Those of you who have Sprint and the palm pre mind giving me some feedback on that phone.

Looking at upgrading both my wife and I to a smart phone and we've been eyeing this one. Some of the online info I've seen seem to give the palm pre a decent rating. There are some negatives, but that appears to be the case for most of the phones all are mostly good phones with some things not so good. I've read from the hardware standpoint it could be better...seem a little "plasticy", key board could be better, etc. But overall it seems to get good reviews.

We are currently with Sprint that is why we are looking at the Sprint phones. We were at Sams (they carry ATT, Verizon and Sprint) the other day and the guy there recommended we stick with Sprint, and not switch to ATT or Verizon. I had mentioned those two because we are looking at bundling with TV and internet at the house.

Or any other recommendations for smart phones that sprint carries that are worth a darn.

Any feedback would be much appreciated.

Seriously staff, could we just make a smartphone discussion thread a sticky here?

i'm pretty happy with my sprint service, especially at the end of the month when the bill shows up. I pay half of what my iPhone buddies pay, so even if the iPhone is badass, it's not worth the extra money at the end of the year.

My wife and I both have the Palm Pre, and we both like them a great deal. That being said, I have patched the hell out of these things to get them how I want them. When webOS shipped, it didn't have some very rudamentary tweaking options installed. Palm has been very forthcoming with their system, though. As a result, there's a whole community out there that makes it very easy to get the phone how you want it.

www.precentral.net

Initially, I was a little sad about the lack of apps, but things have picked up in a big way. We probably get 20 or more apps each week, and since the catalog has opened it's grown to over 800 at last check. The biggest thing that has me juiced about it is the fact that Flash 10 is coming to the phone in the first part of 2010. This should mean wonders for web navigation.

Operations-wise, it's a pretty fast phone. I can get a little l**** on occasion, but it's nothing to scream about. The battery life stinks, but i think that's to be expected on these types of devices. The iPhone's is no better.

Another great thing is the contact management and backing up system.

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If I had it to do over again, I'd probably stick with the Palm Pre over the Hero just because of the amount of work emailing I do. The physical keyboard is a big plus.

I wouldn't mind getting a hero, though. If I cared less about the physical keyboard, I'd probably be using one right now.

I decided on the HTC Hero.. Android seems to be here for the longrun.


The Pre is a good phone though. Very easy to use and a good user interface.

Yeah, Srint has me with their cheap plans. I'm on Everything 450 plan with 20% discount and $20 off per month making my bill $39.99 a month. (I used to be on SERO but couldn't get any of these cool new phones on that plan). 450 minutes may not sound like much but with their ANY mobile to mobile, it's all good

yeah, I am on a "family plan" with two "everything" phones and I think my total out the door after taxes is around $100. We split like 700 minutes or something, but the free mobile to mobile (regardless of service provider) is ridiculously sweet.

my bro has the pre

he has had to return it 3 times within 3 months

Thanks for the input MW!

Oasis - what sort of problems is he having?

I've had both the Pre and the Hero. After using the Pre for almost 3 months and suffering with the horrible build quality (see www.precentral.net forums for all the threads on the Oreo Effect) and inadequate PIM apps, I bolted to the Hero the day it was released on Sprint. For my needs, the Hero and Android are far superior to the Pre/Pixi and webOS.

Nevertheless, if you prefer webOS over Android (many people do), I would strongly recommend looking at the Pixi instead of the Pre. The slider mechanism on the Pre is terrible (q.v. the Oreo Effect) and the plasticky, creaky feel of the Pre is compelling evidence that Palm rushed the Pre into the market as fast as possible. The Pixi is more solid.

alarm didnt work
freezing other 2 times

i can only post about my experiences, but both my wife's and my phone have not had any build issues.

My Pre doesn't have the problem of shutting down when the slider is closed too hard, it does however have that 'oreo' effect, it's not that huge of a deal.

My Pre doesn't forward emails correctly and the calendar is slow and doesn't sync correctly. The internet browser doesn't respond to EV-DO when I leave the card open, lock the phone, and unlock it a little later when I need to use it. I have to restart the browser every single time. Also any two or more cards open sharing EV-DO sort of 'freezes' up the connection. (works when wifi is on though) Having multiple cards open works for a little bit, but it doesn't last long since my phone will lag like crazy, which completely negates the multitasking aspect of the phone.

I've patched my phone and installed homebrew apps. I've removed those patches and homebrew apps. I've reset my phone twice and taken it to the store only to be told to 'reset' it. Palm's online profile service which stores your numbers should you lose your phone or need to reset it, didn't work for me. This was addressed by Palm and I believe someone is suing them over it.

The battery life is absolutely terrible. No excuse for that.

There will be an update on January 7th (?) whenever Palm announces something at CES, so hopefully these issues will be addressed, if anything, at least the BASIC issues many people are having concerning email and calendar. If not, I'll be looking at the Hero or whatever may be announced for Sprint in January.