Low cost or cheap?

In my post earlier today I talked about buying a new (used) cell phone.

A few weeks back I brought my old Palm IIIe back to life. My Palm IIIe was my second Palm product (my first was the original Palm Pilot). Both Palm PDAs were fantastic. They were durable (I can't tell you how many times I dropped them), and were great on batteries. The mono-chrome screen was okay and easy to read.

I found my trusty Palm IIIe in the bottom of a box a couple of months ago and hit the power button. Dead. I threw in a pair of new batteries. LIFE.

A bit of searching around led me to the Chapura PocketMirror, and in no time I had Calendar and Address Book synchronization with Outlook.

I should also note that the cell phone I'm using is a hand-me-down from my wife. It is a first generation Motorola 2G phone, that is in baby blue and missing the antenna. Still, the reception is fine and the battery lasts forever. Also, it will probably haunt me and last longer than anything else I buy. I won't be shocked if I am back using it again by this fall.

In any event, the phone I bought on eBay that I'm waiting for (hopefully it arrives tomorrow), is a Palm Treo 650. It of course has the old faithful Palm PDA applications, and also the phone. It also has a camera and video camera. So, I can also pull my Flip video camera out of my pocket and leave that at home too.

It will be sad to re-retire my Palm IIIe. But it will be nice to only have to schlep around one device again.

So - am I low cost or cheap? I'd like to think that reviving an old cell phone and PDA, and then upgrading by buying a used device on eBay makes reflects my low-cost business strategy.