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I can't buy one yet, because I live in Sweden... But I have now read 12 reviews (!) and I absolutely LOVE everything, except following mainly minor details, taken from my glowing recommendation in my "gest Buy guide" of Vantage Technology Magazine... As you can see did I not find the hardware that bad, even if I don't like the USB port's rubber flap either...
"But there are naturally some problems - even if the innovative OS is close to magic and most of the software stuff below, easy can be fixed with extra third party programs or Palm's updates... And there are actually very few hardware problems... This is the smallest ultra advanced smartphone, but that does also mean that they could not fit any removable storage, so you can't expand the generous memory. - but it would anyhow be a nice option, even if it would make the Pre a tiny bit longer... There is no lens cover and that's rather ironic - because the slide out keyboard, could also work as a camera lens cover... And I don't like the rubber flap over the miniUSB connection, because a smart micro door (that may be of rubber and naturally open sideways) is both more easy to use and look better.
My "wish list" for software developers and especially Palm...
01) There is a lot of "elegant" waste of screen space and very BIG fonts, in almost every basic view and they should give an option... Because you need only 33% more space, for accurate finger navigation and NOT more than twice the space, for the same info... They should actually offer two alternative settings - that show two or three times as much info (at every view that now use huge fonts) and still be easy to navigate with your fingertips... Yes, the events have small text in the calender and many may love the new spacious design and huge fonts - but there should naturally be some alternative, for everyone that have a lot of info in the smartphone and don't want to scroll like crazy.... And it's especially very easy to miss vital info, if you can't see it directly - type in Tasks and Contacts... So I sincerely hope it soon will be possible to "tighten" up all the new empty space between text lines and at least select smaller fonts (naturally together with less space around the letters) in the settings... And the absolute best would be if you can select that separately for the tasks, contacts, email, calendar and messaging... And then choose between five sizes, with the current as 4 and "modern" or roman fonts... Because if some tightening NOT is possible, will the the bigger screen only be useful for web browsing and that would be very very sad... Yes, you can now only see HALF the info in Tasks (without scrolling or missing vital stuff) even if the screen is much bigger, than I can see directly in my "old" Palm Treo 680 and that vital missing option, would make Palm Pre practically useless for me!!
02) In the calendar, should you also be able to remove that "empty time holder" completely, to free even more space for real calender info!!
03) The included Task application seems to be worthless, because of three big usability limitations - you can't see if there is an "extra note page" connected to the task, it don't show the priority and you can now only select 3 priority levels (just as in Windows mobile and Symbian, it was 5 levels before) even if it have both alarm and due date functions (!) maybe for people who hate (??) to use the fine calender... The only reason for that, would be if these post ALSO was shown in the calender!
04) The "universal" search don't search in Emails, the Calendar, Tasks* or any documents and that is very strange - it should at least be a two step search, with a "Search deeper in Pre" option, before Pre offer you to search in Google... Or even get a finer possibility, to select where the Pre normally should search... *But you can search Task, if you are inside.
05) And I also want the possibility to change the boring / plain ugly "modern" light grey and baby blue colours of the OS to something I actually like.
06) Some part of the ultra smart "Synergy" integration give you also trouble, because if you include your Facebook account will everyone you "know" there (you can't just select a few) be saved as contacts and that may result in ton's of contacts, you don't want in your smartphone - but it will probably come some extra program that "filter" that later and the other new "Synergy" contacts functionality, work like magic.
07) Then does copy & paste not work in web pages or any type of messages you get, but that should be very easy to fix.
08) There is no multiple email management, so you have to delete or move each email separately and that should naturally be fixed... Even if you (maybe) can do that in Google email or outlook, instead?!
09) You could use Pre as a modem for a notebook, but Sprint did stop that...
10) There isn't any "scroll bar" that show where you are, not even as an option and it should be a slim transparent indicator, that also show how big the actual view is of the total page.
11) You can't change how many "message lines" you can see in the email preview.
12) Then might the ring signal be too quiet, but only according to 1 of 9 reviewers and another one say it's loud enough...
13) The phone work very fast, but there is a delay when you open new programs and no "hourglass" so you might sometimes wonder if something happen, the first times you open a heavy program... But I don't know if that really need a fix or just some getting use to?!
14) And then do I also want the magnificent "floating event" functionality (at least in a third party application) that I now have in DateBk6 so you can show vital events that should be done today, in the calender and get them automatically moved to next day, every new day.
15) The pretty "Memo" application is pointless (just as before) when you anyhow have Task and Calender... And it is not possible to sync, so what you really need is a good plain text editor - that is easy to back up and open from your notebook, rock solid, ultra fast, has smart search & replace and handle minimum 144 huge text documents, in 12 folders... Including at least txt, html and hopefully some other file types... I sincerely hope that someone will make a fine text editor, because a true Word document editor IS a lot more clumsy and slower to use, in a smartphone!
16) You can't change the alert sound for texts and emails!
17) Finally is the new program launcher, rather limited... You get only three windows, without any helpful category names - like main, games, web favo, friends, settings and extra - you get only a simple I to III style indicator at bottom... But you will probably be able to buy a more advanced launcher, soon... And you can temporary put your 12 main programs (that not is on the quick bar) on the first page, web favo's plus settings on the second and everything else on the last page!
** And please Email me at - exe@telia.com - if YOU got any extra information about this more and less vital software problems... Type if there is a way around any of them or a fix on the way / already done!?!
Okay... Palm Pre is anyhow the finest alternative, according to over 10 reviews, with a great margin and can only become finer, with even smarter software ;-)
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