Palm Pre: A Pre-tty disappointing start
With my Sprint contract running out and having been frustrated with my HTC Mogul--more like Windows Mobile 6--it was clearly time to upgrade.
Our smartphone senior editor Bonnie Cha pointed me in the direction of the Palm Pre since I was adamant about having a touch-screen and physical keyboard. I was also drawn to the Pre because of the new WebOS operation system and Synergy functionality.
After having waited in line for almost two hours outside a Sprint store in downtown Manhattan, I was thrilled to get home and start playing around with my new Palm Pre.
A few hours later disaster struck. The phone began occasionally resetting when I opened or closed the sliding keyboard (see embedded video). A day later, it happens almost every time. After some quick searching on the PreCentral.net forums, I found that I was not alone. The issue doesn't seem to be widespread, but there are people out there who are experiencing the same thing.
Unfortunately, the Pre seems to be sold out everywhere here in Manhattan, so getting a replacement isn't going to be easy.
Anyone else having similar problems?
Make sure to check out today's episode of The 404 for an extended look at my Palm Pre situation and more launch day stories!
Before covering games and gear for CNET Reviews, Jeff Bakalar dabbled in film and video production. An avid writer, reader, and gamer, Jeff is also an obsessive New Jersey Devils hockey fan. Catch him live every day as the co-host of CNET's infamous podcast, The 404. 
the music player in the pre has a lot of missing functionality actually
Palm need to fix this soon
for thoose that use itunes sync the podcasts are clubbed together with the music which is super lame
then there is no progress bar for the song currently playing
plus no ability to create playlists ot queue songs on the fly
the multi-media features of the pre are seriously a problem right now !
I'm not sure if you haven't tried it on your iPhone, but I can check the web or maps while on a call perfectly fine.
If you want an iPhone interface just get an iPhone.
And why would anyone get a Palm Pre with its 18 apps? Apps let a ?smart? phone edit Excel files, have a talking dictionary, look at MRI images, play The Sims 3 on their phone etc.
With no apps, the Pre is a ?dumb? feature phone with full internet capability.
PS: For everyone who bought a Pre, Palm hasn?t even released the SDK yet to most vendors, you can wait about 1 year for them to develop the apps to get anywhere near the utility of an iPhone or Blackberry (if the developers aren?t busy making apps for iPhone, Android and Blackberry already!)
the iPhone has a huge lead in the app space and will only get bigger I guess
now that they opened up the O.S more in 3.0 !
but still the pre has a lot more going for it
multi-tasking like no other
a awesome implementation of universal search, best calendar to date
above all the best notification system on the planet
{ did you see how in today's Keynote they showed of push notifications
it's going to be a big mess IMO }
also after palying with a friends pre I found that the touchscreen is actually more responsive than the iPhone's plus the ripple effect it creates when touched is ingenious ! and the accelerometer works better too
apps will surely come in the future
even right now the pre is quite impressive if you ask me
as far as problems go all phones have their birth defects which get fixed
also the pre is still missing a lot of key functionality
at least Palm is in the right direction with the O.S
it's wat iPhone 3.0 should have been IMO
well here you go...
'Maybe you should refresh your memory and remember that Palm came out with most of the iPhone's 'precious little features' you describe YEARS ago.....(ie TOUCHSCREEN, 30,000+ available applications, INCLUDING MRI images, dictionaries, emulators for gaming, etc.)
AND maybe you should ALSO remember that this is Pre 1.0---did iPhone have 30,000 app with their first iPhone-i dont think so. Reality check for you and many other readers. Stop force feeding bs to the masses and fact check yourself before writing incredibly numbing and factless statements.
Lets also say that for the record, I use and have used all OS's including--RIM, Symbian, Winmo, Palm OS, Android and now WebOS. Palm has released a product with an operating system that keeps them in the game.
Move over Apple---there is a giant market and Palm is ready to take it back with WebOS and its GROWING app catalog.'
I wonder if it is a widespread problem ?
In order to properly support MS Exchange push mail with most companies and providers that want security, the Pre should support exchange EAS PIN-locking. Every Pre rival (WinMo, iPhone, Instinct, BlackBerry, etc) supports it, and even the old Palm phones (like the Centro) support it. The Pre is going to sink like the Lusitania because the developers didn?t get this basic security item straight.
That?s a shame too. I?d bet there is a 30% return rate (or higher) if they don?t get this fixed fast. What were they thinking? Maybe they weren?t?
i also have some dead pixels which i showed the sprint store at the time of purchase. they said to come back when they have a new shipment of phones and have it replaced.
one time i had a memory issue and the phone said to close some programs because it ran out of memory to open new ones. i didn't have ANY programs open at all! i had to take out the battery and restart it.
i'm not even going to mention that i have to charge it several times a day because it goes dead quite quickly. not having over heating issues though.
i can't get google maps to launch at all. it just sits there and tries to load.
when i tried to transfer files from my computer to my palm pre i plugged it in via usb. then when i clicked on "connect via usb" on the pre, my mac instantly crashed. not cool in my book!
i have an appointment at the sprint store to return it and go back with my old palm centro which worked great. i just wanted the cool new thing - first releases never go well so i should have known better. oh well, at least i tried.
About the tech issue...I didn't even realize it was a problem at first. After a half hour of not getting replies to some texts I'd sent, I checked the phone and noticed it wasn't even on. That's when I felt the queasiness in my stomach. I played around with it a bit more and noticed it was shutting down when I tried to open the slider. It wasn't staying on the "black but still on" screen. It was shutting down completely. The re-boot, from what I've read, normally takes 45 seconds to a full minute, so I don't think that's a bug. Pretty big inconvenience, though.
The phone worked fine for the rest of the day. On Sunday, I got a few more shutdowns, but it only happened when I closed the slider with even minimal force. By Monday I was losing faith. I was testing it, and it happened seven out of ten times. The only times it didn't happen was when I closed the slider verrrry gently. Clearly, there's a hardware issue. I'll probably take it in to Sprint today and get on a wait list for a replacement. Hopefully it won't be too long here in the DC area.
But overall, I love the damn thing! It's compact, got a beautiful screen and OS, and it's got an app for NASCAR! (yawn!!)
casey
http://forums.precentral.net/1654403-post65.html
http://www.precentral.net/slider-crashes-inspire-macgyver-solution
Slider Reboot = Loose battery losing connection
"Palm Pre: A Pre-tty disappointing start"
Pre-tty disappointing headline for an amazing phone.
As for many of the complaints Ive read they seem to be matters of preference. The mp3 player is ok unless that the main reason you bought the phone. I have had several apps running while on the phone with no problems. The cmara is very functional. There are new apps just about every day.
By the way I chose the Pre for three reasons (1) I've used Palm pda's since the mid 90's. and have found them to be reliable devices. (2) Web OS. When it was time for an upgrade (the last week in May for me) I purchased a Treo Pro. This was my first windows mobile device and I decided after a week that it would be the last windows mobile device. (3) I like Sprint. I've had AT&T and Alltel several years ago and paid a lot for unreliable voice service. I've switched to Nextel before the merger and was happy. After the merger I got switch to Sprint and bought a Treo. Since coming to Sprint they have gotten better in almost every way. Customer service is actually pretty good. Great voice and data coverage and lower cost than their competitors.
Lol!
best comment of the day
- by wmurch3 June 9, 2009 1:25 PM PDT
- I can't wait to get the Pre. I'm currently on the Sprint store waiting list but I should get it in the next few days. I've had an iPod Touch for a while now and am not interested in an iphone anymore. It's a slick phone and all but the pre just tickles my nerd fancy. Having an ipod touch means I can play all the cool app store games without signing up for stupid At&t. So i'll be getting the best of both worlds now! woohoo!
- Like this Reply to this comment
-
Showing 1 of 3 pages (73 Comments)