Nov/Dec 2004

RFID reading capabilities have been added to the distinctive MX3 "half-height" range of handheld computers from LXE. The new MX3-RFID is said to be capable of reading both barcodes and EPC-compliant RFID tags. And a rather nice practical feature is the way users can switch between the two simply by pressing one of two buttons (on the left- and right-hand sides for easy differentiation).

The company says the unit's 10.8-volt, 1800mAh Li-Ion battery pack allows it to be used for a full eight-hour shift, even on RFID applications.

The unit includes an EPC-compliant class 0 (read-only) and class 1 (write once, read many times) tag reader. The unit's firmware is also Gen 2 field upgradeable, which should mean users won't have to buy new hardware or even take the units out of the field when they upgrade to the new standard. Users can control what codes are being read by the unit with a "read range" (RF power setting).

The company is making application programming interface calls (APIs) available to help operators with their application development. Additionally, the MX3-RFID includes "keyboard wedge" software, which places valid EPC data directly into a keyboard buffer so that off-the-shelf applications should be able to access the data without complex development.

 

The MX3-RFID runs under Windows CE 3.0 or CE.Net, and comes with either 206MHz Intel SA-1110 processor or 400MHz XScale PXA255 according to which of these is chosen. Expansion is provided for with PCMCIA and Compact Flash card slots, and Wi-Fi wireless connectivity is supported.