Windows Phone Thoughts: The Evolution of Handhelds

"I tend to break Palms and Pocket PCs into two categories: PDAs and handhelds. Devices are separated into these categories by how they are intended to be used. A PDA is a peripheral for a desktop or laptop computer. Without a bigger computer to synchronize with, it's virtually useless. Back in the mid-90s, when the first Palm OS models debuted, they were definitely PDAs. A few still are released today, like the entry-level Zire models. A handheld, in contrast, can stand alone (although they aren't used this way often enough). A handheld can do just about anything a desktop or laptop computer can do. I classify just about all Palms and Pocket PCs released in the past few years as handhelds."

Ed Hardy has written an article discussing the trend where handhelds are moving towards laptops in terms of functionality. The inclusion of hard drives in handhelds certainly gives them a bump in that direction, though I dearly hope the first Pocket PC implementation we see is better than what Palm did with their LifeDrive unit. What do you think handhelds will be like 24 months from now? What evolution will they undergo?