I shuddered when the notice came in the
mail. The official letterhead of the Federal Court was concise and to
the point. "You have been chosen to appear for selection for the
Federal Grand Jury. If selected you will appear for 3 days per month,
for the next 18 months or such a period as deemed suitable by the
court."
"Perfect timing," I thought. This just as we started a
complex development project at work. I remember previous experiences
with jury duty, involving hours of waiting and boredom. Now don't get me
wrong, I'll do my duty but there had to be a way to use the downtime to
keep up with my group project.
I live out in the country in the mountains of Northern Arizona, but
the district Federal Court is in Phoenix about 200 miles away. So I
needed something small, portable, and with great battery life. But I'd
be away three days at a time, so I also needed something very capable;
something with a useable keyboard and a decent screen. My notebook PC,
an IBM Thinkpad, is very reliable and capable computer. But it's not all
that small and it has horrible battery life. Using it means I have to
carry around pounds of equipment, including the Thinkpad, the power
adapter and accessories. In addition, I didn't think I'd have easy
access to an AC outlet in the Courthouse.
Then I remembered that a friend had just bought a new Sharp Mobilon
Pro (www.sharp-usa.com). This
Handheld PC Pro (see Screen 1) has a bright, active matrix color screen,
gets up to 8 hours of continuous use on a fully-charged battery, boots
up instantaneously, and has a keyboard big enough for my large hands.
Best of all, it's small enough to throw in my briefcase. I bought one.
Screen 1: The Sharp Mobilon Pro has
a full, 640x480 4K color screen, up to 8 hours of use on a full-charged
battery, and a touch typeable keyboard.
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