I was hunting for charger for a Palm Tungsten E, because:

  1. this device comes with a charger that only works in the region it is sold in, i.e. North America in my case, unlike my $50 Nokia cell-phone
  2. and I don't have that charger for various reasons

The Tungsten E does not have a craddle, it syncs with a mini-USB cable, and the one I have for the digital camera fits the bill. So I went to the stores that sell that kind of devices.

The first one didn't have the Travel Charger, a $45 + taxes kit that works worldwide with a variety of plugs, because it seems to be back ordered.

The other one did have the mobility kit, which is a USB cable that you plug to an adapter that you can use in your car. It advertises "charge it from any USB plug". So I got that for $40 + taxes. I go back to the office, plug it in to the MacMini USB port, nothing happens. *sigh* So I return it to the store, checking with the sales guy, and get a refund.

In fact it appears that in that case, nothing should happen, it is documented in the KB as Trickle Charge. It is just that it is charging slowly and the device will not tell about it. But the article is not really clear whether this apply to any USB cable or just that specific one sold for $40. So I mail the tech support and they tell within the next hour that it works with the USB cable that comes with the device (not the one I use, because I don't have it) for syncing. So it should work and I'll give it a shot. At least I know that it will not tell me anything when charging.

Bottom line: Palm, you would have written on your package how this work, that we are not expected to have feedback from the Palm when plugging this thing, you would have sold it to me, even if I don't need it.

And the fun part: In the second store, there was a LifeDrive with its web browser and wifi. I tried the browser and in a few minutes, when trying to load this blog, it ended up with an error like: "Sorry can't load, page is too big". I never got that with the Nokia 770.