Palm Treo 500v
Considerably less bulky than previous Treos and running the latest Windows Mobile 6 operating system, the Palm 500v appears to be a logical step in the evolution of the business smartphone but that’s not really the case.
Ted Gibbons | Tuesday, April 01 2008Having said that, any device running Windows Mobile 6, and with Office applications and Outlook synchronisation onboard, is more than capable of allowing you to get some work done on the run. It’s just that without a touchscreen you are one further step removed from your productivity applications and navigation becomes that much clumsier and time consuming. Also, in making the 500v so compact, the QWERTY keyboard has been squeezed up too much for comfortable typing unless you have a trained sparrow to peck at the tiny keys.
Still, let’s not keep bashing the 500v for what it’s not. On the upside, this Treo has a clear and bright widescreen display that you can see even in full sunlight and an excellent graphic user interface overlay that gives you easy access to all your applications from your home screen. Simply hit the start button and you’re presented with all your applications as icons in a horizontal bar that you scroll across at the top of the screen. As you select each icon, details appear below. For example, if you select Contacts a list of your favourite contacts appears. If you want another contact you simply hit the soft button for ‘All Contacts’. Similarly, if you select the Message Centre icon you can see instantly if you have any messages, voicemails or missed calls. If you want to get away from this interface you can just hit the soft button for Main Menu.
The 500v feels well-balanced in the hand and making and receiving calls doesn’t feel like you’re holding a brick to your ear. The five-way navigator works well and the Home and Back buttons are also welcome. I was also pleased to see a standard mini-USB connection for charging and cable connection, and a standard 2.5mm jack for a headset. Let’s see no more of those irritating proprietary connectors.
On the email front, even if you don’t have a business Exchange server to connect to for push email, setting the Treo up to retrieve mail from a Gmail account, or similar, is very easy indeed.
On the entertainment side, multimedia applications work well on the 500v with Windows Media Player handling music and videos very well. Sound quality through the provided headset is great, and songs even sound good via the speakerphone – which the Treo automatically defaults to if the headset is not plugged in. 150MB of onboard memory is available for your files, and this can be expanded via microSD cards. Annoyingly, memory cards must be installed under the battery, rather than externally.
Pictures taken with the 2-megapixel camera are crisp, with quite accurate colour and good saturation, and framing your images using the big screen is a breeze.
Video capture is also provided and looks great, with a very smooth frame rate. However, there is no LED photo light or flash for low-light situations.
Overall, while the 500v doesn’t have the wi-fi, HSDPA or touchscreen that a power user would want, and its looks won’t be for everyone, it’s a well-executed and capable device.
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