By John Chan
11/10/2007
URL: http://asia.cnet.com/reviews/mobilephones/0,39051199,41168637p,00.htm

When Palm became a Windows Mobile (WM) licensee, hell froze over for Palm OS fans. That worked out all right eventually as the Treo 750 PDA-phone turned out to be one of the most user-friendly WM devices out there. That's something the company historically excels in, and is a factor that keeps people buying its Treo devices even though these PDA-phones are sometimes lacking in other features.

The 500v is Palm's first Treo using WM6 standard for smart phones. This marks the first Treo smart phone that doesn't have a touch-sensitive display. Unfortunately, it is also the first time we felt Palm didn't live up to the standards of usability we expect from it.

Design

The design of the 500v was leaked months before its launch as the Palm Gandolf. Like many other Windows Mobile smart phones with QWERTY keypads, the 500v features a landscape-oriented QVGA display. Under this display, the Vodafone name is prominently displayed. Like the Treo 750v, the 500v will start out as an exclusive with the European operator, a point further reinforced by the Vodafone logo found on the back battery cover.

QWERTY keypads are standard in Treo devices and the layout of the one found on the 500v doesn't differ much from previous Treos. Though the smart phone is much more compact than earlier PDA-phones like the 680 and 750, its keypad size remains the same. This makes for great thumb typing because of the excellent tactile response and well spread-out keys. Compared to an older Treo 650, we did find the keys stiffer than we'd liked, but that should not slow down typing much. As with all QWERTY keypads, those with larger fingers may never quite take to it, so make sure you try it out at a store before making any purchasing decision.

With dimensions of 110 x 61.5 x 16.5mm, the 500v is not exactly super slim. While it is the thinnest Treo to date, it pales in comparison to devices like the Samsung i600 and Asus M530w which are 11.8mm and 13.8mm in depth, respectively. The material used on this smart phone is very similar to that on the Treo 680, which means it feels plasticky even though the sides are painted with a metallic color. Design-wise, the 500v will probably induce a kind of love it or hate it feeling--we certainly couldn't get a consensus among those who saw it in the CNET Asia office, though most will agree that it is quite well-built.

The buttons above the keypad are flush with the screen, but still easy to press because of the large size. We had no problems with the directional pad as well, which has an oval chrome finish with a separate selector in the center. Volume control and an additional shortcut key can be found on the left side. On the base is where the connectors are. These include a 2.5mm audio jack and a mini-USB for charging and syncing.

Features

Ease-of-use is the name of the game for Palm. This is a company that has excelled in making PDA-phones simple for the masses, as evidenced by the Treo 650 and then the WM Treo 750 later on. With the 750, Palm addressed some common issues users had with the WM interface. For example, users can dial directly from the Today screen on that device and search for contacts with fewer button presses.

The thing with WM6 standard, the version meant for non-touchscreen smart phones, is that it is already very user-friendly to begin with. It was designed by Microsoft for use with a numeric keypad, and even without any customization, dialing and searching for contacts is a breeze--a user need only begin typing in the first few letters of a contact to find it from the home screen, whether using a numeric or QWERTY keypad.

Since that's taken care of, Palm has seen fit to make its menu easier to use with its own carousel interface. Pressing Start from the home screen calls up the category tabs which can be scrolled through from left to right. Tabs include recent programs, a message center, quick contacts and access to essential settings like profile, ringtones and keylock. You can even assign numbers to favorite contacts so that pressing and holding that number will start a call, a feature brought over from the other Treos.

We have to agree that this is certainly more convenient than the vanilla WM6 standard interface, but it is not new. Samsung has something similar in the i600, which it dubs as the card wheel interface. While not all the features are identical, Palm is certainly not the first in this space.

The most glaring omission, we felt, is threaded text messaging. First found on the Palm OS Treos, this feature was then ported over to the WM Treo 750. WM enthusiasts have even ripped out this feature and put it in other devices. Though that's not a practice we applaud, seeing that Palm meant it only for its own PDA-phones, it shows how popular this feature is. We know a legion of Apple fanboys will flame us for calling it a copycat feature, but threaded messaging is also found on the iPhone. So we cannot fathom why this was left out of the 500v.

A Palm spokesperson told us the company wanted to concentrate on the interface, and being a consumer-oriented device, that was the focus, not threaded messaging. To that, we say why not just set the bar higher? This is a feature we are sure the mainstream consumer will enjoy very much, and it would have differentiated the 500v from other WM6 smart phones.

Connectivity-wise, the 500v is equipped with a 3G radio, but not HSDPA. It also does not have Wi-Fi, which means Web surfing and email will all have to be done using the cellular network.

This smart phone comes with 256MB of internal flash memory, of which 150MB is available to the user. For those who use it as a video and music player, it also has a microSD card slot for memory expansion. Note that this slot is found below the battery, which means you need to turn off the device everytime you want to switch cards or copy files onto it when using a card reader.

Found on the back of the 500v is a 2-megapixel camera. As far as phone cameras go, this one takes decent images, though we would have liked if it had autofocus and an LED flash. There is no front camera for video calls.

By virtue of its WM6 OS, the 500v will come with Windows Live integration, support for multiple email accounts, the Internet Explorer browser and Office Mobile for opening and editing documents.

Performance

Call quality was good, even in loudspeaker mode. The fact that the speakers are at the back didn't affect audio quality and we didn't hear distortions or muffling.

We managed to use the 500v for about two days on a single charge. The rated battery life of this smart phone for voice calls is 4.5 hours.

Conclusion

The Palm Treo 500v goes for S$698 or S$498 with a two-year contract with Singapore-based operator M1. Currently, only the gray-colored version is available. This seems like a fair deal considering similar products like the Samsung i600 and Dopod C730 went for over S$800 when first launched. But given the time they have been on the market, prices would have gone down. In fact, you can get the i600 from M1, too, at S$498, and you get Wi-Fi, a front-facing camera and HSDPA. In addition, Samsung has just announced the WM6 upgrade for the i600, making it in every way comparable to the 500v, and more.

While we appreciate the 500v's ease of use because of the customized interface, it needs more than just that. An irresistible price of perhaps S$199 to S$299 with a contract would have greatly helped its cause because, when we get down to the price versus value debate, the competition looks much more attractive at this point.