The REX 6000 is an ultra-thin

Personal Digital Assistant A personal digital assistant (PDA), also known as a handheld PC, is a variety mobile device which functions as a personal information manager. PDAs have been mostly displaced by the widespread adoption of highly capable smartphones, in part ...

(PDA) produced by Xircom, and later

Intel Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California. It is the world's largest semiconductor chip manufacturer by revenue, and is one of the developers of the x86 seri ...

, from about 2000 to 2001. Its primary claim to fame is as "The world's smallest full-function PDA", due to its unusual physical configuration as a PC card Type-II card (8.57 × 5.40 × .5 cm; 40 g). The REX may be synchronized by inserting it in a host PC's PCMCIA/PC-card slot. Docking stations were manufactured for connection to hosts without PC card Type-II slots, which allows the REX to be connected via a

USB Universal Serial Bus (USB) is an industry standard that establishes specifications for cables, connectors and protocols for connection, communication and power supply (interfacing) between computers, peripherals and other computers. A broad ...

or serial connection. The REX 6000 is the successor to the Franklin REX 5000, with a notable difference being the addition of a

touch screen A touchscreen or touch screen is the assembly of both an input ('touch panel') and output ('display') device. The touch panel is normally layered on the top of an electronic visual display of an information processing system. The display is ofte ...

. In addition, it is possible to remove and install executable code (including both custom applications and the

operating system An operating system (OS) is system software that manages computer hardware, software resources, and provides common services for computer programs. Time-sharing operating systems schedule tasks for efficient use of the system and may also i ...

itself). As with the earlier models, the REX 6000 hardware was developed by the Citizen Watch Company of Japan, marketed as the "DataSlim-2". The firmware for previous REX models was written by

Starfish Software Starfish Software was founded in 1994 by Philippe Kahn and Sonia Lee, as a spin-off from the Simplify business unit from Borland and Kahn's severance from Borland. It was located in Santa Cruz, California. Starfish developed intellectual proper ...

, but the REX 6000, though modeled on previous versions, included a complete re-write of the firmware. The REX 6000 does not support

handwriting recognition Handwriting recognition (HWR), also known as handwritten text recognition (HTR), is the ability of a computer to receive and interpret intelligible handwritten input from sources such as paper documents, photographs, touch-screens and other de ...

and to enter data, a

virtual keyboard A virtual keyboard is a software component that allows the input of characters without the need for physical keys. The interaction with the virtual keyboard happens mostly via a touchscreen interface, but can also take place in a different form ...

is used. The standard REX 6000 has an American keyboard layout, although

third-party Third party may refer to: Business * Third-party source, a supplier company not owned by the buyer or seller * Third-party beneficiary, a person who could sue on a contract, despite not being an active party * Third-party insurance, such as a Ve ...

software allows for other keyboard layouts. The pre-installed software for the Rex consists of the following: * Calendar *

Address book An address book or a name and address book is a book, or a database used for storing entries called contacts. Each contact entry usually consists of a few standard fields (for example: first name, last name, company name, address, telephone n ...

* To-do list * Notebook * World clock * Calculator Third-party software ("add-ins") include games, painting programs,

spreadsheet A spreadsheet is a computer application for computation, organization, analysis and storage of data in tabular form. Spreadsheets were developed as computerized analogs of paper accounting worksheets. The program operates on data entered in c ...

s and replacements or improvements of the pre-installed software. Most third-party software has been developed in spare time by interested users using customized versions of the

Z88DK Z88DK is a Small-C-derived cross compiler for a long list of Z80 based computers. The name derives from the fact that it was originally developed to target the Cambridge Z88. Z88DK is much developed from Small-C and it accepts many features of ANS ...

compiler In computing, a compiler is a computer program that translates computer code written in one programming language (the ''source'' language) into another language (the ''target'' language). The name "compiler" is primarily used for programs tha ...

or the

Small Device C Compiler The Small Device C Compiler (SDCC) is a free-software, partially retargetable C compiler for 8-bit microcontrollers. It is distributed under the GNU General Public License. The package also contains an assembler, linker, simulator and debug ...

(SDCC). The earliest release of the REX 6000 had 1 MB of flash memory, while later releases doubled this to 2 MB. (Earlier REXes stored user data in

RAM Ram, ram, or RAM may refer to: Animals * A male sheep * Ram cichlid, a freshwater tropical fish People * Ram (given name) * Ram (surname) * Ram (director) (Ramsubramaniam), an Indian Tamil film director * RAM (musician) (born 1974), Dutch * ...

with the operating system in

ROM Rom, or ROM may refer to: Biomechanics and medicine * Risk of mortality, a medical classification to estimate the likelihood of death for a patient * Rupture of membranes, a term used during pregnancy to describe a rupture of the amniotic sac * ...

.) The REX has 32 KB of RAM, but only 12 KB is available for application developers. It uses a 4.3

MHz The hertz (symbol: Hz) is the unit of frequency in the International System of Units (SI), equivalent to one event (or cycle) per second. The hertz is an SI derived unit whose expression in terms of SI base units is s−1, meaning that one he ...

Toshiba , commonly known as Toshiba and stylized as TOSHIBA, is a Japanese multinational conglomerate corporation headquartered in Minato, Tokyo, Japan. Its diversified products and services include power, industrial and social infrastructure systems, ...

microprocessor A microprocessor is a computer processor where the data processing logic and control is included on a single integrated circuit, or a small number of integrated circuits. The microprocessor contains the arithmetic, logic, and control circ ...

compatible to the

Zilog Z80 The Z80 is an 8-bit microprocessor introduced by Zilog as the startup company's first product. The Z80 was conceived by Federico Faggin in late 1974 and developed by him and his 11 employees starting in early 1975. The first working samples were ...

, has a 240 × 120

pixel In digital imaging, a pixel (abbreviated px), pel, or picture element is the smallest addressable element in a raster image, or the smallest point in an all points addressable display device. In most digital display devices, pixels are the ...

monochrome A monochrome or monochromatic image, object or palette is composed of one color (or values of one color). Images using only shades of grey are called grayscale (typically digital) or black-and-white (typically analog). In physics, monochrom ...

LCD, and is capable of providing beep sounds to deliver alarms and reminders. The REX 6000 is powered by two button-type CR2016

lithium Lithium (from el, λίθος, lithos, lit=stone) is a chemical element with the symbol Li and atomic number 3. It is a soft, silvery-white alkali metal. Under standard conditions, it is the least dense metal and the least dense solid ...

cells. Around 2002 Intel acquired Xircom and subsequently discontinued this product line.

External links

The Rex 6000 Help Page
(February 2012 version on the Internet Archive
The Rex 6000 Help Page
*
Rex 6000 website with addins and other useful info.Intel's official Rex 6000 pageA forum for Rex discussion

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rex 6000 Personal digital assistants Citizen Watch