Do iMacs, Palm Pilots, and Windows all play well together?

December 10, 2004 12:12 PM

imacs and palm pilots and windows systems - do they play nicely together? i'm trying to help a friend figure out if his soon-to-arrive imac (his first mac since 85) will be able to sync with the calendar and contact software on a palm pilot. he currrently uses ACT at work (WIN), but is willing to change that to a different calendar/contact solution that will allow him to sync the palm pilot at home too, (and add info at home). any advice on simple solutions or best practices?
posted by chr1sb0y to computers & internet (4 comments total)

Palm Desktop should do all of that.
posted by modofo at 12:22 PM on December 10, 2004

My father uses his Sony Clie (which, as far as I know, is identical to a Palm in everything but name) with his iMac with no problems.

Interestingly enough, Palm Desktop started life as Claris Organizer. I still have the floppys for CO lying around my parent's basement somewhere.
posted by hughbot at 12:48 PM on December 10, 2004

Yes.

If it's an older Palm with a serial cable, he'll need to use Palm's serial-to-USB cable (third-party cables don't work, in my experience -- use the Palm-branded cable).

iSync can be used in lieu of Palm Desktop: you use iCal and Address Book instead. It installs a special iSync conduit in Hotsync Manager (which is still required). There's also a conduit for Entourage (the Mac equivalent of Outlook).

If he has a newer (OS 4.0 or later) Palm, he might also be interested in the Missing Sync in lieu of Hotsync Manager.

PalmOne's Mac page; iSync; Missing Sync.
posted by mcwetboy at 12:51 PM on December 10, 2004

I can vouch for the Keyspan USB=>PDA Adapter, for hooking up old serial cables/cradles to mac USB ports.
posted by britain at 3:06 PM on December 10, 2004