Guardian Article: Can Palm find a way to survive?

I think you've said it best. My whole PDA experience is with Palm beginning at the start with the 5000 and routinely upgrading with each advancement. I purchased the T3 and sat and waited for the opportunity to move to integrate my pda with my cell phone. I want a phone with wifi capabilities and I'm not interested in a thumb keyboard. I want Graffiti. If I could make calls from my T3 I'd be all set. So I will move on and leave the Palm OS behind. Sadly and the greater issue for Palm is, while I've minimized handheld purchases, I am an avid buyer of programs and applications and will now make purchases on a different operating system. That is where Palm's base will truly show signs of erosion as buyers leave and developers chase and follow them to another system. I have waited this long to move to another system because of my investment in these programs for the Palm OS. I do not foresee coming back when Palm finally releases a worthy product and duplicating my investment.

I'm switching too! I'm waiting for the availability of HP 210 iPaq. And check their HP's website everyday even though I've subscribed to be notified! :P I downloaded Windows Mobile 5's emulator and found it a very pleasant environment. Multitasking so the ability to switch back and forth between programs (state intact), opening multiple tabs in IE, dozens of web-browsers available, Unicode font support, block-recognizer [Graffiti One] which is fast and accurate, add to it a 4" VGA screen, 600Mhz cpu and replacable battery of HP 210 iPaq.

I bought a Palm TX in replacement of a dead Palm T3 (dead battery) just because of 5 years worth of data that I have on my PDA. Notes, contacts, journal entries, time logs, expenses ... And now I have to find similar softwares, and ways to port the old data to the new OS. If the T3's battery wouldn't die I wouldn't even buy the TX and would switch to WM directly after the T3.

Microsoft had the vision, they started with a product with a solid core, then they changed it through years to suit the specifics of handheld devices. They showed they have management. The impression is that there is someone there who knows what he's doing, has the vision, and is a superb manager. Steady flow of newer versions, improved each time. So simply Microsoft offers a better product today and I don't see any reason to be willing to remain on Palm OS anymore. 12-18 months??? Sick and tired of this "new multi-tasking OS" thing. We've been hearing it for years. How many years they've been saying this by the way????? When there is this wonderful multi-tasking OS right now out there why should I wait for Palm?

By the way, what's the reason behind 'no replaceable' batteries on Palm TXs. Is it for keeping the cost down or forcing the customer to buy a new one when the battery is dead? My old Sony Clie SJ22 has relacable battery!!

My 600 was mostly better then the 650, exept the low-res screen

And Bluetooth, improved camera software, the removable battery, and NVFS (contentious, I know, but I prefer a device that doesn't forget everything when the battery runs flat).

Yep, it was an incremental upgrade, but it was still definitely an upgrade.

4" VGA screen

Seriously, something to drool over. Have you compared the dimensions of that unit vs. the TX?
TX (via my micrometer) - 78 x 14 x 121 mm
iPAQ 210 - 76 x 16 x 126 mm

The HP is actually less wide and only slightly larger in the other two dimensions, but with a 4" screen! Again, just what we've been asking for: max screen in a minimal body.

The rest of the specs are fantastic as well: SD and CF slots, internal mic, 3.5mm headphone jack, mic in, two speakers, removable 2200mhz battery, BT 2.0, 802.11 b/g. Unless this thing costs an obscene amount of money, anyone wanting a higher end PDA has got to at least take a serious look at it.

So once again I'll repeat that if Palm is going to force me to a WinMob device, it won't be Palm branded.


Thinking about Vista? Think again: http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt
Want an alternative? Try this: http://www.ubuntu.com/ or http://www.mepis.org/

Pair this thing with a solid Bluetooth keyboard and a tiny dumbphone and you have a REAL mobile manager!

Pilot 1000-->Pilot 5000-->PalmPilot Pro-->IIIe-->Vx-->m505-->T|T-->T|T2-->T|C-->T|T3-->T|T5-->TX-->Treo 700P

Yup, that's me that claims the Palm V is right up there with the iconic all-time great designs in the history of electronics....the Palm V is right up there with the original Mac, the StarTac, the Gameboy, Sony Walkman etc. Of course, the Palm V is the iconic one but I feel the m500 actually perfected the design.

And I still give huge props to Handspring for the Visor Edge design. They probably spent a fraction of what Palm did (did Handspring do it in-house? I'm pretty sure the Edge was not done by Ideo) and other than the horrible stylus placement, fixed flip cover and lame mini-Springboard slot (that was the device that should've kicked off SD for Handspring) it was a superb piece in every way, surpassing the Palm V in several aspects.

Side by side review/pics of two classics, in case anyone's feeling nostalgic:

http://the-gadgeteer.com/review/handspring_visor_edge_review

Pilot 1000-->Pilot 5000-->PalmPilot Pro-->IIIe-->Vx-->m505-->T|T-->T|T2-->T|C-->T|T3-->T|T5-->TX-->Treo 700P

ahhhhhh, 1999. those were the days...

http://the-gadgeteer.com/review/palm_v_review

life was so much simpler back then.

Treo was never an option due to the screen size

The screen size is so important for me too. That's why I'm a two piece PDA/cellphone type. HP's new series is a ray of hope. I really hope that classic PDAs don't die because they could be such useful devices. Or at least be replaced by phone/pda hybrids that have similar dimensions and screen size to PDAs. But the down side of the second alternative [phone-pdas] is the price.

I'm actually surprised at how easily my TX paired with my Nokia 6233 and how seamlessly it works. SMS is always done from my TX since I can enter graffiti much more quickly than pecking on those tiny keys. YMMV.


Thinking about Vista? Think again: http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt
Want an alternative? Try this: http://www.ubuntu.com/ or http://www.mepis.org/

Chung Hwa Telecom, though I doubt that helps you at all. :)


Thinking about Vista? Think again: http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.txt
Want an alternative? Try this: http://www.ubuntu.com/ or http://www.mepis.org/

Baal;

Without retreading old ground too much, here's the nutshell summary:

Early CDMA BT phones unofficially worked with older (T2, T3, T5) Palm devices for BT DUN. Then Palm disabled CDMA BT DUN functionality on the LifeDrive & TX (likely either at the request of Sprint & Verizon or b/c they wanted to act chummy with the large CDMA telcos).

Palm never officially supported CDMA BT DUN in the first place but they went out of their way to disable it in their final two non-smartphone releases with Bluetooth. Then Verizon changed (or disabled?) their CHAP authentication over BT to really break things for users of older POS handhelds. Again, I'm recalling all of this from memory since it doesn't do me any good to dwell on this matter anymore b/c it makes my blood boil.

Anyway, I think that this CHAP authentication change basically rendered WinMob handhelds & Wintel PCs still compatible but locked out Palm OS devices (based on inherent OS limitations). Some brave souls on Brighthand/HoFo modded their Verizon phones' firmware to bypass this authentication but that's something I've never felt comfortable doing with a work-issued handset.

So my guess is that Palm worked in partnership with the telcos to disable PDA BT DUN in favor of all parties selling higher-margin Treos with the accompanying overpriced data plans.

Now look where Palm's pillow talk with the carriers has got them.....no one but Sprint wanting to even look at a Garnet-based unit, increasingly fierce WinMob competition, the Fooleo dead in the water, and a practically moribund PDA line.

I said several years ago that Palm could have extended the useful lifespan of their handhelds by releasing a series of TX & T|C-style handhelds that could work fine as standalone devices or could work in tandem with *ANY* Bluetooth handset on the market, regardless of carrier. If the domestic telcos would adopt reasonable ($10/month for BT tethering for handhelds, $20 for laptops etc) pricing policies, then the folks who prefer two devices could be happy alongside the folks who like a single converged device.

What if Apple wants to begin installing BT in the Touch as a way of offering an "almost iPhone" for people who don't like AT&T's coverage and/or want or must carry a different cell phone? THAT might make the carriers wake up and pay attention!

Pilot 1000-->Pilot 5000-->PalmPilot Pro-->IIIe-->Vx-->m505-->T|T-->T|T2-->T|C-->T|T3-->T|T5-->TX-->Treo 700P

Perhaps PALM is thinking of doing all that has been discussed about "just release a PDA ya Dummies!".

I refer all a-GAIN to the words that Andy Brown said about rethinking.

Will they even be around in 12 - 18 months?

This is getting so old that even old faithfuls have got to be preparing to bail. This is the same song and dance that we heard back in 2004 with Cobalt. Still, we have almost nothing compelling beyond what was created at Palm in 2003. As someone said before, if I only had call, WiFi, and 3G on my 2003 model TT3, then I would be in high cotton.

We have been begging for this forever, and we still get 12-18 months. Ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna step out on a limb on this one. Palm-Linux by Palm Inc will NEVER see the light of day. It's vaporware. Palm may be a vaporCo soon too. They tried unsuccessfully to sell it earlier this year and nobody wanted the albatross. I think if I were Motorola, I would swoop in and buy this thing for pennies on the $, just to try to wring something outta the Treo name and the marketing channels.

This "12-18" month statement is the last straw for me. My 680 is sooo awesome and just needs some updating. But, I think the party is over. These people have basically milked this thing into certain death. I feel sad.

Pat Horne

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm gonna step out on a limb on this one. Palm-Linux by Palm Inc will NEVER see the light of day. It's vaporware.

I disagree on this one. I think it's different from the Cobalt debacle. Cobalt never saw the light of day in large part because of the ridiculous corporate games that Palm/Source were playing at the time. There was different leadership, different engineers, different priorities. I refer everyone to the interview Hawkins gave back in March this year:

Jeff Hawkins: OK, let’s put this in perspective. First of all, Palm, in my mind, is in the best shape it’s been in, in a long, long time. It’s amazing this company is still around. It was split up, the founders were kicked out, and they sold off the operating system. It’s nothing that I or Ed or Donna had anything to do with; but, this company has been operated in…many different ways.

Now, look at Palm today: we have Ed, practically a founder, running the business. Donna (Dubinsky) is on the board, and I’m still involved. We have our name back. We just bought the rights back to Palm OS from ACCESS; so we now have control of the Operating System again. One of the main reasons we did a Windows-based product is because we were worried we wouldn’t have access to the Palm OS. Palm is in complete control of its destiny again.

PJA: I think releasing WinMo devices was a smart move, in any case.

JEFF: It probably was; but here’s the thing: we didn’t have control of our own destiny for the past 5 years. We didn’t have our name, we didn’t have our brand, and we own our OS. We were struggling to get into the smartphone space, while we were losing our traditional distribution channels. It was a difficult time. While all this was going on, Palm kept growing; and, is still growing rapidly. Although there are lots of competitors, Palm is a very healthy company. We’ve been profitable for many consecutive quarters, years really; and, we’re making lots of money; and, we finally feel like we have control of our destiny back in our hands again.

Now, it takes a little but of time to turn that into products. It takes 2 years to design new products, and so you don’t see this control reflected immediately in the product line. In my view, this is a good time at Palm. In terms of viability, we have lots of cash, we’re profitable, and we’re in control of our own destiny. We haven’t been in this kind of shape in a long, long time.

SV:
I would assume that PALM, having thrown up their hands in disgust and dumped the Fooleo's Linux for Windriver's

How many times, SV, must we go over this? Palm were making a planned transition from Intel's 2.4 linux kernel to Windriver's 2.6 kernel. Unless you seriously suggest they should have stuck with outdated tech forever?

Tim
I apologise for any and all emoticons that appear in my posts. You may shoot them on sight.
Treo 270 ---> Treo 650 ---> Crimson Treo 680

anything Hawkins says is suspect - wasn't he the one who spoke at length about what an innovative and groundbreaking product foleo was? Case closed!

> ...Are you suggesting they should have stuck with Linux 2.4 forever?...

My statement was:

== "PALM threw up their hands in disgust and dumped their own
== modified version of Linux and decided to go with WindRiver's instead"

The context of that statement ORIGINALLY was the a-STOUND-ing news that PALM had ... well ... dumped years of development ONE MONTH BEFORE they were supposed to ship THE NEXT GREAT THING and that "over the coming months" were going to be releasing WindRiver's version instead. That was an a-MAZ-ing self-condemnation of their own Fooleo Linux development. It doesn't MATTER what gimmicks (*) the existing Fooleo Linux had, it is READILY apparent that the overall system was broken - badly.

Ever since then, I've used that same statement as context for other comments but it and the reason for it has pretty much remained unchanged.

In no way does that statement say ANYTHING about NOT =eventually= moving on to other versions of Linux.

==========

(*) Yes, gimmicks. "Instant on"...but "instant on" only if your application has been specially programmed to be instant on otherwise instant on doesn't work. Ill-defined "auto-sync"...but "auto sync" only if there is a special client running on the phone as well as on the Fooleo and your phone application knows about that client. A menu system that purportedly is ONE level deep (admittedly, I've seen only ONE post elsewhere about this but it was from someone who went to a Fooleo hands-on who also is (was?) a PALM fanboy so I believe it...YMMV).

The Rubinstein timeframe was in different articles. For example:
http://origin.mercurynews.com/business/ci_6882548

“Q: When will we see the first fruits of the Elevation deal?

“A: We haven’t been sitting on our hands. . . . We’re continuing to execute on our future products.

“Realistically, Jon’s direct involvement, you’re not going to see the fruits of that for 18 months.”

In the Guardian article, notice which words are direct Colligan quotes and which are the Guardian's words. It wouldn't be hard to get the details mixed up.

The only direct quote in that paragraph is "it will be 12 to 18 months". The rest of the paragraph is the Guardian's rewording of what they think they heard. We can only hope that the quote is in context and the rewording is accurately paraphrased from the original.