Most Helpful Customer Reviews
|
|
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Excellent Phone, Decent PDA ; Much Better than Windows Mobile Phones, July 30, 2008
Treo 755 (Verizon) has the one of the best voice and sound quality that I have ever had in a cell phone. Since 1992, I have used 3 Motorola, 1 Kyocera, 1 Samsung, 1 Nokia and 1 HTC phones. Two of them were Windows Mobile based and really bad. Windows Mobile phones freeze all the time and although have lot of bells and whistles, most of the features don't work half the time. Palm software is much more intuitive to use and is more stable; but not without glitches. I have not been able to synchronize my calendar with Outlook on Treo. Keyboard on Treo 755p is cramped but you get used to it in a few days and begin to like it. The body is well contoured, clunky, fits nicely in hand and you can operate most functions, including keyboard, with one hand. Browser is bare minimum - you can't watch Youtube videos like you can on iPhone! Touchscreen is quick and responsive. Most applications are simple, unadorned but functional a.k.a. Google style.
My main requirement in a smartphone is the ability to use Microsoft Office documents, spreadsheets, databases which I can do a lot better in Palm Treo than I could ever in Windows Pocket PC phones. They used to lock up. Two medical softwares that I use, UpToDate and Epocrates also work much better in Treo 755p than Windows Pocket PC phones. Web browsing is barely functional and nothing like iPhone but if you need to look up something on the web, you can do it.
My son has iPhone which I have used and seriously considered before buying Treo 755p. Unarguably, iPhone has the best user interface, is the best multimedia device and has beautifully designed mobile browser; but is not a reliable phone. AT&T signal and coverage are not as good as Verizon, the voice quality on iPhone not great, the iPhone cannot be used as a cellular modem (without hacking). Keyboard, with hard keys, is better in palm.
I have been able to use Treo 755p as a cellular modem with my laptop and have gotten speed in the range of 800-900 kbs. Overall I am satisfied with Treo 755p and consider it to be a good choice amongst the PDA phones - at least on Verizon & Sprint. Verizon has come out with Palm Centro now which is smaller and lot more pocketable.
Lot of people complain of Treo not being multitasking. But how many tasks can you do in device with such a small screen? Windows Mobile is multitasking and so unstable. Palm is a tried and true reliable platform. Who knows what Palm's next Linux based OS will be like? They tried their hand at Windows Mobile and the result is an unstable Windows Mobile device. More the third party applications you install, the slower the phone responds.
Therefore, my take on Smartphones and PDA Phones is:
1. Windows Mobile devices are awful and unusable most of the time.
2. Blackberries are primarily email devices with less PIM functionality and very little 3rd party software.
3. Symbian based devices like Nokia N95 are not that widely available on US carriers and neither are subsidized by them and don't have that much 3rd party software available. My experience with Nokia N95 is secondhand and I was not impressed.
4. iPhone is an awesome music and video player and has the best mobile browser but a below average phone. If you want an iPod with a great web browser and phone is secondary to you, then go for iPhone.
4. If you want a reliable phone with decent PDA functionality, palm devices are the way to go. Centro is compact & pocketable, an ideal PDA phone. Treo 755p is chunkier but still a good choice.
|
|
|
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
A workhorse phone for busy connected people, July 7, 2008
I had the Motorola Q9m prior to this phone. Although Motorola is the best in my opinion for raw cell phone calling capability, that phone was terrible at everything else. But this is not about that device. This is about the Palm Treo, which is what I switched to after I found that the Q9m is actually not compatible with most car kits that have phonebook capability.
I got the Treo and I have been thrilled ever since.
The Palm OS is something I used several years ago, and now coming back to it, it's like an old friend. All my old Palm apps still work great, and I really love that my Palm memos can be stored securely, requiring a password to unlock. This allows me to store personal information that I regularly need on the go, but I can password protect the information and feel confident that the information will not be compromised. With Windows devices, this is really not possible (I don't know about blackberry, though).
For email, I recommend shelling out the extra $40 for chatteremail, a really fantastic email package that has many many features. Features that may frighten the casual user, but for the most part, the default setting are great and you can have fantastic email service on this device with little trouble. The free Versamail is good, but Chatteremail offers IMAP push, so messages on IMAP servers come through immediately. I get messages on my phone BEFORE they show up on my desktop nearly all the time.
The phone calling functions are very good. Calls are not quite as good as with a phone like the RAZR, but still quite good, and better than any Samsung, LG or Nokia phone I have ever used, and I have used several models of each through various work duties.
Bluetooth is very nice. With my Parrot car kit (a 3200 color kit), my "quick dial" contacts all synchronize well and it handles transfers of calls when I turn on and off the car very nicely. Bluetooth Hotsync with my PC works considerably slower than USB, but I don't care. It is not so time consuming that it bothers me. It is about as good as bluetooth gets.
I love the quick dial ability. EVERY alpha or numeric key on the keyboard can be set to quick dial. I really like that because it is easier for me to remember a letter association with a quick dial than a number.
The screen is really fantastic. It is really an ideal size. The resolution is quite good and a lot of information can fill the screen. Yet it is not too big, as the overall size of the phone I find quite tolerable. The brightness of the screen is excellent. I can use it in broad, direct, high-noon sunlight, and in fact it looks quite decent under such lighting. The touch screen works nicely, too. The phone comes with a screen protector. I highly recommend taking the time to apply it to the screen. Not only does it protect the screen, it actually makes it easier to clean (which surprised me). Take the time to apply it well, being careful not to introduce bubbles. I use the broad end of the stylus to push out the bubbles as I slowly lay it down from one side to the other.
The web browser is something I have really come to appreciate tremendously. Blazer (the name of the browser) takes pages and reformats them for better viewing and scrolling on the small screen. Although Blazer does not do this for all web pages, it does it for many, and this is very nice for what I like to do. I also like the bookmarks tabs that can be setup. I setup one page of marks for news, one for entertainment, etc, etc.
Many people complain about needing to reset. Although I agree this is something that has to be done more often than desired, it is my experience that a reset takes little time. In fact, a reset takes about 1/5th the time of a windows mobile reset. My Treo has plenty of apps and yet I do not need to reset all that often (once a week, maybe).
I have only one gripe, and that is that it often has moments when it takes a second or two to "react" to an input. This is clearly a case of something happening in the background. An annoyance, but compared with the other smartphones, a minor price to pay.
I do not use the media features, so I can not comment on them (eg music, video) although I have viewed a few youtube videos with no issues. The camera is a toy, producing crappy images, but this is what I would expect from a device that has no room for decent optics.
This is truly my one-device-does all phone. Email, phone calls, contacts management, calendar appointments, tasks. I have it all in one place.
I use it so much every day that I drain the battery by the end of the day. I need to get the larger battery (the Seidio extended battery without the extended door looks nice....).
I highly recommend this phone.
|
|
|
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Good phone with some flaws, June 20, 2008
I think it's a nice size with a lot of features arranged in an intuitive way. But here are some problems I've experienced after a few months of use:
1) The battery that comes with it is pretty weak. If you can't fully charge it more than once a day, you may run out.
2) The USB cord is really poorly designed. It fits in sort of flimsily and comes unattached if you move it (you hear that two-note bell from your computer). Plus there's a sync button at the base of the cord, so I sometimes sync it when all I wanted to do was plug it in or take it out.
3) The "hang up" and "voice mail" buttons are in the same place on the screen. So you may be intending just to hang up, but you end up hanging up and calling voice mail.
|
|
|
Most Recent Customer Reviews
|
