Palm Pre: Breathing New Life Into A Dying Brand

By Author: Jerry Smith
Total Articles: 225
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It's no big secret that the days of dominance of the smart phone market of Palm devices is a distant memory. Outclassed and outpaced by the bigger and more competitive rivals, Palm is struggling to stay afloat and live up to its reputation of being one of the pioneers - if not THE pioneer - of the smart phone. Palm was into smart phones and PDA long before QWERTY keypad phones were appreciated and extra features were considered to be luxuries rather than the must have many consumers are demanding for today.

A Look at the Aesthetics, Design, and User Interface

At face value, the Palm pre looks very sophisticated, especially the model than comes in glossy black. The slider phone is slightly uncharacteristic for a Palm, but is surprisingly easy to use, with the full QWERTY keyboard sliding out under the screen. The buttons and keys are also (relatively) conveniently spaced apart from each other, making typing or messaging fast and easy. Of course, people with large fingers or long nails will still contend with a few inconveniences and additional learning curves, but this is not Palm Pre-specific, but rather an issue ...
... with all QWERTY smart phones.

The dimensions of the phone measure at 100.5 x 59.5mm on the long and short sides respectively, with 16.9mm thickness. The weight is also a bit one the heavy side (at least as far as mobile phones go, at 133 grams. However, this gives the Pre a solid feel.

Both touch screen technology and QWERTY interface are possible with the Pre, making it deliver the best of both worlds. The user interface is also okay, which is very responsive and easy to learn.

More Impressive Under the Hood

The distinct feature that sets the Palm Pre apart from the rest is its excellent multitasking ability - it's almost flawless. And the biggest smart phone out in the market today, the Apple iPhone, can't even do multitasking of any kind. That the Palm Pre can do what the iPhone can't - that's big.

Battery life is a bit short though, with a full charge lasting more or less a day. Another downside is the lack of video recording capabilities as well as video calling, but Palm says that an over the air update in the future will fix the lack of video features.

The Palm Pre has no expandable memory card slot, but the internal memory is 8GB, which is more than enough for most people. The Palm Web OS loaded in the Pre is also very impressive, run by a ARM Cortex A8 600 MHz processor with PowerVR SGX graphics and 256mg RAM.

The Palm Pre's camera is at 3.15 megapixels which is quite shoddy for a smart phone belonging to this price range. However, the Pre takes good enough pictures assisted by an enhanced fixed focus feature and an LED flash. Connectivity-wise, there are also no complaints, with the Pre supporting Wi-Fi, 3G, Bluetooth and even GPS connections. Browsing is also relatively fast on the Pre, which, along with the document viewer / editor, is very good news for people who plan to use it for business purposes.

The Down Low

All in all, the Palm Pre just meets the standards expected of it since it was announced at the Consumer Electronics Show in 2009. For Palm to be placing a significant amount of its few remaining chip is well-justified. It's a very capable phone filled with features, which is bound to give other competitors a run for their money.
Jerry Smith, the editor of http://www.mobilephoneonly.co.uk. An expert on mobile phone and an observer of UK telecommunication market. He writes reviews on latest mobile phones, and also suggests promotional deals and special offers from mobile phone retailers in UK.