Features and Specs

The Palm 700w’s product specifications include the follow:
Operating System:
Windows Mobile 5.0.2.0 Pocket PC Phone Edition

Memory:
128MB (60MB user accessible) non-volatile

Processor:
Intel XScale 213 MHz Processor

Screen:
240 x 240 TFT touchscreen display
16 bit color display with over 65k colors

Wireless:
800/1900MHz nationwide digital phone
CDMA2000 EvDO network – backwards compatible with 1xRTT and IS95 networks
Bluetooth 1.2 wireless support

Digital Camera:
1.3 megapixels with 1280 x 024 resolution
Automatic light balancing
2x digital zoom
Integrated self portrait mirror
Video capture

Audio:
2.5 mm headset jack is stereo headset compatible – requires a stereo headset adapter sold separately for use with standard stereo headphones
Speaker
Windows Media Player 10 included on CD-ROM
Polyphonic MIDI, MP3, WAV and video ringtones
External ringer on/off switch with vibrate mode

Keyboard:
Full QWERTY key layout with backlighting
Integrated number dial pad
Keyguard feature

Expansion Slot:
Support for MultiMediaCard, SD, SDIO cards

Battery:
Removable, rechargeable lithium ion batteries
Talk time: up to 4.7 hours
Standby time: up to 15 days

Power/Sync:
Multi-connector on device
USB sync cable
AC Adapter (108-132 BAC/60Hz)

Size:
2.3” W x 4.4”H (excluding antenna) x 0.9” D
58mm W x 113mm H x 23mm D

Weight:
6.4 ounces
180grams

Desktop Requirements:
Windows 2000 or Windows XP
USB port (USB ActiveSync cable included)
CD-ROM drive

A look at the phone

Front of the phone

Here’s a picture of the front of the phone:

At first glance, the 700w looks pretty much like the Treo 650. The top of the phone has the status indicator and the phone speaker.

Below this, you have the display which is limited to a resolution of 240 x 240. It’s also a touch screen display with a color depth of 65k colors.

Beneath the display are two action buttons that straddle both sides of the 5 way navigator controls. You’ll be using the left and right action buttons quite a bit on the Treo 700w since they correspond to actions on the lower portion of the display (which you can also activate by touching the screen).

There are four additional multipurpose buttons beneath the action buttons – from left to right they function as follows: Phone/Send button, Start Menu button, OK button, and Power/End button. These buttons are multi-purpose buttons. If you press the Option button and then press one of these buttons, the functions change. From left to right, pressing the option button will make the four buttons perform the following: Bring up Internet Explorer, Bring up the Calendar, Bring up the Memory applet, and lock the phone.

And finally below the buttons is of course the keyboard. The buttons have changed in the 700w with the form factor being squarer than rounded in previous Treos. Whether you think this helps the phone will depend on your personal preferences. I for one found the square shaped buttons very easy to work with since I felt like I had more surface area to feel for the buttons.

The keyboard backlighting is by default turned on whenever a key or button is pressed (of course only when the unit is powered on). The backlighting is bright and definitely helps me see the keys much more clearly when I’m in the dark.

Top of the phone
On top of the phone, you’ll find the antenna on the left following by the expansion slot, infrared port, and ringer on/off switch.

Bottom of the phone
The bottom of the phone looks as follows:

From left to right, you’ll find the 2.5 mm headset jack, the multi-connector,, and the microphone.

Back of the phone
Here’s a picture of the back of the phone

The upper left portion of the phone is where you’ll find the 1.3 megapixel digital camera. To the right of the lens is the self portrait mirror. The speaker is found beneath the digital camera.

Left side of the phone
Finally, the left side of the phone has the volume control and a single customizable button (which defaults to launching Windows Media Player)

A look at the OS
As we mentioned earlier, the Treo 700w runs the Windows Mobile OS 5.0 which is a significant departure for Palm. However simply dumping the Windows Mobile OS into the Treo wasn’t good enough for Palm – they actually went ahead and made several usability modifications to the user interface to improve upon shortcomings in Microsoft’s PDA/Phone OS. Let’s take a look at the new Today screen as presented by Palm.

The Today Screen
Here’s a snapshot of the Today Screen.

Palm modified the original Today screen to include much more information than it ever did. Now, you have the following sections on the Today screen:
- Contact lookup – you can lookup contacts to dial or directly dial the number you want
- Speed dial buttons – a dedicated section of buttons for speed dial phone numbers. You can now have pictures representing the speed dial numbers
- Calendaring and To-Do Notifications – this is a carry over from the standard Today screen – you’ll get a reminder list of notifications for the next several days
- Messages – This messaging section presents a list of all the new messages that you’ve received – whether it’s via Outlook or via Text Messaging.
- Internet Search Box – finally, Palm added an Internet search box which automatically sends keyword search requests to Google via Internet Explorer.

The Rest of the OS
Let’s take a look at the rest of the OS. There’s the standard Windows Start menu which you can bring down either by touching the screen with your finger or stylus OR by pressing the Start button. The Start menu can only hold 7 programs followed by the Programs, Settings, and Help icons. You can customize which seven program icons you’d like to display on the Start menu.

If you select the Programs portion of the Start menu, you’ll see all the various applications installed on your Smartphone. For the 700w, the default applications are Games (which include Bubble Breaker and Solitaire), ActiveSync, Calculator, Camera, Download Agent, Downloads, Excel Mobile, File Explorer, Notes, Pocket MSN, PowerPoint Mobile, Quick Tour, Search, Sounds, Tasks, Terminal, Wireless Sync, and Word Mobile.

Do you feel like customizing the phone a bit more? Click on Start -> Settings to bring up what essentially is the Control Panel. Here you can take a look at all sorts of features – everything from memory usage to Bluetooth settings to Passwords.

Palm did everything possible to try and make everything on the GUI usable and accessible via the keyboard buttons. It’s not always perfect of course but they should be commended for their efforts nevertheless. Turning the Pocket PC Phone Edition into a usable single hand OS isn’t the easiest thing.

Usage

I’ve been using the phone for over two weeks now and have been relatively pleased with its operations though it does have its quirks. If you plan on using it for mostly phone related tasks and keeping in sync with your calendar and email, then the Treo 700w does a good job at handling these tasks. If you’re more a PDA person – meaning you’ll use the device for everything from managing your expenses to watching videos to using it for GPS purposes, then the 700w might be a bit underpowered and under whelming.

Let’s start with the plus side of things first. As a phone, the Treo 700w works well. Every time you get an incoming call, it’ll ask you if you want to save the phone number into a contact record. If the incoming phone number is recognized by the OS, the contact information is shown immediately (along with a picture of the contact if you have one saved). Press the Send button and you will be able to bring up the Call menu which will show you the last set of outbound calls that you made. The 700w has a built in speakerphone so you can easily activate it when you’re on any call and the sound output is loud and clear.

The 700w works well as a basic PDA. As with any Windows Mobile device, you can sync the 700w with your PC desktop using Microsoft’s ActiveSync software. If you’re familiar with ActiveSync and with Windows Mobile devices, there’s nothing new here so you can skip this paragraph. If you’re coming from the Palm side of things, you’ll probably end up loving ActiveSync. When connected, the Treo 700w will actively synchronize all data between the desktop and the Smartphone. Delete a calendar appointment in Outlook? No problem – that very same calendar appt. will now be deleted on your mobile phone. There’s no need to press any Sync button to initiative synchronizations. All of it is done automatically and behind the scenes. As with any Windows Mobile device, the Treo 700w can only sync with up two PCs.

I can see all upcoming appointments and reminders via the Today screen. If I receive a new email or text message, I will receive a notification on the display. Even if you’re on a phone call, you’ll see a small dialog box pop up if you receive a text message – and yes you can even reply back at the same time while you’re talking.

The 700w supports the Verizon Wireless EV-DO data network so if you happen to be in a city with access to the Broadband Access (VW’s name for their data network) network, you’ll love surfing on the 700w. Of course many web pages just won’t look all that good on the 700w and that really can’t be helped on a 240 x 240 display but many other web pages will come quickly. Make sure to check out the Windows Media web sites and download video clips.

As we saw earlier, the button layout on the 700w has also changed from prior Treo versions. To accommodate the notion of a start menu, Palm decided to include a start button. The button is really there so you don’t have to worry about using a stylus all the time to bring down the menu from the top. Palm also included an OK button because in the Windows Mobile world, you close out an application by pressing OK or the X button on the upper right corner. The OK button is not to be confused with activating highlighted or selected buttons on the screen. To activate those buttons, you need to press the center of the 5 button navigational control. Yes it’s a bit strange.

Here’s an important note about the OK button – it doesn’t actually tell the running application to exit. The GUI typical goes away and you go back to whatever you were doing before hand but the application is typically still around. Apps are normally shut down when Windows Mobile sees fit them to OR if you explicitly shut then down. So if you are not familiar with the Windows Mobile paradigm, then pressing OK to switch away from an application may seem a bit strange to you.

Now because these two buttons are on the Treo 700w AND you also need to have your typical call/end buttons, there just isn’t any room left for dedicated calendar or contacts buttons. That’s where the option key comes in. You press the option key and then you press one of the other four buttons to get to a secondary control. This isn’t the best option of course but it beats clicking the start button and then scrolling down to the program item you want to launch.

One of the features that I find helpful is the voice applet found in the Settings section of the OS. By default, the Voice features are disabled on the phone but should you enable it, you’ll find it nicely used throughout the phone. When you receive incoming calls, the phone will speak out the person’s name and the phone number. You don’t have to look at the phone to know who is calling – just listen to the synthesized voice. Calendar alerts will also be provided to you via voice.

So what if you want to do more than this? That’s where the Treo 700w starts showing cracks in the foundation. First and foremost, the 700w just doesn’t have enough Program memory available for lots of applications to be open at the same time. Despite the advertised claim of having 60MB of user accessible memory, you really only have roughly 25MB free for applications. If you’re not careful with how many apps are running simultaneously, you’ll frequently find yourself needing to shut down applications otherwise you’ll get out-of-memory warnings or worse – application slowdowns and even crashes!

In many ways, this limits what you can do with the 700w. You have plenty of room to install applications but how many of them will be able to run concurrently? We’re not quite sure.

Bluetooth is another sore spot on the 700w. Although I had no trouble pairing my Motorola Bluetooth headset with the Treo 700w, I did have trouble trying to connect the Treo with my computer at home and my Toshiba laptop. My computer at home used a Logitech diNovo Bluetooth setup and my Toshiba laptop had its own stack from Toshiba. Both devices could see the 700w but I could never get the systems to connect to allow me to sync over the air. Oh wait – one more item – there’s no voice dialing over Bluetooth – bummer.

The final disappointment is the resolution of the display. At 240 x 240, it’s a real setback for people coming over from the Treo 650. If you’ve been using a regular mobile phone all these years, then the resolution will be just fine for you. However, if you’ve been using higher end PDAs or even the older Treo 650, then this just won’t cut it.

Summary

After months of anticipation, I finally got my hands on a Palm Treo 700w. Would Palm work its magic with the Windows Mobile OS like it had with the Palm OS on the Treo 600 and 650? Well not quite. Don’t get me wrong folks. The Treo 700w isn’t a bad Smartphone at all. However, it could have been far better. The 700w suffers from a low memory ceiling, crippling of Bluetooth functionality, and a low resolution screen. If you already own a Palm Treo 600 or 650, you can probably stay where you are. However, if you’re in the market looking for a Windows Smartphone, consider the Treo 700w. However, consider the other Windows Smartphones out there also. That’s the beauty of it all – there’s actually a solid choice among mobile phone vendors and the 700w isn’t a clear cut winner above everyone else. It’s a good Smartphone for the phone user who happens to use a PDA here and there. It’s not a great Smartphone for heavy PDA users who live and breathe by the PDA.