
It's been about a year since Palm pulled itself back from the brink of imminent destruction with the announcement of webOS and the Palm Pre, and even less time since the products announced actually hit the market. In that time span, the company has issued another handset (the small, less powerful Pixi), released a number of over-the-air updates to its OS (nine in all), and created and disseminated a slew of developer tools, including iterative releases of its SDK and a new web-based development environment called Ares. Throughout the ups and downs of the past 12-or-so months Palm has been "back," the company has stuck with Sprint as its lone carrier partner in the US -- so while it's been innovating and tweaking on its platform and devices, the third-place partner has kept it from the larger audiences AT&T or Verizon might offer. Now -- almost a year to the day -- Palm has turned around and opened its devices up to the country's largest carrier, in addition to bumping the specs and features of both phones it offers (the Pre getting an additional 8GB of storage and double the RAM, the Pixi is now equipped with WiFi). All the while significantly improving its SDK (with the new native Plug-in Development Kit) and app distribution model. So can Palm finally really get this ship sailing, court the developers it badly needs, and deliver on the promises of webOS, or is it too little, too late? Read on to find out!

First off, there's not a lot to say about substantial hardware or software changes to either of these devices -- they are very much the same phones we've used (and reviewed) for Sprint. In fact, as a primer to this review, we suggest you take a look at our encyclopedic rundown of the Pre and webOS, and our more recent Pixi review for the basics. We'll concentrate on the Pre Plus here, since it's undergone the most significant and noticeable changes (both externally and internally).
Hardware

As far as looks go, this should all seem very familiar to those of you who've checked out the Sprint Pre. That physical home button has been replaced with a thin LED slit, just like the Pixi, and in general we don't see it as much of a change, though we did miss the tactile feel of the physical button now and again. Even if it didn't get a lot done, the click was nice to hear. The new style certainly goes a way to retain the "polished stone" design motif which the company has touted, and we can't complain too much about clean, unbroken surfaces on our gadgets. Palm also says that the hinge for the slider mechanism (a pain point on older models of the phone) has been improved as well, and in our tests it does seem a bit tighter, though we noticed that when we used the phone with the keyboard open, it seemed to want to slide shut a bit easier than the previous version. Additionally, the company has altered the keyboard to be a bit more stiff and plasticky (a la the Pixi), though it's by no means as clicky as we'd like it to be. The overall effect is minor, and coupled with the fact that the company has yet to really tighten up its word correction / prediction, typing on the Pre still takes some getting used to. We're also not sold on the new monochromatic color scheme for the keyboard -- being able to clearly see the orange number keys was a nice little touch, now it's a bit of a challenge to find the digits.
Otherwise, changes are nonexistent, even down to the cheap, plastic cover which Palm uses on the MicroUSB door here -- we broke the first one on our original Sprint test unit, and every time we pull the thing up, it feels precarious. We wish they'd gone in the direction of the Pixi with this (a small flap which doesn't have to be pushed into place). Overall, it's the same Pre you know and / or love. Palm took smarter steps with the industrial design of the Pixi -- which feels like a more solid phone -- and we wish they'd have put some of that juice into a new version of the Pre.
Internals

Besides the small spec increase, you're left with the same phone that's been out since June -- not necessarily a bad thing, but we think Palm is likely due for some new hardware soon, especially given the current trend of smartphones with higher resolution screens; devices like the Pre and iPhone are starting to look a little cramped compared with the Nexus Ones of the world.
One other note -- the sound quality on the Pixi seems substantially better to us than the Pre, both on the earpiece and speaker. The Pre produced shrilly, almost painful mid-rangey tones, while the Pixi was much smoother and pleasant. Here's hoping Palm makes some changes in this area on upcoming hardware... though we've been spoiled by the Droid when it comes to sound on cellphones.
Software

Besides that inclusion, the software is the familiar version you probably know. Now, Palm has done a series of updates (as we noted in the intro), and the company has taken pains to add much-needed features and squash bugs. Unfortunately, we've been reminded about what is missing in webOS during our testing much more than we've been surprised by the additions (of course, we've also been tracking these updates closely). We're still waiting for basic inclusions in the software, like the ability to set our own notification tone (and set it for different alerts), better word prediction and correction on the keyboard, multiple message management in the email app (really guys?), a decent way to manage Synergy contacts and calendars, and a handful of other obvious changes that we have yet to see (we won't even get into our plea for threaded emails). And then there's the issue of consistency and speed -- for a phone which boasts a CPU as powerful as the iPhone 3GS, you certainly don't see it shine here like you expect it to. Applications still take longer than they should to open, and we still saw some lag during heavy use. We also take issue with notifications on webOS -- the little pop-ups are handy, but compared with Android, Palm still has a ways to go towards making them manageable. When you get four or five messages at a time, things can get a little hairy. And it needs to be said: the mail application is just not that good. It really needs some TLC from Palm.
Palm promises speed improvements in the next iteration of the software along with battery life improvements, and both are definitely needed. In particular, the battery life on the Pre is just awful when put through a day of heavy use. In our initial review, we noted you probably couldn't get through a full day, but now it feels like you might not even get through an afternoon. On one lengthier call (about 50 minutes), we watched our battery life dip from 67 percent to 24 percent. That's just unacceptable as far as we're concerned -- this is an issue that must be addressed by the company if it keeps pushing these data-heavy services.

And that brings us to the PDK -- or Plug-in Development Kit. With the new tools for developers, app-makers will be able to create the same content- and graphically-rich applications that they would for say... the iPhone. We've already seen this demonstrated in the form of a handful of 3D games now available for the Pre (sorry Pixi users -- you're out in the cold here). As a first pass at gaming on the Pre, the offerings are excellent. While we noticed a slightly lower frame rate when compared side-by-side with the iPhone 3GS, they still held their own. Graphically, we couldn't see much of a difference, though the Pre's smaller screen squashed some of the details out of scenery. Small issues notwithstanding, the crop of applications using the PDK show enormous potential for webOS. Provided Palm gets these tools into the hands of developers and lets them go crazy, we could see some fascinating new software for this platform.
Network / Pricing<

As far as pricing is concerned, Verizon isn't breaking any new ground with the Pre Plus and Pixi Plus. The devices will be available for $149.99 and $99.99, respectively, with a two-year contract and mail-in $100 rebate. If you're smart and buy the devices online, you get that rebate instantly, and Verizon is also offering a buy-one-get-one deal through February 14th which lets you pick up a free Pixi Plus with the purchase of either device.
Wrap-up

So let's just talk about the Pre Plus for a moment.
As far as phones go, it is by no means perfect -- like the iPhone 3GS or the Nexus One or the Droid, it has its issues, and you will find yourself annoyed by certain decisions Palm has made here. It should be obvious that as a smartphone buyer, you have some amazing options right now. If you're a Verizon customer, you can get the excellent Droid, or wait for the forthcoming Nexus One, to say nothing of the BlackBerry offerings on the network (if that's your cup of tea). If you're carrier independent, then your choice is even harder -- T-Mobile, Sprint, and AT&T offer a stack of seriously great phones that would make even the pickiest geek happy. So why choose the Pre Plus on Verizon? To answer that question, you have to figure out if you believe in the potential of webOS devices; Palm doesn't have the fastest phone, or the phone with the highest resolution, certainly not the biggest app selection, and it doesn't have a massive community behind it. What it does have, however, is a brilliant platform with huge potential to change the way you work and live with your phone (provided they tap that potential soon... as in now). If you're as hopeful as we are that that potential will be fulfilled, your decision should be a simple one.
Multitasking with simultaneous 50 apps
Yea, you read that right -- fifty apps loaded side by side by freaking side on the Pre Plus, and the thing just kept on ticking. The chaps over at Pre Central decided to test out specifically how much of an improvement the doubling of RAM and storage in the new handset delivered, and they were not disappointed. Opening up the same apps on both phones, they found the original Sprint Pre (sporting a mere 256MB of RAM) ran out of puff at the 13 app mark, whereas the Pre Plus soldiered on until a nice round fifty was reached. Go past the break to see the video evidence for yourself -- long live multitasking!
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