Sony's NZ90 offers features galore, from a real camera to dual-wireless capabilities. But features aren't the only factor of a good device. Larry Garfield looks at Sony's hefty new device.
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Sony is still king of the feature set. It's CLIE PEG-NZ90 is one of the most feature-rich Palm OS devices we've seen, but unfortunately that feature set isn't backed with the sort of integration and clean implementation we'd like. And then of course there's the price...
Design
The first thing everyone notices about the NZ90 is its size. There's no way to sugar coat it, the NZ90 is big. At 7.62 x 14.2 x 2.3 cm, it's the largest non-ruggedized Palm OS device we've used. It also fills that space with 292 grams of features. It's not the largest handheld we've used, but because of its design and dark color casing it feels even larger than it really is.
 | The NZ90 is a thick clamshell, with a bizarre new cradle
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The NZ90 uses Sony's trademark clamshell design, with the top third flipping out to reveal the screen, keyboard, application buttons, and a new camera. More on that later. As with Sony's previous clamshells, the screen also rotates clockwise and folds down into a tablet mode. And as with Sony's previous clamshells, the swivel point is defintely the weakest point on the device, and the one most prone to breakage.
The screen is Sony's now-familiar 320x480 virtual Graffiti-using color screen, of which we have commented highly in the past. It includes several improvements over the CLIE PEG-NX70v's "toolbar" as well, including a new battery diagnostic popup. It still sports the clock, volume control, and card indicator that is standard for Sony's virtual Graffiti system.
The application buttons on the NZ90 are right below the hing point between the top and bottom halves of the device, and are now arranged in a straight line rather than the staggered design of the NX70v. The two directional buttons between them are small and a bit sunken, making them difficult to use but not impossible. Sony has also added four small buttons to the top edge of the screen part of the device. That way when closed, those buttons take the place of the four app buttons, allowing access to those programs. That is an improvement over the NX70v, but still no good for gamers.
The screen half of the NX90 is set very far back in order to accomadate the thickness of the device, and give room for the new and improved camera. The NZ90 sports a 2 megapixel camera in the hinge portion of the device, including a built-in flash. Unlike the NX70v's camera, which swiveled free, the NZ90's is fixed to the top portion of the device. When opened, it faces towards the user, and in tablet mode it faces away from the user. There is a switch for a lens cover as well. The camera can take pictures at 320x240, 640x480, and 1600x1200 resolution, with a 2x digital zoom.
To test the NZ90's camera, we took several shots and compared them to the same shots taken with an NX70v. All pictures were taken using default settings. The first set were taken of a street corner at dusk, with both cameras at 640x480 resolution: NZ90, NX70v. The color quality on the NZ90 was far better, with good brightness adjustment and compensation for the street lights. The NX70v's image was much grainer and the brightness was very off. In a test later at night, however, the NZ90 was almost completely blacked out while the NX70v was about the same as before. Still, however, the NX70v's picture was much grainer. Even at larger resolutions, the NZ90 was much crisper without any graininess. It's the first PDA-camera we've used that could serve to replace a stand-alone digital camera. Daylight pictures at all three resolutions on the NZ90 are also available (1600x1200, 640x480, 320x320).
The top front of the device when closed has several LED icons to indicate power, Memory Stick access, and Bluetooth activity. All three are duplicated on the inside of the case when opened, above the camera. As with the PEG-TG50, the Bluetooth LED flashes about every two seconds whenever the Bluetooth radio is active, which seems to serve no purpose but to be incredibly distracting.
The NZ90's thumbboard is almost the same as on the TG50. The QWERTY layout keys are slick plastic, although set rather low. There is very little key travel, and it is difficult to tell where a key ends and the surface around it begins. It is also not backlit. It's still a nice addition, but not the best implementation we've seen.
On the left side of the device are the usual scroll wheel and back button, as well as a voice recorder button fairly far down. The infrared port is also on the left side, since the camera dominates the top of the device. The Memory Stick slot is also moved to the right side bottom, where it is very easy to eject accidentally with a finger or hand. The power pull-switch is also on the bottom right, although surprisingly it is not integrated with the Hold switch, right above it. There is also a Capture button for the camera on the top right of the device.
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