Slashdot Mirror
Treo 700w Review
bart_scriv writes "Business Week has a review of Palm's Treo 700w (the first Palm device to run Windows). Aside from network performance, the reviewer was fairly disappointed. From the article: 'The best Windows Mobile device ever, but a cut below Palm's 650."
Reviews Without Fullpage Advertisements
Religion for nerds. Stuff that really matters
It won't. It'll support lots of resolutions, but apparently 320x320 is not one of them.
Also, the 240x240 screen size isn't a limitation of Windows Mobile; there are WM devices with 640x480 and 320x240 screens.
Yes, but all of Palm's hardware is set for a square(1:1) aspect ratio, and WM only supports 240x240, not the 320x320 of the PalmOS Treos
The 650 is probably an 3/5 star phone, but as a pda it's very impressive. Because of the abundance of third party apps, the ease of syncing (works flawlessly with the open, and easy to program for pilot-link), and the openness of the Palm platform (relative to Windows Mobile at least), ensures that I won't ever let anyone else at my company buy a Treo 700 until the "p" version comes out.
If you need a pda, and a phone, and have to integrate the syncronization with your ERP or CRM applications, Palm or Linux phones are the only way to go. If it crashes, complain to tech support, flash newer firmware, repeat. Much easier than trying to get Microsoft to fix windows.
><));>
While most of your comments are true, you do ignore one glaring detail: Opera is available for the Treo.
Palm has provided the necessary Java runtime environment free of charge to 650 users (and $5.99 for others). Once downloaded, you can run Opera or Kmaps (an excellent Java app that downloads data from Google Local and even gets the scrolling part down well) or any other Java app compiled for Palm OS. I use both routinely on my Treo 600 and get pretty decent performance out of Opera. With a GPRS connection no less!
(While I agree that the first generation 650s froze often, those issues have been fixed with firmware updates. This doesn't excuse the initial lock-ups, but it's not a fault of Palm OS necessarily, just as 240x240 is not necessarily a fault of Windows Mobile (although the lack of 320x320 is)).
Per Square Mile, a blog about density
This is a bit of a misstatement. With GPS, your receiver works out your distance from each satellite, the satellites tell it where they are (ephemeris), and your receiver works out from that information where you are. But the satellites do not know where you are, which is what tracking would seem to imply. Receivers are passive.
On my Audiovox PPC-4100 PocketPC phone, I run numerous third party PocketPC applications that won't work properly on the Treo 700w. I can't live without these apps, especially when I travel.
You can get slashdot with AvantGo, you just have to set it up as an rss feed on AvantGo's website, it works fine.
I've looked at them all and here are a few comments. Note that I moved to a XVT6700 but did look at the Treo.
- I had a Danger, and it was a wonderful device. They have done a terrific job of engineering for ease of use and connectivity. However, it is a closed system so you can not find the applications you might want / need. They also have a terrible sync program from Intellisync. No auto operation, full of bugs, etc.
- I looked at the Treo 700, but the keyboard is just too tiny. After the Danger it is a real step back.
- Got the XVT6700. Pretty good keyboard, EVDO, WiFi, etc.
- I've used various Windows CE devices for 5 years. Windows Mobile 5 is better, but still needs work. Not ready for one handed operation and they should definitely improve the apps for phone, today screen, etc. It is amazing how slow MS moves this OS and how slow the OEMs are to get updates out. MS really needs to get a group of users in a room and LISTEN to them. Having said that, I understand that such devices will always represent a large number of compromises between size, battery life, etc. In the end, I find it is pretty good, has great Exchange/Outlook integration, lets me work on Excel, Word docs and view presentations. I have gripes but am OK with the device.
- MS doesn't have a JVM, but there is one from IBM and it provides a MIDP2 environment. I am running Google Local Mobile using it.
- EVDO is awesome. I am actually on my laptop connected to the Internet using my 6700 as a modem. Can not tell the difference between this and most hotel "high speed" connections. On the device, I am not afraid to download 4 Mb files, because they get there quickly. I typically see 400Kbps - 600Kbps.
- These devices are NOT for everyone, but if you are a business user and travel a lot, they can be a life saver. I can now make many trips without a laptop.