Having someone to organize all your appointments would be a professional's dream. But unfortunately not everyone can afford the monthly expenses of having a personal assistant to tag around with. Managing all your contacts and tasks can be a mess, especially if that reliable old notepad doesn't sound any alarm for an important task you need to do or worst an important business meeting with a sensitive client.

Owning a personal digital assistant or a PDA has been a must for people who are constantly up on their toes. It has been a commodity for almost all professions nowadays since it satisfies the common office needs. Basically a PDAs function is a personal information management device. These keeps critical information such as contact numbers, addresses, birthdates, anniversaries, important dates, notes and a task or schedule manager.

With numerous brands and models in the PDA market today, choosing which model and brand to buy can be mind boggling. A thing the buyer should know before buying is that a PDA is just a peripheral that still needs a full blown computer for it to function well. A PDA or a pocket pc cannot at this stage rival the capabilities of the computer. Though it may have applications that can be of the same with a full blown pc, it is just for temporary substitute for the mean time. Application made for PDAs and pocket pc only carries the core component and lacks big time on other features.

The first question is "what are the user's current needs?" followed by "what are the possible near future needs?" Since PDAs come in all types and sizes, the use needs to be broken down into several segments of use.

Entry Level Users

A PDA user of this level only needs the core PIM or personal information management applications such as task scheduler, contacts, notepad manager and PDF file viewer. The user may be at the office most of the time but needs an instrument to remind him of his tasks and appointments.

Mid-Level Users

Users of this level may be constantly out of the office and may need to bring along data that is crucial for meetings and presentations. The type of PDA needed for this user needs to process more than just the PIM task but also other third party application software. Probably it might also be helpful to buy a PDA with a built-in digital camera. Be sure to buy a PDA unit that can pack in extra memory and batteries. A recommended feature would be an extended removable memory card slot and a removable battery slot so it would be easier to change batteries.

Expert-level Users

This level is the hardest to please. These are on the go users that you can seldom find in offices. They pack gadgets to keep them on track of everything -pretty demanding need for such a small computer component. They constantly need live up to date information that is crucial in their day to day dealings.

The PDA they need are the top of the line pocket pc. Probably the user might need a phone to go with that gadget since mobile phone offers 3G connectivity. This technology can get users to connect to the internet 24/7 at virtually anywhere. This class of gadgets is packed with Wifi, video conferencing feature and a QWERTY keyboard layout for users that need constant data entry.