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Palm Is Back With a Mini Companion Android Phone That's Exclusive To Verizon (droid-life.com)
A couple months ago, it was reported that the dearly departed mobile brand known as Palm would be making a comeback. That day has finally come. Yesterday, Palm announced The Palm, a credit card-sized Android smartphone that's supposed to act as a second phone. Droid Life reports: The Palm, which is its name, is a mini-phone with a 3.3-inch HD display that's about the size of a credit card, so it should fit nicely in your palm. It could be put on a chain or tossed in a small pocket or tucked just about anywhere, thanks to that small size. It's still a mostly fully-featured smartphone, though, with cameras and access to Android apps and your Verizon phone number and texts.
The idea here is that you have a normal phone with powerful processor and big screen that you use most of the time. But when you want to disconnect some, while not being fully disconnected, you could grab Palm instead of your other phone. It uses Verizon's NumberSync to bring your existing phone number with you, just like you would if you had an LTE smartwatch or other LTE equipped device. Some of the specs of this Verizon-exclusive phone include a Snapdragon 435 processor with 3GB RAM, 32GB storage, 12MP rear and 8MP front cameras, 800mAh battery, IP68 water and dust resistance, and Android 8.1. As Kellen notes, "It does cost $350, which is a lot for a faux phone..."
We've already seen a number of gadget fans perplexed by this device. Digital Trends goes as far as calling it "the stupidest product of the year."
The idea here is that you have a normal phone with powerful processor and big screen that you use most of the time. But when you want to disconnect some, while not being fully disconnected, you could grab Palm instead of your other phone. It uses Verizon's NumberSync to bring your existing phone number with you, just like you would if you had an LTE smartwatch or other LTE equipped device. Some of the specs of this Verizon-exclusive phone include a Snapdragon 435 processor with 3GB RAM, 32GB storage, 12MP rear and 8MP front cameras, 800mAh battery, IP68 water and dust resistance, and Android 8.1. As Kellen notes, "It does cost $350, which is a lot for a faux phone..."
We've already seen a number of gadget fans perplexed by this device. Digital Trends goes as far as calling it "the stupidest product of the year."
I ain't gonna give you no damn tree fiddy for this turd!
That remains to be seen. Comeback is an awful strong term for an attempt to market a phone to people who already have one.
Imagine GM/Saturn trying to sell a car for when you don't want to use your car. I wouldn't call it a comeback unless they actually managed to move units.
Well, IF it was a PHONE that is :O
Just what I want in a PHONE. so of course it is a fake
Show of hands: how many people who want a small phone ALSO want a big phone?
Hi I'm 12 and what is do not disturb mode?
Palm licensed hardware but did not control the OS so the end result was hardware which did not work with software.
Sony hardware combined with Palm Desktop caused me such problems that I'd still like to strangle the people responsible. And Sony exited the market with no warning nor any support for people who had bought their Clie devices.
I don't give a fuck whether the Palm product now has no relationship to the old Palm devices. I wouldn't use it if it was free. And that goes for Sony
too. Fuck them both. ( never mind the infamous Sony rootkit CD fiasco ).
Since these are marketed at masochists that want more phones, they should sell them in packs of two or three. Their target audience would eat it up!
Digital Trends goes as far as calling it "the stupidest product of the year."
nothing to see here - move along
That is some impostor that has bought the name.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
... when we had these things called smart phones you could use when you didn't need a more powerful computer.
This is a great idea for people into fitness. I hope other carriers will offer this service and that there will be other, less expensive models available.
Then it would be the Apple Watch killer too. /s
If it had an HDMI port, it may be useful as a kodi box with 3GB of memory. $350 does buy a nice shield, or a bunch of mi boxes or amazon fire boxes,,,
At work I was already carrying 3 phones, my personal, a dedicated support phone and a lot of weeks a year, an on-call phone. I didn't pay for the phone I have now, why would I buy a toy phone.
Palm was purchased by HP several years ago.
In addition, WebOS was sold to Samsung by HP.
So we have a phone called Palm with no link to the original Palm phone with no OS that previously ran the real Palm phone.
This is why I'm not really alarmed about the fact that we've reached some climate point of no return. It's probably about time that humanity is wiped from the face of the Earth anyway. Are there really people who will pay money to be "disconnected but not disconnected"? Maybe we can address climate change by just killing those people. I know it sounds harsh, but jesus wept already. Enough is enough.
You are welcome on my lawn.
It wouldn't be hard to take over the market. Just build a phone that makes an actually pretty good phone and never rings when scammers are calling. If any other features are not at the expense of those two, I'd be all over that phone. The best they can come up with is "A phone for when it's too much of an effort to lift your main phone to your head"?
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I didn't even have to look at the hardware specs. I have Verizon but anything with Verizon software is junk. I use a completely non-carrier Pixel 2 on VZW. None of their crapware (I defanged a few things in the ROM related to them too).
Are they still trying to push VZ Navigator on people? Or Caller Name ID? Damn it cell carriers: Just be a pipe. That's all I want.
Oh, and before everyone says I should switch to T-Mobile -- there is not a drop of T-Mobile signal for a mile in any direction. It's flaky at best when I'm driving towards I-95 (and I live in a city).
... Made for Little Hands
I'd be keen on an IP68 phone that's this size. I can't comfortably fit my current phone into my pocket; I'd really like to go back to a smaller one.
Ask me about repetitive DNA
I'm sick and tired of phone review sites that seem to maintain an outsized influence on what people think is "trendy" and what people think is "boring" yet don't actually have a connection to whether the phone is a better tool or not.
Aesthetics and screen size trump all else. Design elements for the sake of novelty (OMG A CURVED SCREEN!) are valued over basic functionality. (It's easy to find reviews that complain at length about 'dull design' because omg simple and functional is so last year.) Getting rid of the 3.5" jack really was courage, because [cool-aid reason here]. Higher numbers are always better whether they have any impact on the user experience or not. Must have 4K! (even though phone users would be hard-pressed to tell the difference from e.g. 1440p in double-blind testing.) Must have 8GB RAM because it's what the trendy flagships are doing! (even though no benchmark has ever shown any real performance advantage in realistic contemporary use.) and so on and so on. And they seem to manage to dictate to users what to buy and dictate to manufacturers what to make.
For people who actually want to use their phone as a tool rather than as an all-consuming 24/7 Netflix and Instagram stream, it's a travesty that Android has had so little in the way of decent small phones. This is especially true for people who spend considerable time doing physical activity outdoors rather than sitting at a desk writing fawning reviews of $1200 toys.
The Xperia Compact has been the only line with good performance and cameras, but it's gotten steadily more expensive and less compact. Plenty of people were interested in the Unihertz Jelly and Atom because they offered a smaller form factor, even despite the phones' clear limitations. I would be likely to buy the Atom myself if it had a quarter-HD (960x540) screen; that's 450 dpi, which is not unreasonable, while the 432x240 screen is just too low-res for many kinds of uses.
"Palm" has ticked a lot of the right boxes with this- genuinely small, high screen area to total area ratio, HD res (1280x720), IP68 and decent impact protection. But the price point is a real problem, and it's too bad it's tied to Verizon.
Just the name is the same. This is now a Chinese company so expect your phones to be hacked straight from the factory just like Blu phones.
The good: the size is perfect since all the other manufacturers seem to only release huge-ass phones now
The bad: the features are just... weird. Why does it uses a face-photo-unlock feature instead of just a regular NIP? It's not like the screen is too small to display 12 buttons in a 3x4 grid.
The costly: If it's supposed to be a phone for when you want to be "less connected" why is it trying to be a full smartphone in a tiny package? Why is there a 12 megapixels camera on the back and an 8 megapixels camera on the front? Ditch both cameras or at least the front one and make the back camera 8 megapixels, drop the RAM down to 2GB and lower the damn price. Why does this over-powered miniature toy phone costs more than most of the other low-end smartphones out there?
WHO IS THIS SUPPOSED TO BE FOR?!
#DeleteFacebook
1) Verizon-exclusive phone
2) 800mAh battery
3) $350
The battery is possibly almost acceptable given it's size, but I'm betting it's battery life is terrible all the same.
Actually I read the entire review, and it was pretty good.
This phone would make a whole lot more sense if it was just a normal phone that ran on more networks and had about a 2000mah battery.
Selling people a device to make them less connected is moronic. Digital well being is bullshit from companies that are pretending they care about you, and want the media to think they aren't evil corporations. People want to use their phones and don't give a shit about stupid features that make them harder to use.
Puck autocorrect!
Especially when you're trying to talk sexy and you end up plucking her fussy.
Or you could just buy a cheap phone
Doesn't matter how successful Palm was... they failed which mean they didn't know what they were doing. Any new phone is just another new kid in the block. Choosing a kid to play with is just plain arrogant. Exclusive? Who gives a flying phuck!!! The world is not gonna drop AT&T and join Verizon just because Palm (a failed company) came back to make a phone only for Verizon. Doing that literally means they deny their own success by not accepting non-verizon customers.
This is what I have been trying to achieve for years. I have my secondary dumb Nokia. The only problem is I am in NZ. People who carry their phones on them all day only want small phones. I have an Apple SE and they are not making this form factor anymore. Very Sad!
I partially disconnect by not installing Facebook/Instagram/Paypal: Not by connecting with a smaller screen.
I despise 5-inch and 6-inch screens: The 6-inch phone is ubiquitous to the point of being shoved into bras, and not between the breasts. My phone is not a general-computing device, even though it's built (hardware And software) that way.
A credit card is 2.2 inches in length, meaning this screen is 50% longer than a credit card.
If people are carrying multiple phones and phones are getting too big for pockets, there are two solutions: A) Allow multiple SIMs in one handset. B) Make standard phones, hand-sized. C) Do A and B.
The screen is 3.3 inches. That is pretty similar to the 3.5" of a Iphone 4s. This isn't a tiny phone at all. It is modernized version of the size all smart phones used to be before they turned into battleships. It's a bit more compact owing to an edge to an edge screen making better use of the real estate than the old phones did.
So, basically, is back with nothing.
Sent as ripples into the electromagnetic field. No single photon has been harmed in the process.
I think I'm probably the only person in the world who loved Palm's stylus writing input method, "Graffiti". It had a learning curve, but was way easier than dealing with a micro QWERTY, and you could do it without looking. If they brought Graffiti back, I'd have to try it out, otherwise it looks like little more than a novelty.
An Android Smart Phone that doesn't feel like Im carrying a brick in my pocket?
This is actually what I've been looking for.
But this isn't it.
Time to kick back against the phablets. A Palm Pre for the modern age would be great.
But it must be small AND powerful ( thick means it can be that ), not this crap.
And it's not a phone you can use on it's own, and that is what makes it stupid. It's not a small phone, it's a gimmick that looks like a small phone but is really a companion device for your big phone that you still need to carry with you.
> " But when you want to disconnect some, while not being fully disconnected, you could grab Palm instead of your other phone"
It sounds like "But if need that extra push over that cliff, then we go to eleven."
No. It is my understanding that you can turn off your big phone or even throw it away away, and the Palm works just fine. You just can't stop paying Verizon for service for both phones.
Palm, the company that made the Palm Pilot is long dead. This is some random company that bought the rights to the Palm brand off of HP slapping it on some random android handset. Whatever spirit or ethos the name Palm may have originally represented is long gone.
Where this fits I think , or would fit better, is people who have a tablet with Cell connectivity. As a Phone handset for the portable PC tablet.
For using when you don't want a full phone? It's a "faux phone"? Does it require Bluetooth and being near your phone to work? Or are they just saying all this because "real phones" are 5+ inches and cost $800+? This just seams like a (expensive) cheap phone.
Sony had a prototype like this about 5-6 years ago. It was a companion accessory to a very large phone / tablet intended for business. The idea is you'd have your tablet in your bag which your accessory would be connected to.
There was also a tablet sized display that had nothing but a battery and a docking slot for a phone, so when you were home you'd have a tablet, but then pull out the phone when you were leaving.
Neither made it past the prototype stage.
It's an MP3 player with a Verizon data plan. In other words, how to bill people an extra $14.99 a month.
I want it to be my only phone. Why can't I have it that way- is it missing the latest surveillance technology that's built into other smart phones? That just makes me want it more...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
I wager the result is Verizon not letting it be the device it could be: Just a small phone.
Also all the marketing BS about it being about wellness and being a phone made to *not* work as well on purpose strikes me as marketing refusing to believe there would be a market for a small phone without a 'gimmick'.
I wouldn't be surprised if behind this device were an engineering team thinking they were making a phone for people sick of the oversized phablet norm, who may be as disgusted as everyone else at the limited realization of what it is as a product...
The core tech may be capable, but the only way to buy it is as an accessory, having to pay *more* on a monthly plan than you would for a big phone, and the 800mah battery is uselessly small for that class of device, all at a purchase price higher than almost any other phone with those internals.
XML is like violence. If it doesn't solve the problem, use more.
"Verizon Exclusive". It amazes me there are still idiots out there that think that sticking "Exclusive" on their products will be considered a feature, not a bug, by customers. Also congrats Palm, no matter how much effort you've spent making the phone's audio quality great, it's going to sound like you're speaking through a garden hose thanks to Verizon's shitty voice network.
When you come to your senses, make sure it has a headphone jack and a decent battery life (shouldn't be hard if there's no giant screen to maintain and you're not going for credit card widths), and I'm sure it'll sell like hot cakes.
You are not alone. This is not normal. None of this is normal.
I get the impression that it's a startup that only bought the brand name. Nothing else about the old company, good or bad, was brought in. So you're right to be wary.
It's John's phone with a screen, which has been around for years,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
Why can't they do this with a car phone instead?
When I had an OnStar equipped car phone, it drove me nuts that it wasn't able to reach its potential, especially without paying a third party for overpriced cellular service. I'd love to have a powerful mobile transciever with a real antenna array in my car for reliable communications instead of the wimpy portable cell phone and be able to automatically switch devices.
So... it's a smartphone that you need a smartphone to use? I don't get it...
I'm all sad now, I was hoping it was a new PalmOS device so I can stop clinging onto my Sony Clie!
I mean, it's still more responsive, has far more accurate touch, and has better battery life than every smartphone I've used, even now... the fact that people consider being able to use a smartphone for 2 days before needing to be recharged is good battery life just makes me feel sad at how brainwashed people are.
Smartphones are kinda stupid - They're either too small to have a usable screen, esp. since they are all capacitive touch screens which means your accuracy is in centimeters per inch, or so big that I giggle when people hold these gigantic brick-sized slabs to their heads. It's like watching an episode of Trigger Happy TV.
I like my phones to be small and fit into my side trouser pocket without worrying about it being snapped or bent - I still use my ancient indestructible Nokia with its 2 week battery life and actual honest to god buttons that I can use with my gloves on in sleet rain or snow or without having to even look at the pad because it has such nice tactile feedback, and I have a tablet and laptop for actual computery things so that I don't have to squint at tiny text or curse as I repeatedly press the wrong letter on a shitty tiny software keyboard.
Ugh... someone build me a time machine and send me back to the 90's! I hate it here!!!
Just shows what they think of Verizon customers--suckers.