Yardena Arar

Several services on display here at the CTIA Wireless 2003 show offer a glimpse into a faster wireless future. Verizon Communications Inc., Novatel Wireless Inc., Navini Networks Inc., and IPWireless Inc. are among the vendors bringing DSL-type speeds to wireless networks.

Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP) has announced a Pocket PC that offers biometric security through a built-in fingerprint scanner, a first for a mainstream commercial personal digital assistant.

Palms excel at simplicity, while Pocket PCs are for power users. That was the conventional wisdom in PDA circles--and mostly, it held up. But the latest Palm operating system addresses some of the weaknesses that had hobbled its predecessors' suitability for high-end applications, and the first devices based on the upgrade--two Sony Corp. Cli

Imagine being able to get on the Internet with a notebook or PDA anywhere you can use your cell phone-at landline speeds or faster. That's the siren song of next-generation wireless networks. After many years of hype, these so-called 3G (for third-generation) networks-which succeed the old analog and today's digital cellular networks-are finally rolling out.

Become more productive with this handheld.

A sleek, lightweight Pocket PC 2002 handheld.

HomeRF-based wireless networking technology moved a key step forward with the announcement of the first shipping product to match IEEE 802.11b

HomeRF-based wireless networking technology, which is playing catch-up with archrival 802.11b standard, moves a key step forward with the announcement of the first shipping products to match 802.11b's 10-megabits per second speed.