Real reviews are exactly that – reviews targeted towards real users. We don’t run any sort of performance tests. show you boot-up times, or colorful trend charts on battery life, etc. What we give you are real experiences from people who use the product on a day-to-day basis. If you want to read about the specs, feel free to Google them. These reviews are more qualitative and hopefully provide you something that you don’t necessarily find elsewhere.
The Background
The first product is the latest and greatest Treo 700P. The reviewer is a co-worker and previously had the Treo 600. He found himself due for an upgrade after dropping his Treo 600 one too many times. * Owned: 2 Months * Wireless Carrier: Verizon
And now, in his own words:
The Good
- Since the carrier is Verizon, I can take advantage of the EV-DO network which provides near-DSL speeds. Browsing the web is actually bearable. I find myself surfing the phone to find things like flight times, news, directions/locations, movie times, etc.
- Bluetooth 1.2 support lets me use my headset from up to 20 feet away. [Please don’t wear your headset like jewelry – when you’re done, take it off!]
- The built-in camera is 1.3 megapixels (1280x1024 resolution). While not the best, I found myself carrying pictures of my wife and kids around for quick photo-sharing ops with co-workers and clients. For work, the camera comes in handy for the numerous white-boarding sessions that come with the territory. Instead of relying solely on my notes, I can take a quick snap-shot of the whiteboard, transfer it to my computer, and attach it in an email. My clients love it!
- There is a video capture tool include that lets me catch my 16-month old son being 16-months old :-)
- For email support, you have multiple options, but I ended up going with a third-party email client called Chatteremail (www.chatteremail.com) which I found to be high on user functionality. It does come with a $39.95 one-time licensing fee.
- The QWERTY keyboard comes in extremely handy for efficient input, especially if you’re big on text messaging
- It comes default with 60MB of free memory in addition to an SD expansion slot
- As an extremely organized person, I like having all my appointments and tasks entered into my phone. I use Keysuites (www.chapura.com) to manage the synchronization between my Treo and my laptop. The one drawback is it currently does not address time zone sychronization which is a pain if you travel quite a bit, like I do.
The Bad
- Although it’s alot easier to surf the web, websites updated to render on small screens are still lacking.
- The wireless sync email client that comes with the Treo did not impress me with its poor usability. It appeared to always be “syncing”, thereby using up my battery faster; it also didn’t sync well with my mail server when I deleted mail on my Treo.
The Ugly
- Compared to prior versions of the Treo, the battery life is short! I have to charge it as least once a day and depending on how many conversations I have on it, more than once a day.
- The Treo seems to slow down as the battery power gets low
- I’ve noticed some lag time (2-3 seconds) when switching between applications which requires a soft reset to clear up. I find myself resetting the Treo 700P about once a week.
The Short of It
For me, the pros of the Treo 700P outweigh its shortcomings and I recommend it to business travelers such as myself. While it is pricy compared to the Motorola Q and Blackberry, it contains more functionality and can increase productivity at work and at home.