condition for half the price. I bought it, and was pleasantly surprised at what I got. I didn't know when I bought it that it used AAA batteries instead of rechargeable batteries. I was a little disappointed at first, but I found later when going on vacation it was much easier to bring an extra set of batteries than a charger cable. The high-resolution display is great. Text comes out clear and easy to read. I sort of miss the color display of my old m130, but the hi-res makes up for that. The included 8MB of RAM is more than enough for storing contacts, memos, and date book entries. I even had enough room left for JPEG pictures I transferred from my computer using the included software. While I never bought a memory stick to expand the memory, that feature would be useful for people who want to store photos, video (with included gMovie software), or games. While it comes with dozens of applications on the CD, almost all are trial versions or shareware. It does, however, include street finder with one free map download. It takes up a lot of memory (around 2MB for program and map), but is very useful. It also includes powerOne personal, which is an upgrade to the included calculator and includes more features. It's been about 6 months since I bought this PDA. I'm now thinking of upgrading to a Tungsten C to take advantage of my new WI-FI home network. This PDA was great and I haven't really had any problems with it. I would not suggest this to anyone who needs a PDA for music, movies, internet, or games. This is a very basic PDA with some more advanced features. Overall, it is a great investment for anyone who needs a inexpensive, basic PDA.
OK, for a while... 2004-05-08
I received this product as a gift a year and a half ago. Initially, I noticed the unit was getting turned on and the batteries drained while being carried around in my bag, thanks to the wonderful "feature" that turns the unit on when any of the front buttons are pressed. These buttons are constantly pressed when pressure is applied to the flip cover. I read on the SONY site there's no way to turn this feature off. Bummer. I started carrying it around in a cardboard box so this wouldn't happen, but that sort of negated the benefit of its small size. Also, if you use the backlight you can literally watch the battery meter drop.
The big problem is that once the AAA's are drained, the small internal battery drains as well. Normally this small battery is only supposed to make sure you don't lose everything when you change the AAA's, and is supposed to be kept constantly charged by the AAA's. Now EVERY time I change the AAA's, whether they're discharged or not, the system resets and I lose everything. I have to back everything up on the MS (which leaves you SOL when you don't have enough juice) or HotSync all the time to combat--but not fix--this problem. I inquired about sending the unit in for service to presumably replace the small internal battery (it is out of the warranty period) and they quoted the fix at $138--more than the unit cost brand new a year and a half ago, and well over what they're selling for now. I'm so completely annoyed at this, I'm not sure if I'll try another PDA (NOT SONY), or go back to old fashioned paper.
In summary, OK for the first 1.5 years, pretty useless after that.
Don't Trust about "Expandable Memory" 2004-03-01
I really like to express the problem I have struggling with Sony SL-10. I thought it was a good buy with additional Memory Stick (MS). I found out it was really a waste becuase I cannot run/read a text book from MS with an application such as Reader in internal system. I had to transfer everthing (all data: a whole textbook)from MS to internal; then, it runs. So, my point is "Don't get fooled with Memory Expandable." What is the point of getting a memory stick which you cannot run the programs from? All you can play is with 'internal free space, 7 MB.'
I called twice to get help from 1-877-760-7669, but nothing helps. It blames on low memory space.
Believe me! Most of us using this product are
undergrads, grads and professional students. We need more memory space (without a memory stick)..
I regret that I bought it. Now I am in search of a Palm pilot........other than SONY after 2 years frustration with this product.
