[sbell22]

I have had my Treo 600 for about a month and am in general, very pleased with it. However, I've encountered one "anomoly" and I'm wondering if it's unique to this particular Treo 600, or if they all have this problem.

That is, the quality of my outgoing audio isn't nearly as good when I use the Microphone (holding the unit up and using it as a telephone), as it is when I am using a headset, *or* the spreakerphone mode.

I discovered this before I got the headset - people were telling me that I sounded a bit "muffled" over the phone. I recorded a voicemail to myself and upon playing it back, confirmed that the
recording did indeed, sound muffled or a bit distorted.

What was a surprise was, when I got a headset, I made recordings with both the headset, and without it - and discovered
the outgoing audio is much sharper/clearer when using the
headset. So I initially assumed that my unit had a defective
microphone. However, the next surprise was when I recorded
a voicemail using the speakerphone, the headset, and then the mic. The speakerphone also generates clear outgoing audio! So only when using the mic (Treo 600 as a handset) is there a problem. That rules out a defective Mic, since the speakerphone also uses the same Mic. It would have to be the circuitry which equalizes or Pre-amplifies the mic signal (but not when in speakerphone mode).

I decided to call Handspring (PalmOne) about this, but discovered they have outsourced their (used to be excellent) tech support to Sprint PCS. I've dealt with Sprint PCS support enough over the past few years to know that, I'd probably be wasting my time even to attempt to describe this problem, much less get an answer ) But, I thought some of you might want to make a voicemail recording -- and let me know if your Treo 600 has the
same problem. If not, then I'll go for an exchange. If the other
Treo 600's do have this problem, then I've discovered a major
engineering defect in the front-end for the Microphone. I used to design telephones and speakerphones at Bell Labs, so I wouldn't be surprised if that's the case here. Anyway, just try recording a voicemail to yourself using first the Microphone, then the Speakerphone, then a Headset and note if there's a major voice quality difference when you play it back! If you're interested.

steve
"Treo 600 enthusiast" (great voice quality or not)

Sharp Zaurus>HP200LX>Cassiopeia E-10 (Windows CE)>Palm Pilot 1000/5000>iPaq 3600>HP 360/620LX>Palm III, IIIx>Palm V>Palm Vx >iPaq 3630,3670>Samsung i300>Kyocera 7135>Samsungi330>Treo300>Samsung i500>Sony NZ90>Sony SJ33>Rim 7230>Treo 600

[K3SLS]

I noticed the same on both my wifes and my Treo 600. We each enabled our voicemail and quickly noticed the anomaly.

I suspect there is some pre-emphasis/de-emphasis tweaking here to deal with the speakerphone audio (echo, overdriving, etc..) and that it should have also been applied to the straight mic.

Anyway...you're not alone.

[sbell22]

Aha! So it seems like we may be onto something here. If this can be verified by a few more Treo users... then I will write a certified letter to the VP/Engineering at PalmOne.

I would call this a major engineering bug! I'd like to encourage other T600 users to leave themselves a voicemail first using it as a phone, then with the speakerphone (and/or a headset)... notice how "muffled" you sound on a Treo! Sub cheap-cell-phone quality.

This should be worthy of a major recall (probably exchange) program to fix the problem, I would think!

If verified that this is widespread... then the next question is, is this just a "production run" problem (some units), or does it impact every Treo 600 they have sold?

I used to design speakerphone/telephone analog integrated circuits in a prior life (~1989). Looks to me like they screwed up the Microphone equalization, somehow. What's surprising is that it isn't a problem when in speakerphone mode. They probably have more gain on the Mic when in speakerphone mode... my guess is they screwed up the attenuation (in the "Mic" path/mode) when they designed the analog front-end (IC) for the Microphone processing. An easy mistake to make, but surprising it got through the Q.A. since it makes the Treo 600's outgoing audio pretty aweful... unless you're on speakerphone.

Hmmm!

steve

[The Chupacabra]

Originally posted by sbell22
Aha! So it seems like we may be onto something here. If this can be verified by a few more Treo users... then I will write a certified letter to the VP/Engineering at PalmOne.

I would call this a major engineering bug! I'd like to encourage other T600 users to leave themselves a voicemail first using it as a phone, then with the speakerphone (and/or a headset)... notice how "muffled" you sound on a Treo! Sub cheap-cell-phone quality.

This should be worthy of a major recall (probably exchange) program to fix the problem, I would think!

If verified that this is widespread... then the next question is, is this just a "production run" problem (some units), or does it impact every Treo 600 they have sold?

I used to design speakerphone/telephone analog integrated circuits in a prior life (~1989). Looks to me like they screwed up the Microphone equalization, somehow. What's surprising is that it isn't a problem when in speakerphone mode. They probably have more gain on the Mic when in speakerphone mode... my guess is they screwed up the attenuation (in the "Mic" path/mode) when they designed the analog front-end (IC) for the Microphone processing. An easy mistake to make, but surprising it got through the Q.A. since it makes the Treo 600's outgoing audio pretty aweful... unless you're on speakerphone.

Hmmm!

steve

Poor voice quality (outgoing, incoming and speakerphone) was one of the reasons I decided to return my Treo 600. Handspring created a superb overall design but unfortunately, they cut corners in the construction of both the phone and PDA parts of the device. I don't think people realize how bad these phones sound on the other end.

If you want to try another (simpler) experiment, have someone borrow your phone and call your land line. Then have them call you with a regular cell phone and then finally with another land line. You may be shocked by the results. If many people do this, Handspring is going to get a ton of returned phones and that will hurt their profits even further. The company would probably have been better off (financially) simply specifying better parts for the phone and paying more attention to voice quality. This is a phone, afterall!

[sbell22]

Yes, you make an excellent point. Now that you mention it, I do remember taking note when using the speakerphone, that the incoming quality is quite poor. It's at least a 10-15% raw distortion level; sounds like a lot of clipping is going on.

They probably did the audio circuitry in CMOS to save $. In a "real" cell phone there would be a bipolar IC/front end. It's hard to design low-power output stages in CMOS... well, the front-end would be tough too. It can be done but takes a crack designer/design team. Anyway the Treo 600 clearly has major problems in this department.

Now that I'm getting a better understanding that the core function of this device was not implemented well (the cell phone functions), I'm starting to reconsider whether I should keep it. I may end up re-activating my Sanyo cell phone/camera which worked very well on Sprint, and going with a T3 Palm... it has a simply AWESOME high-res screen.

Somehow I feel insulted paying $599 for a PDA that has a really junky cell phone! And it bugs me that they still are promoting the idea that the 160x160 display was a smart decision in order to save power. Most of the power is actually consumed by the backlight, not the display itself. And many high-res Palm devices have excellent battery life, even with cell phones. Plus, 3-4 hours is plenty of battery life.. most people don't mind recharging these nightly. I just don't believe it's factual that this display saves that much battery life vs. a high-res. It probably makes them extra margin, mostly... it's certainly PRICED as a very premium, highest high-end device.

And turning over their support to Sprint, which is simply worse than AWFUL at support (I've suffered along with them for 2 years; yuck!), is a true message to those of us who are their customers, too. So I'm re-thinking this purchase decision, although I'm well out of Sprint's 14/(sometimes 30?)-day refund window. Doesn't mean I can't sell it!

steve

[The Chupacabra]

Originally posted by sbell22
Yes, you make an excellent point. Now that you mention it, I do remember taking note when using the speakerphone, that the incoming quality is quite poor. It's at least a 10-15% raw distortion level; sounds like a lot of clipping is going on.

They probably did the audio circuitry in CMOS to save $. In a "real" cell phone there would be a bipolar IC/front end. It's hard to design low-power output stages in CMOS... well, the front-end would be tough too. It can be done but takes a crack designer/design team. Anyway the Treo 600 clearly has major problems in this department.

Now that I'm getting a better understanding that the core function of this device was not implemented well (the cell phone functions), I'm starting to reconsider whether I should keep it. I may end up re-activating my Sanyo cell phone/camera which worked very well on Sprint, and going with a T3 Palm... it has a simply AWESOME high-res screen.

Somehow I feel insulted paying $599 for a PDA that has a really junky cell phone! And it bugs me that they still are promoting the idea that the 160x160 display was a smart decision in order to save power. Most of the power is actually consumed by the backlight, not the display itself. And many high-res Palm devices have excellent battery life, even with cell phones. Plus, 3-4 hours is plenty of battery life.. most people don't mind recharging these nightly. I just don't believe it's factual that this display saves that much battery life vs. a high-res. It probably makes them extra margin, mostly... it's certainly PRICED as a very premium, highest high-end device.

And turning over their support to Sprint, which is simply worse than AWFUL at support (I've suffered along with them for 2 years; yuck!), is a true message to those of us who are their customers, too. So I'm re-thinking this purchase deciscion, although I'm well out of Sprint's 14-day refund window. Doesn't mean I can't sell it!

steve

A few points:

- I challenge everyone reading this thread to get someone to borrow their Treo 600 for a minute and have them call your land line to hear how you sound to others. It would be revealing for people to post their findings. If everyone finds the voice quality is horrible, I can see Handspring being forced to issue a fix sooner rather than later.

- You are right about the low res screen not saving battery life. This was chosen because of cost issues. Period. I didn't mind the low res screen, but can see why others were less than impressed that their $600 phones came with second rate hardware.

- Sprint reps are beyond useless. Handspring is just going to alienate even more customers if they really have outsourced support to Sprint.

- According to the one of the customer service supervisors I spoke to a few days ago (I'm returning my Sprint Treo 600), they have extended the return period to 30 days "because of the holidays". If you're within this time frame, you should still be ok. Good luck.

[Jacko]

Incidentally, steve... What version of the firmware are you using? There's a huge thread in which a bunch of europeans are installing 2.0.8 and reporting better phone quality.

As a T-mobile treo 270 user waiting for the 600 upgrade, it's important to me if the phone capabilities have been improved or worsened.

I have to say, I have suffered significantly worse sound quality with my Treo 270 than I ever did with my old startac. Speakerphone is mediocre. Quality is so-so. Sometimes I switch to speakerphone just to get enough volume in regular use (same over my three treos). Ear positioning is also critical to hearing ok--off by a little and you can barely hear anything. On me, it means my ear is resting uncomfortably on the ridge of the fliplid.

In sum, although I love the data features of my treo 270, I have been annoyed by the clear degradation in my calling experience since that "upgrade". If the treo 600 does not improve things, I will be switching back to a phone phone with organizer features (SE610) instead of upgrading to the 600.

I'd be interested in knowing if firmware is the difference between good phone capabilities, and mediocre ones, because then obviously I would take the 600.

[The Chupacabra]

Originally posted by jacko
Incidentally, steve... What version of the firmware are you using? There's a huge thread in which a bunch of europeans are installing 2.0.8 and reporting better phone quality.

As a T-mobile treo 270 user waiting for the 600 upgrade, it's important to me if the phone capabilities have been improved or worsened.

I have to say, I have suffered significantly worse sound quality with my Treo 270 than I ever did with my old startac. Speakerphone is mediocre. Quality is so-so. Sometimes I switch to speakerphone just to get enough volume in regular use (same over my three treos). Ear positioning is also critical to hearing ok--off by a little and you can barely hear anything. On me, it means my ear is resting uncomfortably on the ridge of the fliplid.

In sum, although I love the data features of my treo 270, I have been annoyed by the clear degradation in my calling experience since that "upgrade". If the treo 600 does not improve things, I will be switching back to a phone phone with organizer features (SE610) instead of upgrading to the 600.

I'd be interested in knowing if firmware is the difference between good phone capabilities, and mediocre ones, because then obviously I would take the 600.

http://discussion.treocentral.com/tc...887#post302887

[SeldomVisitor]

I am microphone-circuitry naive, however...

Isn't it rather unlikely that Handspring QA - or just their regular group of non-QA employees who were using TREO 600s prior to general release - would MISS poor outgoing voice quality?

We know with pretty good certainty that the vast majority of use of the TREO 600 will be as a phone (not speakerphone, not headset).

Thus from MY naive POV this would appear to be a known, designed-in, feature - maybe as Yet Another Power Saving trick. (that is, high voice quality would have required too high power consumption for the most-used method of using the phone side of the TREO 600.)

True, I don't know what I'm typing about, but I think it's REAL unlikely Handspring wasn't fully aware of the sound quality difference. (thus - they're not going to fix it)

[jeeter]

Originally posted by SeldomVisitor
I am microphone-circuitry naive, however...

Isn't it rather unlikely that Handspring QA - or just their regular group of non-QA employees who were using TREO 600s prior to general release - would MISS poor outgoing voice quality?

We know with pretty good certainty that the vast majority of use of the TREO 600 will be as a phone (not speakerphone, not headset).

Thus from MY naive POV this would appear to be a known, designed-in, feature - maybe as Yet Another Power Saving trick. (that is, high voice quality would have required too high power consumption for the most-used method of using the phone side of the TREO 600.)

True, I don't know what I'm typing about, but I think it's REAL unlikely Handspring wasn't fully aware of the sound quality difference. (thus - they're not going to fix it)

I think you might be on to something there. HS has provided a fix in the form of firmware updates 2.08 and 2.09 but there are users who have reported increased battery drain since applying the update. I'm not applying the update until I have a better understanding of how much it's going to impact my battery.

Cingular Treo 600 (T-Mobile network)

[The Chupacabra]

Originally posted by SeldomVisitor
I am microphone-circuitry naive, however...

Isn't it rather unlikely that Handspring QA - or just their regular group of non-QA employees who were using TREO 600s prior to general release - would MISS poor outgoing voice quality?

We know with pretty good certainty that the vast majority of use of the TREO 600 will be as a phone (not speakerphone, not headset).

Thus from MY naive POV this would appear to be a known, designed-in, feature - maybe as Yet Another Power Saving trick. (that is, high voice quality would have required too high power consumption for the most-used method of using the phone side of the TREO 600.)

True, I don't know what I'm typing about, but I think it's REAL unlikely Handspring wasn't fully aware of the sound quality difference. (thus - they're not going to fix it)

Obviously Handspring is aware of the poor voice quality. Just as they're aware of the low res screen, ejecting SD cards, lack of Bluetooth, echoing speakerphone, lack of voice recorder, soft screen, poorly-unsupported SDIO, nonreplaceable battery, shoddy camera, lack of 802.11b, limited memory, short battery life, small keyboard, etc. Most of the Treo 600's "limitations" are due to conscious compromises Handspring made in order to design the device to a particular price point and performance level. They put out a device they thought would be considered "good enough" by enough people to make them a profit. Designing to "good enough" standards means the device can always be improved. Significantly. But improving quality and functionality costs money and as you know, Handspring was a little short in that department. Some of these limitations can be improved with firmware upgrades (which take time and money to produce) while others can be rectified with simple design changes. To fix all problems prior to release would have probably added another $100 to the phone's already-high cost and delayed the release several months, squandering Handspring's current (evanescent) advantage over all other smartphones.

It all comes down to what level of quality you're willing to accept. I think users should demand that Handspring optimize whatever voice quality the current hardware is capable of ASAP. But many other Treo 600 owners are completely satisfied with their current voice quality. Which shows maybe Handspring knows a thing or two about what their average customer is willing to accept.

[The Chupacabra]

Originally posted by jeeter


I think you might be on to something there. HS has provided a fix in the form of firmware updates 2.08 and 2.09 but there are users who have reported increased battery drain since applying the update. I'm not applying the update until I have a better understanding of how much it's going to impact my battery.

Cingular Treo 600 (T-Mobile network)

I believe the update made chages primarily to optimize the radio's reception capability, as many users were experiencing dropped calls on certain European GSM networks. But improving RF performance is only part of how voice quality can be improved. Phone design is a complex process and Handspring would have had to outsource this, as they lack the engineering talent to design a cell phone radio + its associated components. Co-ordinating the creation of firmware updates for third party components is going to be a major headache. The quick release of that first GSM firmware upgrade should be somewhat reassuring.

[Bill Mixon]

Hello All,

I have followed this thread with some interest and tried the suggested,"test". I simply don't see, or rather hear, the problem. My phone sounds fine and, more importantly, I have had no complaints from the many people I call everyday in the course of my job. The Treo in general has been extremly reliable and a pleasure to use.

Just my Opinion.

Regards,

Bill...

[SeldomVisitor]

> ...It all comes down to what level of quality you're
> willing to accept...

Yup.

Anecdote - I have an ancient dumb Nokia that I've had for years - have NO idea what I sound like to others, in general. No one has ever commented about call clarity that couldn't be attributed to lousy radio signal strength.

That is, I think it comes down to what Handspring thought would be the number of customers who even noticed the difference.

> ...Which shows maybe Handspring knows a thing or
> two about what their average customer is willing to accept.

Nah, Handspring always has been clueless - I think they're still clueless. They simply made a Market-untested but engineered decision that may or may not come back to haunt them.

=====

As an aside - is the quality of sound REALLY significant or are we having a discussion about sound quality that only someone with a $10,000 audio system can sympathize with?

[nrosser]

Mine is fine, and I've asked friendlys how I sound, in all situations, and it's always - 'you sound great'. I use regular mic, earbud, headset with boom, speakerphone - all of 'em, and they all sound great to me (and I used to work for a speech recognition company, so I'm 'attuned' to sound quality, to a certain extent).
And to think that some big groundswell of user opinion, or writing a certified letter to the VP of Engineering at PalmOne is going to result in any real response, or reaction, well I just think you guys are wasting your time. More power to ya, and I'm not trying to flame anyone, but c'mon dudes - you know how that works: The powers that be roll their eyes at all the *****ing out there, and go on to the next product release meeting. Just don't expect a lot of results, is all I'm saying.....

oh and a few comments/rebuttals to Chupa's post:

Obviously Handspring is aware of the poor voice quality. Just as they're aware of the low res screen (doesn't bother me - it's very bright)
ejecting SD cards, (what? Mine have never ejected)
lack of Bluetooth, (no issue for me)
echoing speakerphone, (what? I've never had that)
lack of voice recorder, (had one on my 6035; never used it, don't want it)
soft screen, (huh? Soft? Meaning, not firm enough?)
poorly-unsupported SDIO, (what? Because there's no Wi-fi or BT drivers yet? My SD slot does just what I want it to, for now - if more stuff comes down the line, I'm sure it'll be ready with the drivers then)
nonreplaceable battery, (a replaceable battery, as has been talked about ad nauseum, would make the overall unit larger, to house the casing for the battery works. No thanks. Mine is fine).
shoddy camera, (it's a PHONE - c'mon man - get a digicam if you're going to gripe that much)
lack of 802.11b, (please - it uses WIDEBAND connectivity - I don't want to have to hunt up a hot spot to grab the internet - yes, 802.11 is faster, but so is a Ferrari, and how practical are they? I'll stick with CDMA Everywhere)
limited memory, (huh? 32Mb + Sd. Please.)
short battery life, (again - huh? My battery is fine.)
small keyboard, etc. (getting the message here?)

My point I'm making with these rebuttals is that the things that seem to bother you dont' matter IN THE LEAST to me - I'm not saying that either of our opinion is more important than the other; it's just that each of us has our own opinion. They are just that - opinions. Nothing more. I'm not trying to be a Treo600 apologetic here, but I think the mass approvals from all the various periodicals and such have shown that Handspring has correctly managed to balance the line between feature bloat, market demand, price, and usability. Yes, that statement is also just an opinion, but time will be the judge on how HS's decisions fared.

[The Chupacabra]

Originally posted by nrosser
Mine is fine, and I've asked friendlys how I sound, in all situations, and it's always - 'you sound great'. I use regular mic, earbud, headset with boom, speakerphone - all of 'em, and they all sound great to me (and I used to work for a speech recognition company, so I'm 'attuned' to sound quality, to a certain extent).
And to think that some big groundswell of user opinion, or writing a certified letter to the VP of Engineering at PalmOne is going to result in any real response, or reaction, well I just think you guys are wasting your time. More power to ya, and I'm not trying to flame anyone, but c'mon dudes - you know how that works: The powers that be roll their eyes at all the *****ing out there, and go on to the next product release meeting. Just don't expect a lot of results, is all I'm saying.....

oh and a few comments/rebuttals to Chupa's post:

Obviously Handspring is aware of the poor voice quality. Just as they're aware of the low res screen (doesn't bother me - it's very bright)
ejecting SD cards, (what? Mine have never ejected)
lack of Bluetooth, (no issue for me)
echoing speakerphone, (what? I've never had that)
lack of voice recorder, (had one on my 6035; never used it, don't want it)
soft screen, (huh? Soft? Meaning, not firm enough?)
poorly-unsupported SDIO, (what? Because there's no Wi-fi or BT drivers yet? My SD slot does just what I want it to, for now - if more stuff comes down the line, I'm sure it'll be ready with the drivers then)
nonreplaceable battery, (a replaceable battery, as has been talked about ad nauseum, would make the overall unit larger, to house the casing for the battery works. No thanks. Mine is fine).
shoddy camera, (it's a PHONE - c'mon man - get a digicam if you're going to gripe that much)
lack of 802.11b, (please - it uses WIDEBAND connectivity - I don't want to have to hunt up a hot spot to grab the internet - yes, 802.11 is faster, but so is a Ferrari, and how practical are they? I'll stick with CDMA Everywhere)
limited memory, (huh? 32Mb (sic) + Sd. Please.)
short battery life, (again - huh? My battery is fine.)
small keyboard, etc. (getting the message here?)

My point I'm making with these rebuttals is that the things that seem to bother you dont' matter IN THE LEAST to me - I'm not saying that either of our opinion is more important than the other; it's just that each of us has our own opinion. They are just that - opinions. Nothing more. I'm not trying to be a Treo600 apologetic here, but I think the mass approvals from all the various periodicals and such have shown that Handspring has correctly managed to balance the line between feature bloat, market demand, price, and usability. Yes, that statement is also just an opinion, but time will be the judge on how HS's decisions fared.

Have your Mommy read you my original post and ask her to explain it to you. The list is a list of hardware compromises (known to most people that have even a cursory understanding of the Treo 600) made by Handspring - not a list of things that "bother" me about the Treo 600. Do a search of the posts in this forum or even read these recent reviews to better understand the significance of the hardware design limitations:

Review #1

Review #2

[sbell22]

Thanks for the response about the firmware upgrade - I'll check that out thoroughly and report back here later.

In regards to the question as to whether this is a "minor" or "major" voice degradation... yeah, it's pretty major on my phone. We're not talking nit-picking here. I first became aware of it on the first day I used the phone, when more than one callee said to me, "I can hardly hear you", "you sound muffled", etc. That is what led me to make the voicemail recordings to test it. It's not subtle.

Yes, I'm sure it's true that they outsourced the analog front-end design. Handspring (or even Palm) wouldn't have the custom analog LSI engineers to do that. Probably bought/licensed a design from a foundry in Asia.

Regarding the power consumption, that could be an issue in the receive (incoming) path, but is unlikely to be in the outgoing (transmit) signal path. The outgoing/transmit audio path does not run at high enough power levels to consume even a fraction of the power of the receive path. The receive channel, on the other hand, has to drive the physical loudspeaker -- either the receive speaker transducer, or (louder) the speakerphone speaker. Both require much higher voltage and current (power) levels. On the outgoing side, the signals are at the microvolt/millivolt level, and there is no significant power consumption variation by volume level. The outgoing signal digitally codes the volume in the network; but it isn't physically realized until the signal is received. The net-net is, the radio power doesn't vary significantly with power level, in the outgoing side. It's the receive side that can really suck down the juice. In some cell networks, the outgoing power is turned down to cut tranmist power and extend battery time, but that's a seperate issue, not a volume-level related issue.

re: writing the PalmOne VP/Engineering, yeah I agree it would go in the wastebasket in about 10 seconds, and the guy would be off to his next product release meeting. *If* a certified letter even reached him, which is maybe 50/50. I spent 25 years in silicon valley working in these outfits, so I understand that. But sometimes I write them anyway, just as a matter of principle. But here (you make a good point) I will probably not waste my time, since the noise ratio is probably too high for it to have an impact.

My more important feedback would be when I jettison the vendor and buy someone else's product! Not there with the Treo yet... it's still a lot of fun. This outgoing voice quality problem is a real issue for me though, since I do about 2,000 minutes/mo of calling. I just ordered that Shure cancelling headset and that will probably be my solution, until they can fix/exchange this round of Treo's or I decide to dump this one and buy a newer production run unit (testing it before buying).

I'm really hooked on the integration of phone/pda/internet - there are so many neat applications you can do, that don't work so well with seperate phone & pda. Someone is going to out-do the Treo 600 over the next 12-18 months, with a high-res PDA screen, compact form factor, and excellent phone. So one strategy is to get by with this one, and set back and wait. The amount of R&D $$ going into PDA-phones right now is just amazing.

steve

"palmtop enthusiast"
Sharp Zaurus>HP200LX>Cassiopeia E-10 (Windows CE)>Palm Pilot 1000/5000>iPaq 3600>HP 360/620LX>Palm III, IIIx>Palm V>Palm Vx >iPaq 3630,3670>Samsung i300>Kyocera 7135>Samsungi330>Treo300>Samsung i500>Sony NZ90>Sony SJ33>Rim 7230>Treo 600

[nrosser]

it's all opinion anyway dude - my 600 is GREAT, and no amount of complaining by you will change my opinion of my device. I've owned Palms for about 8 years, and this one is a great example of elegant UI and design.

'get my mommy to read me your post' - heh heh, whatever. Funny stuff.

[sbell22]

Here is how you can check your firmware and hardware version on the Treo 600. From 'Phone', enter

##786

then hit dial.

You'll get a screen full of information, which also includes Life timer, Life to date data useage, Warranty (activation?) date, & the ESN. I'm on Software Rev Treo600-1.0-SPR, and Hardware Rev B.

As far as I know, for Sprint/CDMA there is no Software update available yet - that's just for the GSM T600's.

Can't wait for HW rev C!

[TechDude]

Yeah, I have the same (Sprint PCS). And you can also get the much of the same information by going into your phone application, menu -> options -> Phone Info.

But where is everyone getting this 2.0.8 type number from? I don't see that anywhere.

--Techdude