Good Mandarin/Cantonese Electronic Dictionary

[silverwofl0]

Hello everyone. I'm new to this board. I am also an ABC (American Born Chinese). I just wanted to ask a few questions.

I am about to go to college in the Fall and (gasp) instead of taking Chinese 506 (5 hours in a language course??? Killing me here) I am taking Japanese 506. Well I figured that I could sort of slide in Mandarin on my own hand in hand with Mandarin/Cantonese since there is so many Chinese people there and use classes to boost Japanese because, well, its not everyday there's a friendly Japanese person walking down your dorm.

Now I was thinking you could suggest to me a good handheld electronic dictionary that has both Mandarin and Cantonese voice pronunciations. My mom had an old one which kind of broke and I found her another one online but it wasn't as good as the first. The new one has horrible sound reproduction and totally pronounces things wrong alot. Having ***GOOD*** Cantonese and Mandarin pronunciation is the main thing.

I am also open to getting a PDA and buying Chinese language software, although I am not sure how well they perform and whether or not there is any voice pronunciation at all. Probably the only plus in this area that I have seen is that most dictionaries are much more thorough and you can magnify the characters in aid with learning to write them.

Thanks all in advance.