| The "Centro" is Palm's first smartphone, initially available | | | | quickly. I'll probably have to make a list of sites best |
| through Sprint - but you can get one through Verizon | | | | suited for mobile use and reading to bookmark. |
| and AT&T now too. It has a touchscreen - which | | | | The next thing I tried was email. I've owned a few |
| is very popular now, but you can use it's included stylus | | | | smartphones before and was never a big fan of |
| as well. This version beats the previous "Treo" brand | | | | reading my email on the cell phone. It was always so |
| hands down. They're calling the Centro the "Bargain | | | | slow and clunky. I was hesitant, but setup my personal |
| PDA" because of it's lower price compared to other | | | | email account using the Centro's "Versamail". I figured if |
| smartphones. When it first came out in November of | | | | I didn't like it - I would just delete it. I entered my user |
| 2007 you could get it for only $99 with a new contract | | | | and login info, in addition to my incoming and outgoing |
| - but now at some carriers you get get it free with a | | | | server address and in about 15 seconds it was |
| new contract. | | | | downloading the mail to my inbox. I was amazed at |
| Features to note: | | | | how quickly I was able to read messages, delete them, |
| - comes in black, ruby red, or silver | | | | and go from my inbox to trash, to sent items, and |
| - 320x320 65K color screen | | | | back again. I can honestly say with the bigger screen |
| - microSD flash card slot | | | | size, and responsiveness of the Centro that I look |
| - EVDO 3G high speed connection | | | | forward to reading my email on this device. |
| - use phone as modem | | | | I proceeded from there to the camera where I took a |
| - 1.3 megapixel camera | | | | few test pics - which were pretty decent quality. I |
| - 352x288 video clip recording | | | | wouldn't advise using this phone in low lighting situations, |
| - stereo bluetooth | | | | but as far as phone cams go - the quality wasn't bad. |
| - Google Maps | | | | You have the usual options after you take a pic to |
| - Pocket Tunes Deluxe | | | | send via picture mail (on Sprint) or to "beam" to |
| - Office 2007 Support | | | | someone via bluetooth. I was surprised however, that |
| - Web Access | | | | once I viewed saved pics, when I accessed the menu |
| - Email | | | | in top left of the screen options to "send" or "beam" |
| The distinctive difference between the Palm Centro | | | | were there too - but by choosing "send" you can send |
| and Treos is it's small size, and the snappiness of the | | | | it to anyone in email! I could never do this before |
| OS. Everything is pretty responsive, unlike some of the | | | | without setting up all kinds of crazy hacks in my phone. |
| "lag time" you get while navigating other smart phones. | | | | I wanted to install the Opera Mini browser on the |
| They keyboard is so very small with mere millimeters | | | | Centro, but many forum threads I read indicated that |
| between the keys, a grown man's thumb covers half | | | | there were all kinds of problems with the JVM (java |
| the keyboard at once (mine does!). Despite these | | | | virtual machine) required installation - so for now I'm |
| issues the "gem sized" keys are easy to navigate and | | | | just sticking with the included Palm "Blazer" web |
| press - I only made mistakes the first few times I | | | | browser. All in all - I think I'm going to really like this |
| typed. Once I got used to it, it was very easy. | | | | phone. My initial response the first day has been much |
| One of the first things I did was access the web to | | | | more favorable that the last 2 phones I purchased |
| see how fast it was. I first went to google, and then a | | | | before it. |
| couple web sites - and everything loaded pretty | | | | |