Shortly after Psion launched the Siena 512k in 1996 I trotted down to Debenhams on Oxford Street, London, and bought one (for £169.95).

It revolutionized my life. At last I had a dynamic way of organising my time, addresses, alarms, and money. Not to mention the ability to write my own applications using the simple but powerful built-in BASIC-like language OPL (Organiser Programming Language).

The Siena lasted three years before it completely fell apart! In the end it was held together with Superglue and prayer! It had done well though, having allowed me to take my M.Th. and TISEC essays on the road, as well as my 15,000 word dissertation! using PsiWin 1.1 (which I bought, with a serial cable, for £80 in 1996.) PsiWin is now a free download from the Psion website, and you can pick up an RS232 serial cable for about £15.00.

In 2002 my Siena was fixed by Pinnock Organiser Services (POS) Ltd. in London for the bargain price of £45.00. My sister, Jenni, now owns it.

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Impressed with its simplicity, and already owning PsiWin 1.1 which allows connection and syncronisation between the Siena/3c and Windows, I bought a new Psion 3mx (the speedier version of the 3c). This has a more freeing 2Mb of RAM, compared with the half a Meg on the Siena.

Impressed with its uses (Patience and Tilefall!) Jane now has a Psion 3mx which is aiding her in her current job.

I later discovered that I could freely download PsiWin 2.3.3 from the Psion website and use this with the Psion 3mx for backups and for drag-and-drop installations and convertions between Windows and the Psion.

I use the excellent Psi-Sync for MS Outlook to synchronize my Psion Agenda file with MS Outlook 2000. More details at Gadec (cost to register is now £18).

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In the summer of 2003 I bought a secondhand Psion Series 5mx on eBay UK. I think I paid around £150 for it, as a Buy Now option. When it arrived a couple of days later (I paid with PayPal) it was in almost immaculate condition; I could hardly tell that it was secondhand.

Why Upgrade?

I had two reasons for upgrading from my trusty and well-loved 3mx: first I was getting very tired of something on my system preventing Psi-Sync and Outlook from... well,... sync-ing! I really needed my Psion Agenda and Outlook Calendar to show the same entries. Second, I wanted a larger keyboard. My plan was to do some writing while on holiday and the keyboard on the 3mx, though adequate wasn't ideal for length sessions sitting in front of on writing projects.

I absolutely love my Psion 5mx. I did go on holiday with it: I did do some writing, and it was ideal. I love seeing the reaction that a lot of people give when they see my 5mx for the first time, because more compact and keyboard-less PDAs, such as Palm and Pocket Windows' devices, are more common.

Accessories

I now have a 64MB Compact Flash card for storing a lot more information, and I purchased the last Psion 56K Travel Modem in my local PC World for just under £25, although on the move I can now send and receive e-mail via my Nokia 6100 mobile telephone.

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My primary use for the Psion is information organisation: Agenda (synchronized with Outlook 2000) Contacts and To Do list.

Writing

Believe it or not I wrote and edited a lot of my MTh degree dissertation on my first Psion, a Siena 512KB. Psions are excellent for taking minutes, notes, and longer writing projects.

Programming

When I have the time I write the odd program in OPL - I am currently working on a Mah Jong Scoring Program, and have plans for a Guitar chord program similar to Andy Gryc's Chord Magic for DOS.

I'd like to find more time to program, but updating and writing websites seems to take up too much time! Maybe this year I'll complete one of my programming projects.

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