O2 adds Treo 500 to roster

by Terrence O'Brien posted Apr 30th 2008 at 5:54AM

British carrier O2 has added the previously Vodafone-exclusive Treo 500 to its roster of business class smartphones. O2 is offering Palm's latest Windows Mobile handset for free with certain data and voice plans, which is probably the only way the company could get anyone to take these underwhelming hunks of plastic off their hands.

[Via the::unwired]

Filed under: Handsets, Palm, O2, Windows Mobile, GSM, UMTS

Tags: smartphone, treo, treo 500, Treo500

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

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Palmit Off @ Apr 30th 2008 8:48AM

>>> "...probably the only way the company could get anyone to
>>> take these underwhelming hunks of plastic off their hands..."

Oh come on - tell us what you really think!

Lol!

Highly Ranked

Kal-El @ Apr 30th 2008 8:54AM

You guys seem to hate Palm...

Neutral

Iscariote @ Apr 30th 2008 10:50AM

Palm's phones are gigantic and underpowered.

Neutral

FyreStarrter @ Apr 30th 2008 9:29AM

ACtually I don't think it's about "hating" Palm. The past 4-5 years or so they have REALLY made some poor decisions about the quality & the features of the merchandise they put out. As a result a market where Palm used to have some dominance, the pda/smartphone market, they now a living hand to mouth in. I used to LOVE Palm & then the Treo 650 came out with all is constant memory issues & the the hideous 700w & 700wx & then the CENTRO??? WTF where they thinking. Their entire R&D staff needs to be hauled out by their cajones & SHOT.

Neutral

Kal-El @ Apr 30th 2008 9:56AM

Well I actually dont care for the form of the Centro cause of the keyboard, but you have to admit for first time users of a step-up from a standard phone, the sales dont lie... Also for something that is internally the same as the 755p, pretty powerful for under $100...
I actually love Palm but I do believe the new form function of the 850 should be pretty nice esp. with Wi-Fi

Neutral

MJ @ Apr 30th 2008 11:26AM

This Treo is actually a decent handset, especially for those who don't want a Blackberry or one of the O2 branded smartphones.

@ Iscariote - It's not huge (though it is slightly wider than the Centro so the keyboard isn't as cramped) and though it may not be as slim as a Moto Q it's certainly easier on the hands.

It's also reasonably snappy for a standard winmo device, and just because it isn't manufactured by HTC doesnn't mean it's crap.

Add in 3G and its not a bad handset for browsing the web/emails (and blackberry handsets require an extra £10 ($20ish) on top of the monthly charge to even get the browser working.

One more point, near enough every handset is 'free' over here in the UK on 18 month contracts, its the really expensive handsets (N95 8GB, E90, Tytn II, Arte) that require cash towards the phone, and even then after a month or so they start being bundled in with the contract, so saying they are trying to offload them 'cos they're free is a little bit misleading.

Neutral

Duscrom @ Apr 30th 2008 11:57AM

Wait... is that a WinMo 6 Centro?

Like is that the same internals as the Centro, from the outside, it looks pretty much identical...

Neutral

Al @ Apr 30th 2008 1:18PM

It is a little wider than the Centro, it is 3G and GSM unlike the GSM Centro which supports EDGE only. Not to mention it believed that Asus is the ODM for this device, not sure who the Centro ODM is. I would so like to get a CDMA version of this for my mother.

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