Palm Treo 500v: New Look, Same Limitations

Although there is very little different under the hood, Palm has officially announced the Treo 500v, a Windows Mobile 6-powered smartphone that will be available on Vodafone in Europe and as-yet-unannounced carriers here in the States. Still no Wi-Fi, because Palm are bastards.

Press Release [Palm.com via Phonescoop]

[#1 posted by Anonymous , September 12, 2007 2:16 PM]

There's nothing smart about smartphones at all, every single one of them takes their design innovation from a brick, you either have a brick that's all screen, or a brick with half a screen and half a crappy tiny keyboard.

would it kill them to try something different? Something like... flip screen?

Or better yet, take some innovation ideas from the Nintendo DS or the LG enV, side flip it open with keyboard/touchscreen instead of an unlovable bastard child design from the late 80's.

[#2 posted by Tubman , September 12, 2007 4:20 PM]

They aren't all (exactly) like that: HTC produce a decent range of seemingly normal candy bar and PDA phones which have a fullish slide-out keyboard.

Being truly innovative, however, is something of a no-no. Firstly, these are business phones and buyers tend to be fairly conservative when it comes to styling, and secondly, adding features not planned in your chosen smartphone OS is time-consuming and leads to a risk of compatibility issues.

[#3 posted by dculberson , September 12, 2007 8:57 PM]

I don't know if "bastard" is quite the right term for a manufacturer that doesn't include WiFi in their smart phone at this point. I think "suicidal" is more appropriate.