Look, there, at the corner table in the coffee shop. What’s that sleek, silver gadget that young woman just can’t put down?

And in the back row at a public meeting, what is that glowing screen that man keeps tippety-tapping at?

The tiny, handheld electronics popping up all over offer an ever-increasing array of functions — tracking appointments, sending e-mail, managing music collections, watching videos.

To the uninitiated, iPods and BlackBerries sound like something from a garden club meeting or maybe a fruit salad. Cell phones with names like Razr, Slvr and Blade sound downright dangerous.

But to the tech savvy crowd, all these devices are just tools to get things done and maybe show off the owner’s trend-setting coolness, just a little.

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"Just like with any tool, you have to pick the right device for the job," said Rich Miles, 48, a technology buff and director of elementary education at the Medford School District.

Most days, he has an iPod and a PDA on his desk — one for fun, the other for business.

Miles listens to tunes at home and work with the popular iPod digital music player, eliminating the need to haul CDs back and forth. He’s just downloaded his first video — an episode of "Battlestar Galactica" to watch on his iPod at the gym.

He’s used a personal digital assistant (PDA) for years to keep track of appointments, phone numbers, e-mail addresses and meeting notes on the go.

The first electronic organizers debuted in the 1980s, the Web site HowStuffWorks.com reports. PDAs, also known as handhelds or palmtops, strive to be portable extensions of users’ desktop computers, with which they share information.

The original PalmPilot came out in 1996. Palm still makes a slew of handhelds ranging from simple organizers that cost around $100 to "LifeDrive mobile managers," sleek, brushed silver gadgets, with bright color screens, that store loads of files, surf the Internet, check e-mail and cost about $450.

Drew Smith, a salesman at Connecting Point, a Medford computer store, said Palm TX and Tungsten E2 models are popular here. Both offer the ability to send and receive e-mail, browse the Web, organize files and photos from a regular computer, and play music, videos and games. They have touch-sensitive screens for entering information, but some customers buy optional, external keyboards to make the gadgets almost as useful as laptops, Smith said.

"It’s a professional tool for business people who need them for organization, but its hip to have them, too," he said.

Hewlett Packard’s iPAQ Pocket PC series and Dell Axim handhelds offer a similar lineup of features and functions.

Beyond a PDA and just short of a laptop in size but essentially a tiny full-powered computer, Microsoft on Thursday announced the rollout of its long- rumored Project Origami Windows XP handheld device that is about 2.5 pounds and has a 7.5-inch touch-sensitive screen. Users can attach a keyboard or type on a keyboard display on the touch-sensitive screen. Three manufacturers will have it on store shelves by June with a price range of $600 to $1,000.

Miles has used all the brands over the years and currently has a Dell, like other school district officials.

Planning meetings through PDAs eliminates the need to make dozens of calls to coordinate principals’ schedules, he said. Recently, after a late meeting at Wilson Elementary School, Miles didn’t want to drive back across town to the district office to check his e-mail. Instead, he found a wireless signal along the street, parked and checked the e-mail with his PDA.

"I use it to create efficiencies," he said.

Increasingly, people seeking such efficiencies are turning to "smartphones" that combine the organizing systems of PDAs with cellular phone service that provides more direct e-mail and Internet access. These phones have tiny, typewriter-style keyboards and as much computing power as a desktop of not so many years ago. Some include touch-screens, digital cameras, and music and video players.

"People are replacing two devices because they can do it all from a phone," said Jacob White, 22, a cellular consultant at Medford’s Chat Cat Cingular store.

BlackBerry, which has gotten lots of media attention in settling a patent dispute that threatened to derail its popular service, is primarily for handling e-mail, White said.

Cell providers introduced BlackBerry service in the Rogue Valley late last year. The spiny, viney blackberries are still more common here, but with 3 million users nationwide, the devices are spreading like brambles across a field.

Palm Treos offer similar e-mail, organizer and file managing capabilities. They have touch-sensitive screens so users can write notes, as well as type messages.

Hewlett Packard offers a iPAQ Pocket PC Phone with keyboard and touch-screen, too. A Cingular 8125 smartphone has plenty of computing power and a slide- out keyboard with large buttons, White said.

Local doctors are buying Treos and BlackBerries to track appointments and patient conditions when they are away from the office, salesmen said. Real estate agents and other business people also are adopting smartphones.

"I’m more and more amazed at who uses these," said Kenny Schults, manager of U.S. Cellular’s Medford store. He expects to see use pick up now that BlackBerry has settled its future and as service spreads locally.

Other cell phones are packing in features and cachet, too, even as they get smaller and slimmer.

Popular, sleek multimedia phones include the Motorola Razr, which has a camera, instant messaging, and video playback; and the competing the Samsung a900 Blade with similar features.

(Even the newest of the new, however, can be hit with the oldest computer problem ... a glitch. Razr sales temporarily been suspended as a precaution after a few of the phones developed a problem.)

The ultra-thin Motorola Slvr, apparently so slim it has no room for vowels, includes a digital music player, Apple’s popular iTunes software and room to store 100 songs, White said.

White carries a Motorola MPx220, which has a music and video player, digital camera for videos and photos, games and e-mail capabilities.

"I like technology, but I like to keep it to a low roar," White said. He’d rather have one phone that does everything rather than tote a distracting number of devices.

While White downloads clips of "The Simpsons" to his phone to watch while waiting in lines, plenty of other people choose gadgets, generically known as mp3 players after a computer file compression format they use, just for videos and music.

The Apple iPod, introduced in 2001, is a top choice. Its latest version, a video iPod, has a color screen and plays videos as well as music, audiobooks and other sound files. Various models can store between 7,500 and 15,000 songs and cost $300 to $400 said Smith, at Connecting Point.

A new version of the smaller iPod Nano that stores fewer songs and costs about $150 just hit store shelves and should prove popular with kids and the parents who buy stuff for them, Smith said.

Kathrin Buettner, an exchange student from Stuttgart, Germany, studying at Southern Oregon University, wanted an iPod to listen to music around campus.

"Then the video one came out anyway, so I got that," she said.

Assigned to watch the television show "Lost" for a class but unable to catch the show on TV, she downloaded an episode to her iPod and now can watch it anywhere, anytime.

Although primarily for playing video games, the PSP or PlayStation Portable, can show movies stored on a Universal Media Disc (UMD), which looks like a small compact disc. It also can surf the Web and download music or video, said Nathan Owens, 23, manager at the Ashland Radio Shack.

"People are looking to combine electronics in a single solution," he said.

"There are always trendsetters who will pay the most money to buy the hottest technology, but the latest technology is getting easier to use so you don’t have to be a techno geek."

Reach reporter Anita Burke at 776-4485, or e-mail aburke@mailtribune.com.