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Palm Announces Killer New Phone
Barence writes "At CES, Palm announced what promises to be the product that finally matches and even betters the Apple iPhone, and certainly looks to be the most important product announced at this year's Consumer Electronics Show. It's called the Palm Pre and it's based on a completely new operating system, called Palm webOS. Its key specs include a 3.1in 320x 480 touchscreen, 8GB of storage, UMTS HDSPA support (in the UK version of the phone), 802.11b/g WLAN, Bluetooth, and GPS. It also includes a slide-out Qwerty keyboard, 3.5mm headphone jack, and what Palm described as the 'fastest ever' Texas Instruments OMAP processor."
Who said it was an iPhone killer? In terms of hardware, the phone is very nice - the OMAP 3430 is much nicer than the iPhone chip, and supports OpenGL ES 2 (the iPhone only supports 1.1). In terms of software, who knows. The preview sounds promising, but I doubt Palm have as nice developer tools as Apple, although they may well have a less hostile set of T&Cs for using them.
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I am in full agreement. Sure, the Iphone is a nice phone, but it's just one of many. To be fair, the fault is with PC Pro rather than Slashdot who are just quoting this nonsensical statement ("finally matches and even betters the Apple iPhone").
Although in a way, it's a cunning statement - whilst fans would want to accept PC Pro's belief that the Iphone is the Best Phone Ever, they can't agree with this statement without admitting that the Palm is better than the Iphone. For the rest of us, who have been using phones long before the Iphone joined the market late, we'll just ignore the statement and judge the Palm against the market as a whole.
The OS is the only real potential gamechanger here, and I'm not so sure about it. Engadget( http://www.engadget.com/2009/01/08/palm-announces-web-os-platform/ ) claims that WebOS is designed to be simple for programmers and is based on HTML, XML, and CSS. Don't know about you, but I just can't wait for another feature limited mobile OS. Also, the prospect of a data breach on an OS designed around a write-up language and online functionality ruins my day.
I absolutely loved my Palm Pilot Pro and gladly paid for the Palm III upgrade module for it. I eagerly bought a Palm V but I was disappointed when I got a Tungsten E and even more disappointed to discover that the 802.11 add in card simply wouldn't work with the Tungsten E.
My Palm TX is a huge disappointment and I would have returned it (or never bought it in the first place) except that I have a major need for one specific specialized application that uses 802.11.
I've heard awful things from people with Palm based phones.
Palm has bungled one generation after another. I've just lost any confidence in them being able to do anything competent.
After purchasing two of Palm's high end smart phones in the past, I've learned my lesson. They *DO NOT* support their phones. As soon as there's even an idea of a newer phone coming out, they drop all support for existing platforms and no more updates are ever seen for yours.
For example, they're currently releasing updates for the Centro series (a $99 phone) but not their 750series (a $500 phone) that are just over a year old. Way to reward your business customers palm.
The road between democracy and tyranny is paved with secrecy in the name of security.
Funny, when Apple announced that you could develop on the iPhone with CSS, HTML, and JavaScript from day 1, developers revolted and demanded a "real" SDK. It will be interesting to see how that goes for Palm.
E pluribus unum
I would agree with you, only that I have a G1 now. The only thing the kept me from getting one before was the poor appearance from pictures. On daily use, however, I've found the build quality and the hardware itself is good and not toy-ish at all. If it came with a glossy black front and a chrome back then it would be even better, but you have to consider the number people putting rubber gimp masks on their iPhone to protect their little precious from getting hurt, so what's the point?
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My prediction is that Android will not kill the iPhone for some time. Partly because the dev tools aren't as polished as Apples but to be honest as a potential developer myself, the toolset is less important than the API's. Unfortunately the Android API's are an area that seems somewhat deficient in a number of places (real-time low latency PCM audio anyone - how can something so fundamental have been so badly done?!). Anyone wanting to write any half-way serious game or audio based app is stuck using a shitty "send-this-file-to-the-output" style API.
There are other areas too where Apple just seem to have put a lot more thought into how things hang together - it's like the API's for the iPhone have been developed by people who have their usability as a prime concern, which sadly, with what I've seen so far, I can't say for Android.
Geez. Get over yourself. Objective-C isn't that difficult to get your head around if you've done any Java/C++/Smalltalk/Ruby/other OO development. They have some pretty good reasons for using it (the underlying OS uses it), and the tools and documentation that they give you to work with it (XCode/apple developer site) are excellent. As someone who develops software for a living (in Java) I'd be *THRILLED* if the docs that I had to work with from vendors that we deal with were a quarter as good as Apple's.
As for having to buy a Mac - do you think it's possible to develop for windows mobile without having a windows-based PC? I can totally understand Apple's point-of-view here - their time would be much better spent making the tools work, and work well rather than porting them to and testing them on other platforms.
Oops -- potential huge fail!
From Ars (emphasis mine):
It's apparent that this radical shift in platform will mean that all existing Palm applications will be rendered obsolete. During the presentation this morning, it was said, "There are a few hundred-thousand Palm developers and a few million web developers." If there was a dark spot during the launch it would be this, but it's definitely not going to extinguish the excitement felt on the floor for this handset.
"Good news, everyone!"
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"let alone have a chance at even guessing the specs?"
Exactly right!
I used to sell cars. Cars and computers are often similar in how they are sold. Take a look at a window sticker of a new car, and see all the "options" and "Upgrades" listed. Computers are marketed the same exact way ... "ATI VIDEO UPGRADE" is the same as "Alpine Stereo" or whatever, it is better than what the "stock" option is.
However, I'd compare Apple vs Dell/HP/Gateway etc as comparing Honda vs GM/Ford/Chrysler.
Honda sells Accords, there are only a few ways one can get an Accord. They have Two engines, three trim models. Their sticker is empty compared to a Taurus or whatever. Taurus has three engine options and who knows how many trim levels, and beyond trim levels you have all sorts of weird option packages and upgrades.
The limited choice of Apple and Honda are part of what makes it a GOOD choice, it is a very known quantity. If you say you have a MacBook Pro, people know you have one of a couple of options. It really is narrowed down. You say you have a Pavillion, I doubt you could get anyone to guess the specs.
The difference is differentiation by Experience (Honda/Apple) vs Differentiation by Spec (HP/FORD)
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