Sony Clie PEG-T625C

The Clie PEG-T625C was one in a series of handheld personal entertainment organizers (also called PDA), manufactured in Japan, by the Sony Corporation, and appeared in approximately 2001. There were two other models that came before and after this, and they had very similar external designs with slight internal improvements. The earlier model PEG-T425 had 8 MB of SDRAM whilst the PEG-T625C had 16-MB; however, they both had 4 MB flash memory. The following model PEG-T675C had 16-MB SDRAM, 8-MB flash memory, and faster processor. This was the more desirable model as it had a headphone socket, and could play MP3 and ATRAC3 files stored in a memory stick.

Review

Compared to many of the Palms models of that time, this Sony Clie has some good points going for it such as a slot for a memory stick, colour screen, Bluetooth and other accessories that could connect through the memory stick slot. However, its down side was the built-in rechargeable battery that had to last for the entire service life of the handheld. Although it is not impossible to change this battery, they placed it under the main system board, which is removable by undoing a plethora of ribbon cables. In this multi-page article I show the inside electronic engineering of this unit, chipset, and battery.

As you can see, they called it a Personal Entertainment Organizer.

It had a small hole for storing the stylus pen. There was also a slot for installing a Magicgate memory stick. The same slot could also accommodate expansion modules to increase the functionality. As you can see, the top edge also had an infrared transmitter/receiver. One very popular application was the remote control capability.

Price/eBay

The Sony Clie is usually for sale on eBay and it can come in various conditions. The PEG-T625C had an extremely high-end metal case, which was highly desirable amongst die-hard Palm users. A complete unit in mint condition together with accessories, cradle, software, manuals, and box, could fetch over one hundred pounds. However, the price of a scratched unit on its own without the charger would be around the ten-pound region.

The things to consider are; without the charger and cradle, there is no way to charge the internal battery, and it will be difficult to find anyone selling just the cradle on its own. Alternatively, a unit that comes with a charger and cradle but cannot hold much charge will require a battery replacement and that costs time and money.

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