Sony Clie PEG-UX50 Handheld

The good things:

Wi-Fi (and bluetooth)!!!! It is built in so I don't need to get a $200 component to take advantage of my wireless network at home, at work, and several other wireless enabled sites I frequently visit.

I like the wide-screen feature of this Palm. I haven't seen any software conflicts with this so far but it makes looking at movies a lot nicer.

As with all the other Clie's, the fantastic high-resolution screen. This is what sold me on the Clie's in the first place. My pictures look so good that I don't carry pictures in my wallet any more. I also love the fact you can read an eBook without any eye strain. Best of all, this screen looks great in ANY LIGHT!!! In Las Vegas, I can turn off the back-lite and read off of the sun's lights beautifully. It does not matter the lighting, I've never had a problem looking at this screen. The ability to swivel it around for use is pretty handy and has raised a few oh's and ah's among my friends. I like the fact that you just turn it around after using it to protect the screen. It feels better than one of those flimsy plastic covers on some other Clies and most other Palms.

The Internal memory on this is nice. It was especially annoying when I had to get a memory card to listen to music with my first Clie when I still had plenty of memory on the inside.

I love this keyboard. It is much easier to type on than earlier models. Warning: this is not a keyboard for taking extensive notes. Use your laptop or desktop for that. But jotting down a few notes or a quick meeting is quick and easy with this keyboard.

I love the more compact size. Yes, the screen is a bit smaller, but this is supposed to fit in your Palm afterall. I prefer the smaller size. When I need more real estate on my screen, I just turn on my laptop. The Palm computers were never meant to replace the laptop or desktop afterall.

Very light weight at just over 6 oz. Fanstastic!!!

I had a problem and called customer service. I had to send it in (that was bad, I missed it) but it came back quickly and in working order. Great job!!!

The Decent Things:

The .mp3 player. Why can't the volume be any louder. Yes, I know you just plug in some headphones or speakers to listen to it but sometimes I want to share a song or audio clip with a small group of people. Very annoying. I now turn to my laptop for that instead but the Palm would be more convenient. It is odd that the Palm has the quietest .mp3 volume but yet rocks the house with its midi and alarm sound files. Other than that, the portable .mp3 player is fantastic and very convenient and I would rather have this than any dedicated .mp3 player I've seen on the market. The only problem is that 128MB gets filled up fast. I would suggest a Memory Stick card reader... it is easier to get music on there than by using Clie's import program.

The buttons. I'll give them credit in that my first Clie, the NR70, had the buttons in the worst place. When you wanted to go to the address, notes, etc. you needed to lift the screen to reach them. It was very annoying. Now the quick-launch buttons are accessible even when the screen is swivelled. My complaint is that they are the wrong buttons!!! The four buttons on every Palm are Addresses (always use), Tasks (always use), DateBook (always use), and Notes (often use). Now we only have one of those, DateBook. The other two are nice... Internet and Email. And I know I can reprogram them to how I want them. But I use the other stuff more than the Internet and Email. If the DateBook button would at least toggle between the different applications.... oh, I don't know. I just wish they hadn't messed with that.

The camera. This was borderline descent and bad. The resolution is higher than my NR70 but it still isn't good enough to do anything good with it other than taking pictures of my contacts and including them in the address book. I would rather spend $100 less and use that $100 credit towards getting a decent camera. I bet you can get one at that amount at less than the extra $100 needed to get this one in the first place. Save the picture taking for a better device. Sony had a Clie with a 2MP camera built into it... what happened to that???

The Bad:

The price... OUCH!!! You can get a decent laptop for this amount.

But, I'll still give it the 5 stars because the Clie has always shown great and continuing innovation and because, overall, it truly is a great piece of (small) technology.


Close to being the notebook replacement   October 9, 2003
Gadgester (New York)
22 out of 22 found this review helpful

First came the laptops that aim at replacing the desktops. Now Sony is working hard at producing PDAs that strive to replace the notebooks. After spending a week with the UX50, I say their first try is a success, the high price aside.

Let me first talk about the cons, so I can focus on the pros more.

The screen is quite small. It's 3.5 inches diagonal and packs a 320x480 resolution, (...) , which has a bigger screen. This reminds me of the slim VAIO notebooks: they feature 1280x1024 on a 10.4" screen. Ouch! If you are over age 50, forget this. You'll have a tough time making out the icons.

Battery life is also below average, when you have wi-fi or Bluetooth or both on. In fact if you use either one continuously, with backlight set to 3/4, you'll run out of juice in a little over an hour. Kinda scary. I wish Sony would give us a compact battery extender that uses NiMH batteries.

Price. Of course everybody thinks this is too expensive. It's expensive, but since it does everything you can imagine, it's cheap compared to notebook. So whether it's a good value comes down to whether you'll use it a lot. Of course, given the battery life problem... You see what I mean.

Now the pluses. There are tons of them.

First of all, this is a *very* stylish PDA. Pictures don't do it justice. You should go into a store (Staples, Circuit City, etc.) to check it out up close. The exterior design is excellent, with the right amount of curves and edges. It's also surprisingly lightweight. Not for your shirt pocket, of course, but jackets and pants should be ok, unless you wear jeans all the time. What really impresses me is how good the unit feels in my hands, even when I hold it with one hand and use the stylus with the other.

Performance is very good, too. You can play an MP3 in the background while doing other tasks and usually you won't notice any delays. Occasionally you do, but that hasn't happened to me often. Apps launch quickly. If you load JPEG files they display quickly, too, unlike on many Pocket PCs.

The keyboard is sweet. It has the usual Sony quirks, but it doesn't take long to get used to the keys. The dedicated numeric keys are at the top, where God intended them to be. Shift and Ctrl are sticky, so you need not hold them down to type. All in all the keyboard feels great and well spaced, and I can peck away in no time.

The wi-fi function works like a charm. I have Verizon DSL and they have installed lots of hotspots in Manhattan, free for customers. I instantly got wi-fi near a payphone near my office. I surfed for about 15 minutes sitting on the curbside and it never got dropped. Back at home, it works fine with my Microsoft AP. I'm very impressed. Bluetooth, on the other hand, is another matter. (...) The manual is very weak. (...)

I can't emphasize enough how great the keyboard is, and working in landscape mode (i.e., horizontal) is fabulous. You can browse the web and edit Office files with so much ease. You get multimedia as well. This is a very well put-together package.


Sony Clie PEG-UX50   November 30, 2003
Chris P. Alexander (West Bloomfield, Michigan)
25 out of 29 found this review helpful

The search for the perfect palm pilot has always been an issue. Many have features that others don't have, that making it complicated to get the perfect one. Finally, Sony has created a PDA that has every feature that anyone could ever want "The Sony Clie UX50".
This PDA has more bells and whistles than any palm powered handheld that you have seen. With its wireless Internet and its blue tooth, it is easy to connect to every type of compatible device and the cradle for charging would be the only thing needed to be connected physically to it. This PDA has crossed over into being more like a laptop.
The UX50 also has a spaced out keyboard, which makes it easy to type in all the information that needs to be typed. Also the UX50 has a swivel screen, which allows you to change the keyboard into a screen. The pda also allows for the left and right-handed user to be comfortable and also eliminating the High-resolution display not to be covered while you write.
The screen resolution (420x380) is better than any pda out. The screen will let you enjoy little movies with the memory stick pro, which goes up to a gigabyte. Also the screen will be perfect to view your pictures from the camera on the pda or other sources. This pda has hand writing recognition for those who like to write on the screen. Also it has an MP3 player and a voice recorder.
This palm powered device is surely one the greatest inventions in the land of the pda's. It almost goes into the realm of laptops. If you were to buy any palm pilot and didn't mind dishing out 650 dollars then the Sony Clie UX50 is the palm for you.


Best PDA!   August 20, 2006
katana (New York)
8 out of 8 found this review helpful

I am sad that Sony is no longer in the PDA business. This is one of the best PDAs of its time. I've had it for several years and still use it. It combines all the features I need, plus more. The keyboard is the main reason I purchased it- very easy to use and illuminates. I also love the ability to check email and surf the web, snap quick pictures, read files, and listen to music and audiobooks. The battery life is not the best, but there are lots of accessories and there is an extended battery. It comes loaded with applications and games. The screen is a nice size. I still get questions and compliments on it!


Good handheld save for one flaw   April 27, 2004
RAMChYLD (Klang, Selangor, Malaysia)
5 out of 7 found this review helpful

Well, I've been using this handheld for over a week now, and I find it pretty spiffy. I also find it amazing that Sony could cram so much wonder into such a small machine. The onboard Wi-Fi allows me to surf the Internet at hotspots, and if no hotspots are available, I could also surf the 'net by using the onboard Bluetooth to connect to my trusty Sony Ericsson T610 and use it(the T610) as a GPRS modem. And if I get tired from surfing the net, I can use the handheld to play back MPEG videos and MP3 music (which it does pretty well) which I store on Memory Stick. Also, the keyboard is a very well-thought idea, as it makes typing long URLs easier. There is also an infra-red port, which can be useful if you're going to try one of those Palm-powered-remote-control solutions. There is also a onboard camera (a really good one, imho - takes really bright pictures) and microphone (also a really good one - sounds recorded are pretty crisp), so your UX50 can double as a makeshift camcorder. And the landscape-oriented color display makes it easier to watch videos or read websites. And the battery life isn't bad - 2 days per charge with modest usage.

My only gripe about this device (actually, PalmOS in general) is that it doesn't support Unicode/CJK. Granted, not many people take notes in Chinese on their handheld, but it is a Internet-enabled device, and it would be nice if the device can view non-English sites (say, if you need to pull some anime lyrics down in Kana format while online with it). Sure, there are solutions abound for that, but they either cost a serious amount of money or need a serious amount of hacking that would mean voiding the warranty of the product. Word has it that both Symbian OS and Windows PocketPC edition supports Unicode. Why not PalmOS?

In a nutshell, it's a nice device, but don't expect to use it for reading anime lyrics in Kana format online.