Review: Palm Pre!!

WARNING!!! This is try to be brief but not so brief… at same time not so extensive review. This is my own version of review after using one week and probably heavily comparison to iPhone since my current device is iPhone.

Introduction
Oh how long I’ve been waiting this phone! I’ve been a Palm Treo user since 600 in 2003 until this year January ditched both Treo and Sprint all together. Here’s all the smart phones I had. Treo 600 -> Treo 650 -> BlackBerry (not sure exact number.. I only had it for less than a week) -> Treo 755 -> Treo 800w -> iPhone. I believe since the end of 650′s life, about the time when they announced 700 there were many rumors of new OS for palm phones such as Nova and etc. After long years of waiting patiently, finally THE PHONE I was waiting so long came out.

The first impression
Sleek, clean, and fits perfectly well in my hands.  It feels a bit cheaper than it looks on picture due to plastic housing. Some might say it’s due to I’m used to iPhone’s metal housing, but none of previous Treos felt this weak and cheap except 800w. First glimpse of OS was really impressive and smooth too

Hardware
Other than plasticky, weak, and little sharp on the bottom edge, it seems like pretty good built. Screen is sharp, bright, and touch screen is as good as iPhone or seems like it responses even better! Camera works great, taking great pictures and auto focus works well. I don’t know why it bothers to have flash though. More than anything, KEYBOARD!!! Did I say PHYSICAL KEYBOARD??? Oh how I miss physical keyboard. It was really sticky in the beginning but after few days it worked really great. I love how palm’s keyboard layout. @, “,”, “.” is right there to use without pressing any other button, and easy of accessing special characters, symbols, and numbers. great plus and something iPhone never can do. Oh and 3.5mm jack, I haven’t had a chance to test it as a music player but I have no doubt it’ll work well.

Applications
Given the fact that it’s been out for only little over a week, I’m surprised decent number of apps. Of course it is not even compare to iPhone apps, but I remember when I got G1 after about a year after launch, Android didn’t have much selections up to that point.
Internet Browser works fantastic, smooth and I felt it runs faster than mobile Safari. I loved how palm incorporated SMS and Instant Messengers all in one, just hoped it had more service offer than gTalk and AIM. Mail apps worked really well with actual PUSH capability. Also total integration of contacts from google was great, and real time sync worked out awesome. Give it a year, palm’s app store will be filled with many great apps just like iPhone. Maybe minus great 3D games. who knows, they might get it all

Conclusion
I love what palm did, but not Sprint. I had just hard time getting this phone (You can read it here) and consistent roaming at work made this phone almost none-usable.
But When it comes to the Phone only, I really wish it released to AT&T. I’d ditched iPhone right away. Yes lack of good apps makes me hesitate to jump right away but that’ll be fixed in few months. Having a sharper and better working touch screen and PHYSICAL keyboard is enough to make me jump. Maybe PHYSICAL KEYBOARD alone is worth enough. The brightest sight is this is the first phone with Web OS, which means more  phones will come out. Maybe I don’t have to wait till Sprint exclusive to end. All I can say is palm did it right this time and really well.

Pros
Touch Screen
Keyboard
OS
Camera

Cons
weak battery
somewhat clumsy and not so lugged built
Phone doesn’t feel like $600 phone
lack of apps
total pointless flash

My rating??
4/5