Wi-Fi to be used in hand heldsDell Launches Smaller Wi-Fi PDAs
Amy Schatz, 10.16.03, 4:57 PM ET
Hoping to snag a bigger chunk of hand-held computer sales during the holidays, Dell will launch its new line of Axim personal digital assistants today.
The Axims have been redesigned to address two major shortcomings of the original models introduced last year: At 5 ounces and 0.55 inches deep, they are 30 percent lighter and 17 percent thinner.
They will be comparable in size and weight to PDAs offered by competitors Palm (nasdaq: PALM - news - people ) and Hewlett-Packard.
The Axim X3i will have 64 megabytes of memory and will include Wi-Fi wireless Internet access for $379.
Dell (nasdaq: DELL - news - people ) will sell a similar Axim X3 without wireless capability for $329 and a model with 32 megabytes of memory for $229.
Dell also is expected to continue selling its current Axim X5, which sells for between $199 and $325.
On Monday, HP (nyse: HPQ - news - people ) released a new series of iPaq PDAs, which have Wi-Fi and Bluetooth wireless capability.
They weigh between 4.7 and 5.8 ounces, and retail between $449 and $499.
Wireless capability is considered the latest must-have for PDA users. The hand-held market has been relatively flat in the past year, but new models' wireless capability is expected to boost demand, analysts say.
A year after entering the hand-held computer market, Dell has about a 5 percent share of the worldwide PDA market, according to Gartner (nyse: IT.B - news - people ), a tech research firm.
Dell and H-P use Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people )'s PocketPC platform while Palm uses its own software. Dell has about 15 percent share of the PocketPC market worldwide.
Dell's new PDA line is the first of several new consumer products the Round Rock-based computer maker is expected to release in the next few weeks.
Last month, Dell said it soon will begin selling flat-panel televisions and digital music players and launch its own music download Internet store to compete with Apple Computer (nasdaq: AAPL - news - people ).