I apologize to everyone in advance for the lengthy post. I just wanted to share my experience and impressions with everyone. As soon as I get a chance I will upload some pictures comparing the devices. Enjoy…and feel free to skip over the boring parts!
The Adventure:
I got to my local sprint store at 7:20 am Saturday June 6th. I was the 22nd person in line and by the time they opened the doors at 8 am there were 54 people in line. Place cards were handed out to all standing in line to preserve order along with a pre-requisite paper explaining that you must have an unlimited data plan, NO EXEPTIONS!!! I myself, was on a family everything messaging with $5 unlimited data addon and the person in line next to me was on a $30 SERO, so this info had us a bit concerned.
A rep from Palm (yes Palm not Sprint) walked through the line letting us play with his Pre while we waited. There were 11 sprint employees working and were instructed only allow people in for Palm Pre purchases! It took about 2.5 hours for me to finally get called up and by this point the anticipation alone was enough to make me feel the need to do anything to walk out the door with that phone in my hand!
The sprint rep took my number card and went to the back to grab my pre, came back and asked for my account info to begin the process. Unfortunately he kept getting an error in the activation process. He walked away for a few minutes and then came back and explained that the error was due to the plan, I indeed did need to have an everything data plan and there was no was to activate the phone without it. I stepped aside and called sprint customer service. It was a very long call but to sum it up: There was apparently an agreement made (contract maybe?) that all palm pre devices are required to be on an everything data, no exceptions, no loopholes and believe me I tried!
My current plan was running me $135 for 5 phones 1500 mins and unlimited data only on my line. The new plan cost $190 a month for the same but now all phones had unlimited everything (except minutes). All would be well if everyone used data but no one does but me so it basically is costing 55 more a month to own the new Pre. Not worth it in my book, but as I said earlier, I would do anything at this point! So with the understanding that I have 30 to return the device and revert to my old plan I got the phone and walked out exhausted!
Side note: For those of you toying with the idea of buying the Pre, the $199 after rebate is only good if you are eligible for the full 2 year $150 discount. If you are only eligible for the 1 year $75 it is off of the retail price of $549 with no rebate bringing your total to $475! That’s an expensive little piece of hardware!
The Aftermath:
After getting the phone I immediately called sprint back about the plan details to see if there was any way to have the data only on my phone to make the plan more reasonable and since I was the only one using the data. After being told NO by four different reps, I was transferred to the retentions department. The lady was very courteous and understanding (don’t know if it was genuine or just to “retain” me, I think the latter) and after reviewing the notes on my account gave me a 10% discount on the monthly bill as well as one full month credit and $40 credits for the next three months to help ease the pain. Good move sprint, you kept me a loyal cusomer! After adding up all the credits applying the discount and averaging them over the duration of the contract , I am now only paying $13 more per month than my previous bill. This I can live with!
My new friend on the SERO plan called as well, he was not quite as lucky. They made him switch to the everything data 450 plan and gave him the same 10% discount. That switch made his monthly bill go from $30 to $60 for essentially the exact same plan. Like me, he was just happy to walk out of there with his new Pre!
First Impressions:
Screen: The first thing you see when you look at the phone is the screen. Now I don’t know if it is because the screen can show a full 16 million colors or the just the source of backlighting, but the screen just pops out at you! When the palm rep came by to demo his to us one of the guys thought it was a fake phone with a vivid printed screen until he touch it and it responded. I am amazed that a screen that has less resolution than my diamond and pro, and is larger could look so crystal clear. Also, keep in mind we were outside in the morning sun. In the afternoon in direct sunlight the screen is very readable, however the glossy coating plus fingerprints creates a bit of glare requiring you to tilt the phone up and down a bit to read it. Speaking of glossy screens and fingerprints, the screen is actually seamless all the way around the side until it meets the center of the phone where it slides. I like the way it looks but I am worried that it will get scratched easily. The screen is a fingerprint magnet! every little smudge shows when the screen is off (not so bad when the screen is on) luckily, the case they supply in the box is made of microfiber and clean the screen well, which is about all its useful for anyway.
Touch: The capacitive touch interface is very responsive. Very rarely do I have to tap on something twice because it didn’t register the first time. The ripple effect is ingenious, it lets you know in a subtle way that you have in fact touched the screen and that it registered it! Swiping has a bit of a learning curve, but overall is very intuitive. When you swipe backwards on the bottom of the phone two led lights come on to indicate it registered the swipe. For some reason it only uses backward swipes, it does register a forward swipe, but does not seem to do anything in any of the programs so far. Multi-touch is very useful, especially when working with photos and web pages. It is very easy to zoom in and out and fairly accurate.
OS & UI: First impressions so far, very stable, intuitive and promising. There are a ton of new ideas, along with traditional ones, that went into this OS and I have to say for a first release of a new OS I am indeed impressed! The scrolling and swiping is very smooth and responsive. The "cards" are useful although I do sometimes wish they could be minimized rather than always blocking the background image. Initial loading of programs, dependent on the program, can be a bit laggy but if you leave your most used programs up as cards they come up almost instantly.
The unobtrusive notifications are truly great. If you are say, in the middle of posting something on ppcgeeks
and a call comes through, it pops up at the bottom of the screen but allows you to continue typing in the web page. You can then swipe the call away if you choose to ignore or you can answer it and then go right back to where you were typing. It seems to do this same behavior for all types of notifications and also for music apps.
I have twice now hit the point where the device told me to close cards due to memory. Both times I had my pictures open as a card and had more than a dozen cards open at one time. Closing the pictures card seemed to free up enough memory to open 4 more cards with no memory message. The phone does get extremely laggy with that many cards open, but was still useable and closing a few cards brought it back to its original speedy self!
The OS also has a built in lock that is enabled by default. If you press the power button once and then wait a few seconds and hit it again the lock screen appears. It’s a very simple screen with a large digital clock at the top and a yellow circle with a lock symbol at the bottom. Upon placing your finger on the circle an outline of a half circle appears above, then you just drag the yellow lock in any direction outside of the line. This is a great implementation, it allows for easy one-handed unlocking and works great for both the right or left hand! When the device is locked you are also required to use the same unlocking motion to answer the call. Notifications are also displayed in the lock screen.
Phone: The dial pad has large easy to push buttons and has no lag at all when dialing. The call history is easy to use although I noticed that the scrolling does lag a bit when the contacts all have pictures. The sound out of the earpiece is clear and fairly loud but I have yet to use it in a loud environment. I have consistently been getting the same amount of bars as my Touch Pro as I’ve been traveling around the last couple of days. (I check almost obsessively) The speakerphone is loud and clear enough to use in the car, however, if you turn it up all the way it does get quite distorted so using it where there is a lot of background noise makes it hard to distinguish. The parties on the other end have told me that I came in loud and clear and were unable to distinguish the difference between a call on speaker and a regular one. So far no big complaints in this department but I will update as I use it more.
More to come on this and many other things! Plus images