Psion 7

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The Psion 7 is a notebook computer from Psion. In size it is fairly original - larger than a palmtop or handheld machine, but smaller than a laptop computer. It was the first of the Psion series to have a full color screen - and the last, since Psion has since discontinued its PDA products. It follows a leather-bound clam-shell design, with a touch-sensitive, VGA-resolution LCD screen and QWERTY keyboard. Internally it boasts a 132.71MHz SA-1100 StrongARM processor, 16MB of RAM (upgradable to 32MB) and 16MB of internal ROM.

The machine runs the EPOC operating system (a Symbian OS), and as such, can be programmed in the Open Programming Language (OPL), using the provided development program, or in C++ using a separate PC-hosted development system. It can be synchronized to a PC by means of an RS232 port to serial connector, a method that is antiquated by modern standards.

The unit has an expansion port for a Compact Flash (CF II) device such as the Hitachi Microdrive. It also has a PC Card expansion port, but the EPOC operating system had little support for devices other than flash memory. For data transfer between Psion computers and to use mobile phones as modems the Psion 7 features IrDA (infrared) connectivity.

The Series 7 is a variant of the Netbook, a machine aimed at the corporate market. Due to customer demand, the "cut-down" Series 7 was released, distinguished by replacing 16mb of the 32mb of Ram with a 16mb ROM chip. Accessing the OS in ROM required slowing the processor down, leading to the false perception that the Netbook and Series 7 used different processors or PCBs. It is therefore possible to convert the Series 7 to Netbook configuration by replacing this memory card. However, at least two different (interchangeable) PCBs were used during the product's lifecycle, the later PCB distinguished by higher power output to the PCMCIA card.

[edit] Included Software

• Agenda - a personal information management program
• Bombs - a minesweeper game
• Calc - a calculator
• Comms - a terminal emulator
• Contacts - a contacts manager
• Data - a flat-file database program
• Email - an email, SMS and fax client
• Jotter - a multipage scratchpad
• Program - an OPL program editor
• Record - a voice recording program, for use with the in-built microphone
• Sheet - a spreadsheet and graphing package
• Sketch - a drawing program (for use with the touch-screen interface)
• Spell - a spellchecker, thesaurus and anagram program
• Time - a world clock and alarm program
• Web - a web browser
• Word - a word-processor

[edit] Linux on the Series 7

An open source project OpenPsion, formerly PsiLinux, aims to port Linux to the Psion Series 7, Netbook and other Psion PDAs. See the OpenPsion site. Linux on the Series 7 rather stuggles, given the Series 7's limited resources, but most PC Card (16 bit) adapters seem to be supported.