Windows Phone Thoughts: Palm's Treo 700w Reviewed: Part 2 (Software, Performance, Conclusions)

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Friday, April 14, 2006

Palm's Treo 700w Reviewed: Part 2 (Software, Performance, Conclusions)

Posted by Janak Parekh in "HARDWARE" @ 06:00 AM

WM5, Palm-style continued
There's a bunch of other little changes Palm has made; the captions explain most of the screenshots, although I've got some side comments where appropriate.

Control Panel applets


Figure 49: The Brightness applet. Why exactly are those grey levels needed? They don't seem to change as the brightness does. And why isn't there a thumbboard brightness control or a means to turn off the thumbboard backlight?


Figure 50: The Backlight applet. It's not quite clear to me why this is separate from brightness.

You can specify a timeout and/or behavior when the screen is tapped, like many WM5 devices. Unlike many WM5 devices, when this timeout is hit, the device doesn't quite completely turn off the backlight at this timeout; it just sets it to the lowest illuminated setting and turns off the thumbboard backlight. If you want the backlight to turn completely off, you have to wait for it to turn off (if you're letting it idle) or at least wait for the turn-off period (if you're using it) whereupon the screen backlight will go completely off and the device will keep running (e.g., when playing media). Not quite sure why it works this way. :?


Figure 51: The real MS Voice Command is included in ROM! :clap: It's off by default; you can use the Control Panel applet to turn it on. Unfortunately, I don't think anyone has gotten VC working on a BT headset on the 700w (it's not officially-supported in the first place, but I believe people have managed to hack it to work on HTC devices). Do keep in mind that Voice Command will use some of your precious RAM.




Figures 52, 53: Keyguard applet.


Figure 54: Notifications.

Palm did significantly change the Notifications mechanism. For each event, you can assign a ring and/or a vibrate. More importantly, you can specify the vibration behavior for either position of the ringer switch, so if you want ring-and-vibrate, or completely silent, it's up to you. Incidentally, the vibrate behavior on the device differs between rings (a very long vibrate) and notifications (shorter buzz), so it's easy and quick to differentiate the two when it's in your pocket. I wish more vendors implemented vibration like this.

One bug, however: I have my email set up through Exchange SMS Push, and when the PDA is off and a message comes in, the device doesn't do a full message vibration: it vibrates 90% of what it's supposed to, thinks for a few seconds, and then completes with a brief 10% vibrate at the end. Yes, it's utterly bizarre. :? I can't imagine this is a design decision, and if you turn the device on immediately after the "first" vibrate the second one comes quicker. There seems to be a bug in the sleeping mechanism, as far as I can tell; I'm curious if Palm has fixed this in AKU2.


Figure 55: Manage ringtones.

One last notifications feature: the 700w supports MIDI, WAV, MP3 (and presumably WMA, though I haven't tried) ringtones. You can specify them in this dialog, and they appear in the list in figure 54. Folders like My Documents are automatically searched. Note that these ringtones are indeed for phone use, and other Notifications don't support them. The standard WM5 ringtones aren't included: Palm includes a bunch of (lame, IMHO) MIDI ringtones.


Figure 56: The power management applet. Nothing that interesting here, other than the fact that a high-precision meter is here, like in the Start bar.


Figure 57: The default Pocket Internet Explorer homepage. It's well designed, has useful mobile links, and again, there's a Google search box... :D


Figure 58: The Bluetooth applet. It's the minimal Microsoft implementation, plus the addition Verizon cripple for no DUN or OBEX... but at least it's reasonably stable and there's no flashing blue LED.

Verizon customizations
One aspect you may be wondering is how Verizon customized this device in addition to all of Palm's changes, especially considering their central role at the initial 700w announcement. Good news: Verizon's customizations are minimal. There are only a few I can think of:
  • The device has the Verizon logo branding on the front;

  • When the phone module is turn on or off, the Verizon logo comes up as part of a "welcome" or "goodbye" screen;

  • Bluetooth, of course, does not support OBEX or DUN;

  • The device has been preprogrammed for Verizon's 1x/EVDO data connections, MMS service, voicemail, etc.;

  • Finally, Verizon adds a Wireless Sync icon to the Programs menu; this is a stub icon that allows you to follow a few steps to install Verizon's Wireless Sync service. Wireless Sync is a third-party over-the-air (OTA) sync tool, designed by the IntelliSync folks, that can give you real push email without AKU2, with or without the use of an Exchange server.

    In short, you either (a) install a small program on your desktop that redirects Outlook email to the Verizon server, or (b) configure the Wireless Sync web account to poll a POP3 service. A client is then installed on the Pocket PC that syncs with the server whenever changes are detected on either end. Yes, this means a copy of your emails, contacts, calendar, tasks, and notes are uploaded; if you don't want this, use Exchange ActiveSync. The good news is that Wireless Sync doesn't use SMS, and it does support Notes sync (which Exchange doesn't). However, I prefer the built-in Exchange functionality, and like that it doesn't use Verizon's servers as a conduit for my data. I have used Wireless Sync in the past, and it's reasonably functional, so it's an option if you want.

Next, I'll talk briefly about the phone's camera and media playback functionality.

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