So the day finally came. Yesterday, the Palm Pre, announced in January by Palm at the Consumer Electronics Show, finally went on sale. This device is supposed to be Palm's savior, helping right the company after years of declining sales. It may also provide the support to Sprint that it desperately needs, as the telecom provider has been hemorrhaging customers as of late.
Following somewhat significant hype, and apparently some manufacturing issues, it became obvious that in order to acquire a Pre at or near launch date, getting to a store very early was required. Despite the repeated suggestions of insanity from our family, friends, and colleagues, Sarah and I woke up at 4:30 yesterday morning, threw on some clothes, and headed over to the Sprint Store at Mohawk Commons in Niskayuna, NY. We arrived at just about 5 AM, to be greeted by another couple that was apparently there since 10 PM the previous day.
In the three hours prior to the store's opening, additional customers arrived, and by 8, a total of 10 people were in line. The store opened promptly at 8, and we were ushered in by the rather excited Sprint employees. The in-store process went very smoothly. The only minor issue was that the salesperson accidentally swapped our phones, so we ended up having to go through the setup process twice. No big deal. After an hour in the store, we left with our phones, very happy. I also left with a leather holster-style pouch, and Sarah got a Touchstone. Although the phone was finally on sale, the employees were still not permitted to tell us how many units they actually had, though everyone that was in line did appear to get one before I left.
After leaving the store, a large portion of the remainder of my day was spent playing with my new gadget. I was just about to call the Pre a phone, but that moniker is becoming increasingly inaccurate. Yes, this device functions as a cellular telephone, and does so apparently better than the other two "smartphones" I've owned, but calling it a phone is a misnomer. This, like most other smartphones, is much more than a phone, and I agree that we need to come up with a more appropriate name.
My initial impressions are somewhat mixed, but generally positive. There are many areas that make this by far the best mobile device I've ever used, but there are definitely still others that require further work.
As other reviews have stated, the build quality is good, but not as good as I'd hope. It's not quite as sturdy as I'd like. The physical appearance of the phone is stunning... if it's clean. That's a pretty big if. The high-gloss plastic exterior smudges extremely easily. The inductive charging back plate that comes with the Touchstone is rubberized, like the exterior shell of my previous Palm Treo 800w. I'd actually consider getting the Touchstone only to get that replacement back, since it doesn't show all of my greasy fingerprints.
The physical size and shape is great. The phone feels great in my hands. It's compact, light, and the curved shape just feels... right. I'm not sure I can properly convey this. It's obvious that the physical design was carefully considered. It really doesn't feel like you're holding a block of plastic and metal. It feels like you're holding something that was meant to be in your hand.
I'm not totally sold on the keyboard yet. The keyboard is similar to the keyboards on the Centro and Treo Pro. I was hoping it would be more like the keyboard on my Treo 800w. The keys are the same physical size, but whatever it is they're made out of has a tacky feel, which I suppose I'm just not used to. Since the keyboard is recessed into the shell, I find the top row of keys a little difficult to type on, even though I don't have very large fingers. I hope that this is something I will grow to get used to. I also hope that as the keyboard wears in, it will require less force to depress the keys, as they are a little stiff for my tastes right now.
The screen on the Pre is great. It's bright, vivid, and very, very sharp. Even small text is extremely readable, and photos look fantastic. Without having one side-by-side to compare against, I'd say that the Pre's screen is at least as good as the iPhone's.
There are a bunch of other subtle little things that are really fantastic about the Pre hardware as well. For example, there's a proximity detector near the earpiece. When in a call, the proximity sensor activates, and when you bring the phone to your face, the touchscreen locks so you don't hang up on your caller by bumping the phone into your cheek, and the screen turns off, so it's not just pointlessly shining at the side of your head.
As nice as the hardware is, it's the software that really makes the Pre shine. As good as Palm's previous offerings were from a hardware point-of-view (and they were, for the most part, great hardware), they were all held back by their software. PalmOS was designed in 1996, and while it was great at the time, never really changed all that much. The user interface had nearly exactly the same look-and-feel in 2007 as it did in 1996. This had become blatantly obvious to Palm, which I'm sure is that convinced them to start offering their products with Windows Mobile in 2006. In my opinion, this decision wasn't great for them either, as it took their phones and simply lumped them together with the seeming endless supply of mediocre smartphones that all ran the not-very-awe-inspring operating system.
webOS changes all of that for Palm. It's fresh, modern, and is truly ready for "now". The look and feel is as good or better than the iPhone's operating system in many places, but still has a few rough edges here and there. The most widely touted feature, Synergy, is a major step forward in data management. Simply enter in account information, and bang, all of your information is right there, right in one place. Contact, calendars... everything. The only problem with this is that by everything, I truly mean everything. Every Gmail account, Facebook friend, everything. There's no way to filter who and what gets in and what doesn't. There really needs to be filtering here. Just because I know someone and have them listed as a friend on Facebook, I don't need their account showing up in my contacts list on my Pre. And I especially don't need their record there if all that their profile allows me to see is their birthday or other useless piece of information. Filtering of contacts definitely needs to be added.
My other big complaint about the software (possibly bigger than my complaint about Synergy) is Universal Search. Universal Search isn't nearly as universal as it needs to be. The lack of searching in calendars and email is big. Right now, finding the message or appointment you're looking for requires manually scrolling through your Inbox or calendar. Not good. If I want to find out when I scheduled that doctor's appointment, or the confirmation email from the concert tickets I ordered, I don't want to go thumbing through months of calendar lists or hundreds of emails. Calendar and email searching (while not fast) was there in Palm OS and Windows Mobile. This functionality is absolutely necessary, and right now is a big stumbling block for the platform. I sincerely hope that this is added in a software update, and soon.
Also a side note... Palm, get the webOS SDK out the door. NOW. Downloadable apps are what really makes the iPhone. Apple's iTunes App Store has something on the order of FORTY THOUSAND apps available in it (yeah, most are junk, but that's not my point). Palm's App Catalog has eighteen. Developers are desperately trying to develop more apps for this fantastic platform, but without that SDK they can't. A lack of app availability could cripple the webOS platform before it's even fully out the door.
Those issues aside, this is a great device, and it's a great platform in general. I think it has the potential to bring Palm out of this slump they've been in, and if Sprint can keep it exclusive for long enough, it can help them out as well. So... let's see.
