Coming Clean on the Palm PRE

by | Aug 13, 2009 | technology | 0 comments

Cool Palm Pre Soap (Bourbon and Coke Scented)Note: The photo here is NOT my Palm PRE. It is the must have soap replica from TwoEggplans

It’s been 2 months since I started the endurance test that is the Sprint Palm PRE.. here’s some observations that may help you understand my plight, and why you may want to upgrade your phone

First off, the PRE rocks. I tried hard to hate it exclaimed “this thing is going back before the 30 days is up” at least 27 times.. but the truth is that I love the multitasking, gps tools and promise of more cool apps to come.

I’m on my 2nd PRE now. After fighting with an incredibly slow response, I swapped for a new phone a couple of weeks back. I had outstanding service from the Buford GA Sprint repair center. Rayna told us she has not been given authority to fix the PRE. I guess Palm won’t let Sprint people open the phone. So we tried a new one.

I’m not out of the woods yet. The new PRE doesn’t require a reboot every day, but once the import of my thousands of contacts from Gmail was done, the searches were slower. Might be me, but they appear to get slower over time.

So, I have trouble looking through past calls, finding a contact when I want to make a call.. just about anything to do with finding people. The Twitter app works so much better than my last phone and I’m still hoping that APPS make a difference.

I’m tempted to compare the Palm PRE to that other device that sells millions. But their customer prevention department has done a good job. (I’m not mentioning their names because I’d like to think there will be someone looking for a review by searching for Palm PRE without the A names)

So why did I keep the PRE?

I’ve been buying and using leading edge technology for decades. I’ve been burned many times, but generally feel that it’s a small price to pay for the productivity gains I can get from understanding the tech and implementing it’s features.

My fantasy is that I’ll find an hour to erase the contacts and upload a smaller list. I don’t call 8,000 of the contacts in there, no sense bogging done gmail and the phone with it. Of course, that will mean spending some time cleaning up my contact list. 🙂

Two really dumb moves by Palm as far as I can see.

  1. They have an excellent OS and some history with apps yet they delayed the hottest trend by crippling the app developers and app store at release.
  2. Google and Palm must have worked together to put the gmail interface on the PRE.. but no SEARCH. This is a  GOOGLE app with no search? These guys need to google “clue”

The keyboard is tiny, but I prefer it to typing on a touch screen. I assume future models will allow for a side keyboard and apps that switch orientation when you use it.. but this one is very usable. Would be nice if they added in keyboard options for more of the commands.

The Palm PRE has many innovations.  Sprint and Palm were in trouble, bet the farm with on PRE and gave us a phone that tries a little bit too hard. Will they hit a home run? I’m waiting to see.