Expandability: You might find three expansion slots or ports on a hand-
held device: Compact Flash (CF), Secure Digital (SD), and USB. Some
have one, some have none, and some have all three. Make sure any
device you fancy is equipped with, at the very least, one CF or SD slot,
as shown in Figure 3-2.
· Compact Flash (CF) type II: The types of additions you can make
to a PDA via a CF type II slot range from adding wireless connectiv-
ity to increasing available memory. Flash memory is a type of solid-
state technology so, unlike RAM, it doesn't need a constant power
source.
· Secure Digital (SD): This method of expansion, which is also solid-
state, is a secure alternative (meaning it supports Digital Rights
Management) to the multimedia card. If the SD slot is input/output-
capable (SDIO), it can also be fitted with an SDIO wireless adapter.
(I tell you more about this in "Adapting Your Laptop or PDA for
Wireless," later in the chapter.)
· USB: A USB port enables you to connect a wide variety of periph-
eral devices to your PDA -- including, but not limited to, GPS
receivers, digital cameras, and miniature hard drives.
Figure 3-2: The CF and SDIO slots.
Not every PDA or Pocket PC can be adapted for wireless connectivity; a few
PDAs equipped with an SDIO slot do not support Wi-Fi. Before you buy a
handheld device that doesn't have integrated Wi-Fi, be absolutely certain that
its expansion slot (whether CF or SDIO) and OS will allow it to be adapted.
Part I: The Wonderful World of Wireless Fidelity
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