Sprint Launches a Palm Centro TV Commercial

Posted By: Kris Keilhack Monday, November 12, 2007 8:56:06 AM

Palm CentroThe new co-branded Sprint Palm Centro commercial is now available for viewing on YouTube. By our best estimation, this if Palm’s first TV spot since a Verizon Treo 700p spot focusing on Verizon's network coverage ceased airing earlier this year. Read on the video clip.

In another sign that Palm and Sprint's marketing departments remain blissfully uninformed and detached from Palm's engineering department, the commercial touts the fact that "multitaskers" (presumably business users looking to buy a Centro) who "have found a way to do several things at once" despite the fact that the aging Palm OS Garnet is not a multi-tasking, multi-threaded OS.

Also interesting is the fact that the commercial is narrated by a grizzled middle-aged engineer type instead of the hip youth/teen market seen at the Centro’s unveiling in New York City at the Digital Life show in September. Few "action" shots of the Centro are actually shown and those that are showcase the red Centro instead of the more widely-available black version.

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In other words...

abosco @ 11/12/2007 4:18:44 PM # Q
The commercial is absolutely useless, does nothing to inspire any form of desire for the device, and was probably drafted by a few of the remaining overpaid marketing guys.

"Let's add in special effects, not show the product at all, and have some old guy do the narration."

Brilliant.

-Bosco
NX80v + Wifi + BT + S710a

RE: In other words...
medevilenemy @ 11/12/2007 9:33:33 PM # Q
Remember, folks, that palm has very rarely pushed television advertisement for its products. When they have, they were relatively short and weren't even seen very often (though I do remember one notable push a couple years back). Anyway, this commercial was probably made without the direct involvement of palm.

Anyway, sprint will probably look to run one or two other commercials on the centro, as they often do for notable new products. We'll just have to see if they get the point.

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Dishonest

Timothy Rapson @ 11/12/2007 6:13:42 PM # Q
Microsoft or Nokia/Symbian ought to sue these fools. Palm's 50-year-old OS does NOT even work half the time, much less do multiple things at once.

RE: Dishonest
just_little_me @ 11/12/2007 9:40:03 PM # Q
Glad to see that the litigious nature of morons in this world is alive and kicking... sue them for what exactly? Do you know what you're talking about?? Did you take your meds this morning...?

The trains stopping Tim - I think it's your stop...


JLM.

RE: Dishonest
joad @ 11/13/2007 12:00:39 AM # Q
I've used Microsoft's mobile offerings - the countersuit from Palm could be even more fun to see!

|
**Another vote for a >100MB RAM Treo**
s
Timothy Rapson @ 11/13/2007 7:02:31 AM # Q
"Glad to see that the litigious nature of morons in this world is alive and kicking... sue them for what exactly? Do you know what you're talking about?? Did you take your meds this morning...?

The trains stopping Tim - I think it's your stop...


JLM."


Sue them for what?

Well, my FITALY software won't work in the current Palms because even though they claim "THOUSANDS" of software titles many no longer work. Neither does DiddleBug nore does Bugme work right. I have now tried to use Documents To Go on my Palm 71, 72, and E2 and it only runs half the time I use it, locks up the computer the other half.

I can no longer search PDA-wide because they broke the OS. Why? I don't know. Don't care. I am just getting out of the POS and PPC long nightmare.

But at the bare minimum Palm and Sprint should not advertise that the Palm is great for those who want to multitask. That is just one step over the line.

RE: Dishonest
dvoulgaris @ 11/13/2007 9:22:20 AM # Q
Any Symbian phone, or Nokia as it was referred above, takes LONGER to boot, LONGER to reach any application, and I don't see them multitask... If you tell me it can play music while you type an SMS (with the "great T9" input method, or the lousy full keyboards), then any Palm OS 5.x machine can do it and faster.

As for PPC, I haven't seen any that work faster than a 680, Centro. It's not about the hard, but about the OS and how easy to use it, it is.

And PPC multitasking... it's a pathetic joke. It does it, and then the device turns to run slower than an original Palm Pilot... Or it freezes.

Garnet, is as powerful as those so called "super-new-multitasking-multithreading" mobile OSs, the problem with Palm is that they have a very bad marketing department, so people believe that a SonyEricsson 9xx, a Nokia Communicator or a PPC smartphone are better, while it's the other way around.

My 2 cents,

Cya!

RE: Dishonest
retrospooty @ 11/14/2007 10:03:00 PM # Q
"Microsoft or Nokia/Symbian ought to sue these fools. Palm's 50-year-old OS does NOT even work half the time, much less do multiple things at once."

Oh pleeeeease. It works just fine, its outdated is all, and sue for what exactly? The commercial doesnt imply the Centro is a great multitasker, it implies the people using are multitasking (as in getting things done while out of the office, or home)

I am as disappointed in Palm as the next guy, but your comments are rediculous.

Symbian
tompi @ 11/17/2007 1:16:35 AM # Q
Well, after many years using Palm, I moved from Palm to Symbian last year. Symbian has a worse user interface than Palm and it is about as buggy. The big advantage of Symbian over Palm is that Symbian supports more modern standards and functionality: 3G, HSDPA, A2DP, podcasting, MPEG4, Java, full web browsing, high resolution cameras, and a few other things. And multitasking does actually work in Symbian. Overall, I haven't regretted the switch, but I won't shed a tear if someone else eats Symbian's lunch.

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???

hmayesh @ 11/12/2007 10:18:38 PM # Q
It is a sad day in Treoville when commercials are the big news of the day. I would rather hear about new devices or operating systems. So sad.
Reply to this comment

Soccer Moms

DarthRepublican @ 11/13/2007 7:10:56 PM # Q
They seem to be going after soccer moms instead of young/hip types.

RE: Soccer Moms
Gekko @ 11/13/2007 7:41:21 PM # Q

milfs



RE: Soccer Moms
DarthRepublican @ 11/13/2007 9:29:53 PM # Q
Not judging from the commercial I saw.

RE: Soccer Moms
hkklife @ 11/13/2007 9:50:45 PM # Q
We determined here at least 2 years ago that the Z22 is Palm's "MILF/Soccer Mom"-oriented product.



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

RE: Soccer Moms
rpa @ 11/18/2007 3:35:10 AM # Q
Sorry, milfs is what? I need to get out more...

rpa
Palm Pilot >> Palm Tungsten E user
Reply to this comment

The Centro is pretty sweet

JackG @ 11/17/2007 9:39:24 PM # Q
As a longtime Palm OS user, I have posted about my irritations with Palm over the 700p issues, as I own a Sprint version. Palm did finally get the thing running decently with the ROM update, but it took them so long that it took awhile for me to get over it, and I ended up purchasing a WinMo HTC Mogul on Sprint. That was a mistake. The Mogul has more issues than the 700p ever did. After already in four months time having two different Moguls, and with no ROM fix for it in site, I asked Sprint to swap me for a Centro. I am so happy I did. I love this device. The keyboard, although smaller, is actually quite usable, and I find that I can one-hand more easily now. The screen is a bit smaller, but in retaining the sharp 320x320 resolution it is still very nice. The sound quality from the external speaker just blows the 700p away. Tunes sound really nice on it, for a one speaker device. Palm and Sprint are selling these like hotcakes, as well they should, for this device is what the 700p should have been. I've not had one crash, it is fast, and it comes with some nice built-in programs. So I'd just suggest rather than just bash Palm at least give the Centro a look, and see if they aren't heading a better direction than they were going.

RE: The Centro is pretty sweet
rpa @ 11/18/2007 3:38:35 AM # Q
Sounds great.....waiting, waiting, waiting for the GSM version.

rpa
Palm Pilot >> Palm Tungsten E user
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