By Stephen Shankland; Special to ZDNet News . . .

At [a] CeBit news conference, the Japanese electronics giant [Sharp] showed off a handheld computer called the MultiMedia Tool, based on the Linux operating system, that can play MPEG4 videos and MP3 music.

Sharp's handheld comes with a pullout keyboard, a 320-by-240-pixel full-color screen and 32MB of memory, and it can connect with Universal Serial Bus (USB) and infrared connections. It is equipped with a Secure Digital slot, the same expansion port technology used by Palm. Its software enables it to surf the Web, check e-mail, organize appointments and synchronize data with a PC.

Sharp currently sells handhelds using its own, proprietary operating system under the Zaurus label.

 
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