Mobile Phones Reviews

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It belongs to the Xpress Music range, but is very effective for many other aspects: the connection speed, the yield photographic and video playback, the screen size. And ‘the new Finnish mobile phone producer Nokia 5800, with surround sound and 3.2-inch display.

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music – Main features: network, display and power

The new Nokia 5800 Xpress Music is distinguished mainly by the scale of its main screen. Has in fact a front monitor the well 3.2-inch diagonal measurement, above the value of extending almost all phones now commercially available. For more on the budget of this screen are the filter to 16.7 million colors, 16:9 aspect ratio and control via touch screen. Its resolution is 640×360 pixels. In terms of connectivity the Nokia 5800 Xpress Music is provided on average, with advanced HSDPA connection and maximum speed of 3.6 Mbps It also lacks Wi-Fi 802.11b / g. Finally, the battery power from 1320 mAh lithium has autonomy of 8.8 hours in GSM mode in call.

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music design

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music is distinguished by its contemporary design, but size and weight slightly above the average of its category. In particular, weighs 109 grams, coupled with a height of 111 mm, a width of 51.7 mm and 15.5 mm thick. Black and silver characterize the main body, but the original notation of design is given by an insert perimeter front that can be red or blue depending on the variant chosen. The large touchscreen display occupies the whole front, while the rear stands the objective of the camera. Opening the shell horizontally you can eventually find the alphanumeric keypad. And ‘possible to have available for browsing on pen-operated touch screen.

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music – Main functions, and multimedia messaging

Designed specifically for use as an instrument of musical entertainment, the new Nokia 5800 Xpress Music offers a surround sound hi-fi quality with crisp and clear. This uses the functionality of integrated stereo speakers. Music playback is via a MP3 player with playlists, sorting by artist, album or genre, 8-band graphic equalizer. The phone also incorporates a GPS assisted (the so-called A-GPS) with Nokia Maps. The internal memory is 81 MB, but included in-box there is a microSD memory card with 8 GB. Among the available connectors that appear Audio / Video, a micro-USB cable for TV connection. There is Bluetooth version 2.0. SMS and MMS are supported.

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music – the integrated camera

This new Nokia not only provides resources musical, but also stands for the quality of your camera. This fact has a resolution of good considering the equipment of a mobile phone: reaches 2048×1536 pixels for each image, corresponding to 3.2 Megapixel sensor resolution. It uses Carl Zeiss optics then combined with a digital zoom 3 image magnification. Do not miss dual LED flash and autofocus features. The format in which images are stored in memory is the classic JPG compressed. Nokia 5800 Xpress Music also supports video recording at 640×480 pixels and 30 fps with 4x zoom video, and has a front camera for video calls.

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music final verdict

In spite of belonging to the Xpress Music range, the new Nokia 5800 phone also found many strengths and, of course, the potential of music playback. The first model in fact offers a well-LCD 3.2 inch diagonal, with touchscreen control and image display in 16:9 format. The surround sound is kind and there is an effective media player. In addition, the potential of video and photography, as expressed in the presence of a 3.2-megapixel digital camera with 3x zoom, Carl Zeiss optics and autofocus. Among other features there are A-GPS with Nokia Maps integrated, internal memory of 81 MB expandable with microSD card 8 GB already included, the HSDPA 3.6 Mbps.

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music user review

The new jewel of Nokia house, a good smart-phone … in all senses! The Nokia 5800 XpressMusic is a phone with infinite capacity.
It is presented in its colored package with a set of quality accessories such as:

• USB data cable high-speed
• High quality stereo headphones
• Support base Desk
• Plectrum
• Touch Screen
• Pen at the back of the cover interlocking, very useful for writing text messages and browse the Web
• Replacement Reserve
• Micro SD Memory Card 8GB”’ of memory to play all your favorite music and view high definition video as well as install useful software on”’Symbian S60”’, all in one device.

It’s a real computer at your fingertips (Size: 111 x 51.7 x 15.5 mm) thin but not very compact and very easy and fun to use, even to touch!
This latest phone is aimed at kids of all ages and is popular with lovers of good music and surf the Internet via Wi-Fi. In fact, “mom” with the new Nokia 5800 XpressMusic all the features necessary to envy to any other phone!

Starting with the 3.2 megapixel camera with flash and Carl Zeiss optics which allows you to take pictures at the highest level of detail, continuing with the wonderful music player (hence the name XpressMusic) with dedicated chip, a sound quality never heard before and a great software for browsing the music library divided by artist, album, genre, year, etc. etc..
The device has two powerful micro stereo speakers, the sound quality will amaze you and you will not be looking for long when the phone rings, the power of speakers is amazing!
How Not to mention integrated GPS antenna? With the installation of a satellite navigation software (I personally I recommend the Garmin Mobile XT maps aggiurnate to 2010), this handheld turns into a great navigation system can lead to the best and as quickly as our destinations preferred. Last but not least Touch screen 16.7 million colors, ideal for viewing photos and video but no multitouch (as the screen or iPod Touch) then there is the possibility of tapping the screen, in two different parts, when you try to do the phone will not be incorporating the input properly.
Very useful and practical is the media bar that appears on the screen of the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic touching the appropriate button located nall’angolo upper right corner of the screen, this will allow us to quickly access the major functions of mobile multimedia (web browsing, music player , media player, radio, picture viewing, etc.)
Remains a cell made and finished for those who love technology.
Personally, the only flaw I found in this device is the “touch of boredom, because the beauty and emotion of touching the screen and see beneath our fingers execute commands goes gradually losing the use of this quitidiano phone, especially the practicality of physical key makes its absence in writing SMS.
But this does not mean there not recommend to buy the Nokia 5800 XpressMusic!
Finally, I believe that this phone has nothing to envy the expensive Nokia N97, it is virtually identical statute and all (the software is identical, the only difference is the presence of the physical keyboard found in the Nokia N97 and absent in the model described) .
Now you can download new applications daily fresh dall’OVI Store, even if the games and applications in general are not as beautiful as the iPhone or iPod Touch, but I think that Nokia is giving a lot to do to a direct competitor in terms of applications App Store’s “world’s most famous apple.”

Nokia 5800 Xpress Music video review

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Mini version of the popular Finnish cell phone manufacturer Nokia N97 presented for design and performance follows the model referred to. He has particular aesthetic, with adjustable mechanism of side-scrolling action to reveal the presence of a Qwerty keyboard below. The integrated digital camera has a resolution of 5 megapixels.

Nokia N97 Mini Main features: network, display and power

The element that strongly characterizes the aesthetic and also the performance of the new Nokia N97 Mini is without doubt the display. This monitor requires the presence of control Touch Sensitive Touchscreen version, and may extend up to the diagonal of 3.2 inches. Moreover, the termination offer is level with 640×360 pixel display. The monitor can support up to 16.7 million colors, brightness control, orientation and proximity sensors, ambient light detector. Nokia N97 Mini proposes using the lithium battery 1200 mAh BL-4D, range up to 320 hours standby and up to 430 minutes talk time. And ‘connections with 3G, including HSDPA at speeds up to 3.6 Mbps, UMTS, in addition to more traditional GPRS and EDGE Quad Band GSM and operational effectiveness. Wi-Fi and Bluetooth technologies there.

Nokia N97 Mini – design

Echoing the aesthetic features of the N97 model which is based on a stronger variant of the Nokia N97 phone call Mini takes the same design features, notably in one respect: the presence of the tilting mechanism of sliding. The original data is the fact that the slide is laterally and vertically as often happens. The right hand side of the body, one below, so you go to reveal a full QWERTY keyboard. Nokia N97 Mini is therefore still included in the type of sliding design, but has a structure quite atypical compared to standard devices with these features. To be penalized is the weight, really huge, the unit of 138 grams. With a total volume of 75 cc, Nokia N97 Mini has a combined thickness of 14.3 mm at a height of 113 mm and a width of 52.5 mm.

Nokia N97 Mini Main functions, personalization and entertainment

In addition to traditional-style messaging, including MMS multimedia appear as adjuncts to SMS text, Mini Nokia N97 allows you to manage email with SMTP, POP3 and IMAP4, with attachments in. Doc,. Xls,. ppt and. pdf among others. Do not miss the envelope also integrated A-GPS satellite receiver, with both the presence of Nokia Maps for mapping. Excellent is the phone’s internal memory, which amounts to 8 GB, and can be expanded up to a value three times (24 GB) using external microSD card. Do not miss the USB 2.0 high-speed access. Musically speaking, there are an MP3 player compatible with WMA and AAC, and a stereo FM radio with RDS support. The games are also used with integrated touch screen control on the wide screen. Headsets and supplied video cable.

Nokia N97 Mini – The integrated camera

Another very interesting resource attributable to Nokia N97 Mini is definitely the camera. Just a data to determine the high quality of this device: the 5 Megapixel resolution achieved by the image sensor integrated. The lens is then type Carl Zeiss zoom and digital zoom even reaches 14. Do not miss autofocus and dual LED flash, plus a secondary camera for video-type VGA. The images are saved in JPG format with a maximum size of 2584×1938 pixels displayed. The camera feature is not lacking, with video capture at up to 30 frames per second, lasting up to 90 minutes and definition VGA display even in 16:9 widescreen. White balance settings and scenery changed.

Nokia N97 Mini – Final Verdict

The presence of the screen tilt and a lateral sliding mechanism to reveal a Qwerty keyboard is a beauty treatment that makes it virtually unique offering of Nokia N97 Mini variant of the popular N97 presented in 2009. The other peculiarity is the presence of a display with touchscreen control of the 3.2-inch diagonal well. The model is well equipped and excellent in all aspects considered. By connections with support for HSDPA and maximum operating speed of 3.6 Mbps, the photo quality of the integrated device, with up to 5 Megapixel digital image magnification and 14 to reach the musical resources (media player and FM radio). The less positive is nell’ingombro apparatus and its weight of 138 grams. Finally, there are even technologies Bluetooth and Wi-Fi for wireless use.

Nokia N97 Mini – User review

Hello guys wanted to write my impression about this phone!
The Nokia N97 is in my opinion a mini phone with great potential because it is truly complete!
And ‘release a few months after the N97 and was immediately bought by many people who were fascinated by the “big brother” but maybe they had not purchased because they thought it too big.
So then the Finnish house has been satisfied with these people through the mini Nokia N97 smartphone may have a unique and not too much space!

As I said before is a phone for those who do not want to miss anything!
But we see the features to highlight!

• GPS and A-GPS: Includes dual GPS receiver. The first is what we all already knew this because already in other phones, the second or the A-GPS (Assisted GPS) has recently installed on phones that are coming out more quickly and allows you to locate the first GPS signal.
• GPS navigation via the Nokia Maps application you can charge your phone through the site. To use the service navigation need to buy licenses.
• 5Megapixel camera with auto focus and double flash! I think it’s a perfect camera for a phone! Sharp pictures and high quality!
• Operating system: Symbian OS version 9.4 (S60 fifth edition)
• 8GB internal memory can be expanded via a micro SD card up to 16GB
• Connectivity: Bluetooth 2.0 and Wi-Fi
• Sending messages is easy thanks to the touchscreen that the pull-out keyboard.

Again I stress the importance have sheep on his mobile phone store. Through this application you can easily download many applications and lots of games quickly directly from the phone without using a PC!

Guys finally I recommend you buy this phone if you really need to buy one because it is a really good phone!

Nokia N97 Mini video review

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While Nokia makes a habit of practically defining “featurephone” for the industry, traditionally it’s handsets like the N95 that hog all the spotlight, leaving Nokia’s few QWERTY phones in the shadows. Not that they’ve been trying too hard — while the E62 and E61i have both shipped over here, neither has featured 3G data in US bands, and the E62 even had the distinct pleasure of having WiFi stripped out. Enter E71, the successor to those phones, and Nokia’s very first QWERTY device to feature US-friendly 3G.

Nokia is also (finally) taking form factor much more seriously: at 10mm thick, the E71 is one of the slimmest Nokia phones to date, and Nokia claims it’s the thinnest QWERTY smartphone on the market. The E71 also attacks the drab, plastic looks of its predecessors with chrome accents and a glossy screen. The phone is incredibly pocketable, and comfortable to hold and use. Of course, with the smaller size Nokia had to cut down on screen real estate and keyboard spacing, but at a QVGA resolution there’s little suffering on that front. The keyboard had a much more rigid, clicky feel to it compared to the spongy keys of the E62, and we were virtually typo-free on it within minutes.

Nokia E71 – Design

This U.S version of the unlocked Nokia E71 can be used with a GSM network service provider and it provides quad-band connectivity (850 MHz, 900 MHz, 1800 MHz, 1900 MHz). It does not come with a SIM card, and it requires that you provide a SIM card for usage with your selected service provider. This phone comes with a full manufacturer’s warranty.

Additionally, this phone can be paired with 850/1900 MHz UMTS/HSDPA 3G networks in the United States. When paired with a compatible 3G network, you’ll enjoy a high-speed connection offering a variety of feature-rich wireless services–from data connectivity to your office to multimedia streaming, and take advantage of simultaneous voice and data services. In areas in the U.S. not served by a 3G network or in foreign territories, you’ll continue to receive data service via EDGE network (depending on network compatibility).

Nokia E71 – Phone Features

With a stainless steel case, etched graphics, and cool metallic finish, the Nokia E71 is as stylish as it is functional. It’s complemented by a 2.4-inch LCD screen with a 320 x 240-pixel resolution and support for 16 million colors. The full QWERTY keyboard makes it easy to compose and respond to email with just one hand. It features intelligent input with auto-completion, auto-correction, and learning capability for fast and error-free typing. The E71 also offers two customizable Home Screen views with active stand-by plug-ins and application shortcuts for fast and easy switching betweenbusiness and personal modes. This phone has a 110 MB internal memory, which can be expanded via optional MicroSD memory cards (up to 8 GB in size).

The Nokia E71 comes fully equipped for easy-to-install and easy-to-use professional and personal email. People who use Microsoft Exchange at work can access their email using the Mail for Exchange mobile email client, which comes pre-loaded. You’ll enjoy reliable real-time access to your email, calendar, contacts and tasks, as well as be able to download attachments like Word, Excel, Powerpoint or PDF files directly to the device.

The Nokia E71 also supports email accounts from more than a thousand internet service providers (ISPs) around the world, as well as Gmail, Yahoo! mail and Hotmail. Additionally, it supports the Nokia Intellisync Wireless Email solution as well as third party email solutions like System Seven and Visto Mobile.

In addition to serving entrepreneurs and smaller businesses, the Nokia E71 comes fully equipped with a robust suite of enterprise grade features, including a built-in encryption functionality for both the device memory and for the memory card. The phone also includes integrated mobile VPN support that gives mobile professionals access to their company intranet, and device lock and wipe to protect corporate information.

This phone provides Bluetooth version 2.0 wireless connectivity with EDR (enhanced data rate), and includes profiles for communication headset, handsfree car kits, and sharing of contacts and calendar events. With the A2DP Bluetooth profile, you can stream your music to a pair of compatible Bluetooth stereo headphones.

The 3.2-megapixel camera offers a wealth of high-end photography features, including autofocus, a digital zoom, LED flash, white balance modes, center-weighted auto exposure, multiple scene modes, and a self timer. The phone’s main camera can also capture video clips up to 320 x 240 pixels (at 15 frames per second) at up to 1 hour in length, and it offers several adjustments including scene and white balance. Additionally, the E71 has a secondary, lower resolution camera on the front (QCIF resolution, 128 x 96) that can be used for making video calls (requires compatible network).

Take your media with you when you’re out on the go. With the built-in RealPlayer software, you can stream and download your favorite content onto the phone, giving you access to the latest news, sports, and entertainment updates. Or sync up with your PC and play the music and movies stored on your hard drive. It’s compatible with a wide variety of digital audio formats (including MP3, AAC/AAC+/eAAC+, abd WMA). You can listen to your favorite radio programs via the integrated FM radio, and the Visual Radio feature lets you see information about songs or artists.

View web pages as they were originally intended with the integrated Nokia Web Browser, which enables you to zoom out to a full screen view of the entire page using the Mini Map feature. Find the section you want and then zoom in to the content you need. The text instantly adjusts to the size of your screen. The browser also keeps a history of your browsing so you can quickly get back to where you started.

The integrated A-GPS and preinstalled Nokia Maps help you explore and locate new places, whether in another country or just around the corner. With access to more than 15 million points of interest, you can locate and navigate to the most interesting sights, bars or restaurants wherever you are. You can also send map excerpts and routes to friends by MMS or save map screen shots to the gallery.

Nokia E71 – Key features:

• Quad-band GSM support
• 3G with HSDPA 3.6Mbps support
• Landscape 2.36″ 16M color display of QVGA resolution
• Comfortable full QWERTY keypad
• Convenient business-minded shortcut keys
• Symbian 9.2 OS, S60 UI with FP1 (topped with some FP2 goodies)
• 369 MHz ARM 11 CPU and 128 MB of SDRAM
• Wi-Fi
• Built-in GPS receiver, A-GPS
• 3.15 megapixel auto focus camera with LED flash
• 110 MB of internal memory, microSD expansion, ships with a 2GB card
• Slimmest smartphone to-date, slimmest Wi-Fi and/or GPS handset to-date
• Stainless steel casing
• Standard 2.5mm audio jack
• Bluetooth v2.0 with A2DP support
• microUSB v2.0
• FM radio
• Remote Wipe
• Provider-independent VoIP support
• Infrared port
• Great battery life
• Office document editor
• User-friendly Mode Switch for swapping two homescreen setups
• Rich retail package

Nokia E71 – Main disadvantages:

• Below average camera performance
• Video recording maxes out at QVGA@15fps
• No dedicated camera key
• Smaller display than its predecessor
• Cheap-looking power key
• No RDS for the FM radio

Nokia E71 – Built for Messaging, Inside and Out

Enjoy full access to business and personal email, even when you’re away from your desk. Nokia E71 includes an improved email application that offers impressive new features and reduces the number of clicks needed to perform common tasks. The Nokia E71 includes an enhanced email setup Wizard that helps configure your email accounts. You can set up most popular Internet email (IMAP/POP protocols) accounts in just a few clicks. Business email (e.g., Mail for Exchange) can also be set up if additional details are entered.

Nokia E71 – Home Screen

Keep the information and features that are important to you at your fingertips. You can define two separate Home screens for different purposes, such as one Home screen for work and another for free time. Your personal Home screen can contain shortcuts to leisure features such as your personal email, FM radio, MP3 player, and camera. To change from one home screen to another, scroll to the Switch Mode shortcut and press the scroll key.

There are three different areas on the Home screen: an application area that provides shortcuts to your favorite applications, an information area that lets you know about events such as upcoming calendar entries, and a notification area that alerts you to events such as missed calls.

Nokia E71 – User review

As the first phone to run on the US 3G network (and in some areas even faster 3.5 G), I was wondering how well this would work as a modem for my laptop for accessing the internet.

Guess what? I’m using this regularly now to connect my macbook to the internet! I’m giving up my mobile aircard (which costs about $ 70 per month) and I’m just using my unlimited mobile internet. Another positive – no need to take out the usb aircard dongle and insert it into the side of the laptop each time I need to use it!

The connection is fast enough to download video and music (you tube etc. will work fine both on the phone and the tethered mac) but the phone gets hot when it’s used as a modem. It also uses a lot of power so for long time use as a modem, I’d keep it plugged into the charger.

Joikuspot is the software I used ($ 25 for a perpetual license) to tether my phone to the macbook so I can use internet.

I’m happy that MS office comes built in. I’m able to import my financial worksheets (even big ones where I do financial modelling) and it still works fast.
Fring works well on these phone – much better than on the Nokia N95. With Fring and my Skype call-out account, I can carry on telephone conversations with almost as much clarity as using my skype on the laptop. In the N95 (which is also a great cellphone), the processor isn’t fast enough to allow phone conversations – the voice quality is so degraded that it’s barely understandable. Apparently, Nokia placed a very powerful processor in this machine.

And since it has a fast processor, all the applications open almost instantly and my cousin, a Blackberry curve user was so impressed with the speed he said it’s the next phone he’ll get.

Another excellent software I like using with this phone is my Salling Clicker. I use it for remotely controlling itunes in my laptop (like when there’s a party and I was to change albums or artists from my phone) or clicking to the next slide in my powerpoint presentation or fast forwarding my DVD player to the next chapter.

This is a lot of technology for the money and I highly recommend it to everyone!

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The Palm Pre is not just a phone, it’s a myth, an idea, possibly a legacy… and a really, really long time coming. It’s almost impossible to believe, but the crew at Engadget has been talking about a Linux-based Palm phone since way back in 2004. Through the now-distant years that followed, we were speculating, pontificating, and wishfully-thinking about a new device from a company that we’d come to expect innovation from.

That’s not to say that the phone isn’t good, because it is. The software has quite a few interesting innovations that push the concepts of what people can do with smartphones, like Google Android when it debuted—only better. The market needs this. The industry needs this. We need this. But the hardware? Cheap. Flimsy. Dangerous even.

I’ve used the Pre as my main device for a week, forwarding my number through Google Voice so I could see what it was like living with it. I was able to pull my contacts from Facebook and Google into the phone quite easily, despite the Pre not supporting syncing to OS X Address Book, so it was a near-seamless transition. Sprint reception is unfortunately bad enough at my house to give me horrible voice quality, but not bad enough to drop calls.

THE HARDWARE

Screen

It’s the best multitouch screen we’ve seen yet. Pre’s screen is smaller than both the iPhone and the G2’s, but has the same 320×480 resolution that equals both, which means the pixels are just more compact. Watching the Dark Knight on both phones showed that the Pre was just slightly crisper, and just slightly nicer than on the iPhone. Though, you probably wouldn’t be able to tell unless you had each side by side. It’s like the difference between a $2,500 TV and a $2,000 TV. Unless you had both in your living room or looked at them one after the other, you couldn’t see a difference.

The black bezel also provides a great contrast to the screen, bordering it with an eye-soothing darkness that makes images pop that much more. At maximum brightness, it doesn’t seem as bright as the iPhone, but is bright enough to be just fine under the sun. The glossy finish makes it slightly harder to see if you’re worried about glare, however. In everyday indoor use, the screen is a tiny bit bluer in color temperature than the iPhone’s—either not something you’d notice or a matter of preference.

But the multitouch! I can’t tell if it’s because there’s a better CPU backing it up, or a better digitizer, or if it’s just better software, but the touch is more accurate, more responsive and just plain better than the iPhone’s. The invention of a ripple effect where you press the screen is genius, and goes partway to solving the chronic problem of passive feedback—whether or not the OS knows you’ve pressed the screen. I say partway, since the phone occasionally still doesn’t register your clicks, even when the ripple appears.

Screen is bright, bezel provides great contrast and overall holds up nicely to the iPhone

Body and Build

The first thing you’ll notice as you slide open the Pre is the absurdly sharp ridge digging against your palm. Nowhere—not on the iPhone, the G1, the G2 or any of HTC’s other smartphones—has a phone been so threatening to the integrity of my skin. If you’re pushing up screen from the bottom of the phone, as you’d instinctively want to do, prepare to get sliced. It’s just that irresponsibly sharp.

To be fair, Palm instructs you to open the phone by placing your thumb on the screen itself and pushing up. Fantastic plan, except for the fact that it’s a touchscreen and by placing your thumb on the screen you’re actually moving stuff around. It’s a kluge; a solution thought of after the fact to salvage a horrible hardware design decision. Even if you do things Palm’s way, the top manages to catch occasionally while sliding open, especially if you’re pushing slightly above or below the middle of the phone.

The rest of the body, thankfully, is not nearly as bad. But it’s also not spectacular. The two halves of the device come together fairly tightly, but not tightly enough to prevent you from being able to twist the top and bottom like a plastic Oreo cookie. It’s one of those small things that are inconsequential, but extremely annoying to people who own the phone—like the back battery cover requiring you to pry off three different points in order to get it off. Or the microUSB connector cover that takes fingernails and a blatant disregard for having a permanent hole in the side of your phone in order to remove it.

Despite these issues, while closed, the phone feels just right in your hand. It’s thicker than the iPhone, but rounded like a polished stone and shorter than you’d expect. If Palm had just been able to make the Pre feel and look less plasticky, the closed-state exterior would be almost perfect.

Keyboard

Since this is a Palm phone, and since it’s introducing the rarely-seen portrait slider configuration, the keyboard has been a subject of tremendous debate. Well, we can put your mind at ease folks — it’s actually pretty good. Now, we won’t lie, it’s not quite the barnstormer of the Bold or Treo 650, but it is a very, very solid typing experience nonetheless. The keys — made of a similar rubbery material which the Treo Pro and Centros use — have a surprising amount of depth given their location, and they’re actually somewhat clicky (a surprise to us). Spacing between keys is ample, but we wouldn’t say generous — though in general getting accustomed to typing on the Pre wasn’t too painful. Our biggest gripe is actually with the software, which omits some no-brainers like double-tap spacebar for periods (though in the phone’s defense, it does have a dedicated period key). Auto-correction is in effect here, fixing your lowercase i’s, un-apostrophe’d contractions, and the occasional misspelling, but it pales in comparison to the iPhone’s intelligent input recognition. We’re not quite as fast with the physical keyboard as we’d like to be, but we count our major gaffes or mistypes in the dozens on the Pre — a number easily eclipsed when using one of its virtual siblings.

If you’re worried about copy and paste, by the way, have no fear. Palm has certainly included it here, and simplified the process by employing the gesture area and keyboard for shortcuts. To move your cursor in a text field, you hold down the orange key and swipe in four directions to navigate. To select, you use the same technique, but hold down the shift key instead. Cutting, copying, and pasting are handled via combos of placing a thumb or finger on the gesture area and tapping X, C, or V.

Battery Life

We didn’t have the time or the resources (like multiple users) to put the Pre through the kind of lengthy, hard-hitting, take-no-prisoners battery testing some of you might want, but we did have a chance to use this as we would our own device for a pretty good run of days (we’ll likely do a follow-up post with harder numbers for specific tasks, like media playback).

In terms of real-world use, the Pre battery situation is good, not great — though we think that you can (mostly) put your Apple-inspired fear of background processes to bed.

During heavy use — phone on all the time, browser testing, media playing, lots of conversations — we could make it about three quarters of the way through a day without having to plug in. We weren’t over the moon with how quickly we noticed the numbers dipping, but we also weren’t completely surprised. Compared with the G1 (and we’re talking 1.5 here), we’d say the Pre does a tiny bit better (or very close) on battery life — but if you’re a heavy talker or plan on running media on this all day long, you’ll be reaching for the charger (or second battery) come dinnertime.

Still, for the battery size (1150 mAh) and amount of data being pushed, it didn’t seem like the phone was performing unreasonably, and we don’t knock the fact that you can snag a second (or third!) battery if you know you’re going to push it. During the more conservative days — which we think reflect the kind of moderate use we put our phones through — battery life declined much less noticeably from morning till night. We’ll be keeping our eyes peeled for third-party options with more juice, but the brick in the box isn’t too shabby at all, especially given our expectations.

Camera

Look, we’re just going to say it: we love the Pre’s camera. There are two things happening here that make it lovable. First, it’s 3.2 megapixels, which makes it at least competitive with its contemporaries. Second, Palm has done something totally radical in webOS — they’ve made it so the image processing is backloaded when you’re shooting. What that means is that you can snap away without having to sit through the shutter lag you’re probably used to, allowing you to actually use the thing like a real camera. Furthermore, the image quality we saw was more than sufficient for on-the-scene shots, with particular clarity and color in daylight shots, though a surprising amount of definition in low light situations as well. Oh, and did we mention it has a flash?

Of course, Palm doesn’t provide a video option here, which should chafe some folks. Why they decided to leave it off is a mystery to us (we’re going to guess a rush to push this thing out the door before their six months were up), but we’d be surprised if we don’t see video recording come to the device in the future.
Palm Pre camera test

SOFTWARE

Web OS

Here, if I may extend my card metaphor, is where Palm laid down four aces. The OS is really where the Pre shines, and manages to create a coherent internet-based platform that’s even more “connected” than Google Android.

On the whole, the OS is quite pleasant looking—with slick icons, a 5-app launch bar and a three-screen menu system that houses all your applications. The bit of the phone under the screen is a gesture area, which you can use to go back a screen (swipe left) or launch apps from the launch tray (swipe up to the screen). The rest of the gestures are the same as the iPhone’s, except the concept of swiping an app up, off the phone, to close it.

It’s too bad the home screen is so much wasted space. There’s just nothing there except for the five apps on the bottom. Palm’s main idea is to keep that area free; free so you can swipe through the app “cards” of the things you have open, free so you can pull up a Universal Search just by typing, and free so you can open the phone by putting your fat thumb on the screen. But this just means you can only quick-launch five apps from the home screen, forcing you to either go into the launcher (+1 click) or start typing the name of the app you want and hope Universal Search brings it up (+ a bunch of clicks).

There are a few particularly commendable features. The little notification bars on the bottom of the phone for new emails, texts, system actions and song changes are wonderful, and can be dismissed with a swipe. The swipe is also slightly different than on the iPhone, allowing you to just delete list items without having to confirm them. The font they used for emails also seems fat and generous without being overly large, and allows the same five emails to be visible at once as on the iPhone.

Dialing is somewhere where Palm’s reliance on Universal Search becomes an over reliance on Universal Search. To dial a contact, you either have to pull up the contacts app and manually scroll down to the person you want (there’s no alphabet shortcut) or start typing. So, when you have hundreds of contacts, your only reasonable choice is to use the search. There isn’t even a “favorites” screen of any kind; Palm just gives you a retro speed dial feature where you can map numbers to particular keys on the keyboard—a clumsy solution for speed dialing.

Speaking of Universal Search, it does actually work quite well. It’s the same concept as on iPhone 3.0, searching your contacts, apps, Google, Google Maps, Wikipedia and Twitter for whatever you type. Searching is actually faster than the iPhone’s search, but only because it doesn’t also search emails, or calendar entries or your music. So that “Universal” in Universal Search isn’t quite so Universal.

Syncing to Facebook and Google Contacts via Synergy works flawlessly, and merges contacts from both services together so you don’t have duplicates of contacts floating around. A manual merge or a manual split can solve any quirks from this function quite easily. Synergy also combines your SMS and IM conversations into one window, so you can seamlessly text someone and then switch over to IM when he reaches his desk. Synergy’s basically just an easy way to make sure services like Google have your data (Contacts and Calendar) pulled down into your phone automatically.

Facebook and Google sync keeps you connected, but may populate your phones with a bunch of people you don’t actually know

A lot of fuss has been made of the Pre’s ability to multitask, and for good reason. It works. Launching a new app is just a matter of hitting the Center button (the gray button on the front), and opening something from the launcher or the tray. The new app pops up as a new card, pushing your currently running programs to the side. Pressing the Center button again pops up all your cards, which you can then flip through to find the app you want. Sliding the card up, off the screen, closes it.

Opening multiple apps at once really does slow down the phone enough to be noticeable. In fact, if you’re doing something particularly intensive, you’ll actually notice your music stutter, which we’ve never experienced once on the iPhone. Ever. The problem with giving you the ability to open a lot of apps at once means you need to police yourself and close them when they’re not in use. But it’s damn well worth it. Being able to view a PDF, then flipping over to Messaging answer a text, then over to Music to change a song, then over to email to tap out a quickie—that’s computing.

Multitasking works well, but it’s up to you to figure out how many apps your phone can take

It’s interesting that launching apps takes one extra click as you fire up the Launcher, and that the Launcher itself only has three pages of apps to use. It’s better than the one long page that Android has, but not quite as generous as the iPhone’s 9 pages. That one extra tap doesn’t seem like much, but over the course of the two years that you own your phone, that’s many seconds lost with extra taps.

Palm makes one of the first mistakes of UI design by not having text under the icons in the Quick Launch bar, making you guess at what each app is. The good news is that you can swap apps in and out from the launcher, so you probably know what those apps are, since you put them there.

Also, the actual act of launching the app is a little frustrating: When you tap an icon, the launcher disappears and all you see is the home screen, as if you did something wrong. You don’t know whether or not your app has opened successfully until it has. Seeing a totally blank screen or some kind of splash screen come up first before the app is running (like the iPhone, once again) would be a better solution.

The Launcher only has three screens, and requires a lot of scrolling to find your app

The home screen’s Quick Launch only holds five apps, but you can customize them

Music and videos, on the other hand, are handled well. The extra man-hours of getting the Pre to pretend that it’s an iPod for iTunes to sync was well worth it. All the proper files, with their metadata, make it over just fine; playlists too. Videos appear in the Videos app, and your song files can be searched and sorted from inside the Music app. What doesn’t seem to be supported are the ratings or play counts in iTunes. And although you can check the box in iTunes to initiate Calendar/Contact sync with the Pre, they don’t actually make it over to the phone.

So it’s not a perfect implementation. DRM tracks from iTunes aren’t syncable, of course, and you have to leave the Music app open at all times, in the background, for your music to play. That concept seems more than obvious on your PC, but becomes somewhat of an oddity on your phone. You’ll find yourself accidentally closing your Music app more than once.

As for video, it’s essentially what you’d imagine a barebones video player to be, supporting MPEG4, H.263, H.264, MP4, M4V, 3GP, 3GPP, 3G2, and 3GP2—more video codecs than the iPhone (surprise, surprise), but not more than other phones in this class. It does the job, there’s seeking and aspect ratio fitting, but it’s nothing special.

If Palm continues to ensure iTunes syncing capability, it’ll ease the transition for people with large iTunes libraries.

App rundown:

• Google Maps is actually better on the Pre than it is on the iPhone, loading blocks and scrolling around being much smoother than we’re used to
• Sprint Navigator (by TeleNav) is an excellent port of the same program you see in other phones—the GPS works smoothly, like in the Google Maps
• Doc View and PDF view are capable enough PDF and Word viewers
• There’s an alarm clock, but no stopwatch or world clock; you can download a Weather app from the App Catalog
• The photo viewer works the same as the iPhone’s, with swiping gestures, and can upload directly to your Facebook account
• The browser works off the latest WebKit build, and is fast and snappy; it should be about as good as iPhone 3.0’s browser, since they both use WebKit
• Backup works much like Microsoft’s My Phone, storing your contacts, calendar and tasks, as well as app and system settings on your Palm profile; it comes with the phone, and is useful if you ever have to wipe or replace a lost phone
• YouTube quality is just as good as any other phone, even if it does seem to take slightly longer to bring up videos on the Pre

The App Catalog is pretty bare at launch, with Pandora, Sudoku, Accuweather, AP/NYT, the Classic Palm OS emulator, Connect 4, Spaz (Twitter client), Tweed (another Twitter client), a Stocks app and some various other utilities. Their respective download screens have ample information, including links to the developer’s home page and support pages, as well as ratings and reviews. Once downloaded, the apps behave like any other native apps on the Pre, and can be multitasked just fine.

All the apps in the catalog now are made by developers with a closer association with Palm, so they get access to the native libraries. Why haven’t they opened up the SDK and allowed everyone to use native libraries instead of just web tech like HTML/Javascript? I don’t know. When it comes down to apps, lack of open SDK is why the Pre is currently inferior to the iPhone or Android. Under this plan, we’ll get a small percentage of good, solid apps, and a bunch of apps that aren’t living up to their potential.

The App Catalog has a handful of decent apps already, but the fact that Palm is singling out only trusted developers to write software for the Pre isn’t a great sign

Now for the miscellaneous complaints. The lack of a D-Pad on the phone forces you to always tap where you want, even when the list item is just one notch lower than the one currently selected. Copying and pasting only works in text fields where you can write, not when reading emails or SMS or web pages.

Pro:Impressive start to an OS that should form the base of some quality phones in the future

Con:Hardware quality is lacking, and feels flimsy and plasticky compared to the G1, G2 and the iPhone

VERDICT

Think of it like this. The software is agile, smart and capable. The hardware, on the other hand, is a liability. If Palm can get someone else to design and build their hardware—someone who has hands and can feel what a phone is like when physically used, that phone might just be one of the best phones on the market.

I’m bored of the iPhone. The core functionality and design have remained the same for the last two years, and since 3.0 is just more of the same, and—barring some kind of June surprise—that’s another year of the same old icons and swiping and pinching. It’s time for something different. The Pre may have hardware that’s worse than the G1/G2, but the whole package—the software and the hardware—isn’t bad. It’s good. It’s different. That’s something we can get behind. I can’t wait to see what Palm gets dealt in their next hand.

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