Comments on: Palm Pre promises to explode into a supernova of suck

By: Austin

Austin — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 20:16:01 +0000

I have the iPhone 3G S(i’ve had every iPhone so far) and I have never had a dropped call with any of the iphones to date. And yes, MMS is available today; I’ve had MMS since August actually. So fuck the Pre.

By: Alex

Alex — Thu, 03 Sep 2009 15:41:48 +0000

someone said “How well does it voice dial when you’re using a bluetooth headset in a car? There are quite a few basic functions that the iPhone does not do that any cell phone should do from the start.” Well the Pre does not support voice dial either and it was released 4 years after the iphone, the Pre also does not allow you to forward a txt mesg, something EVERY other txt capable phone does…. and Palm is not saying if or when they are going to fix the hundred or so missing functions of the phone.

By: PJ

PJ — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 17:00:21 +0000

Full ofCrap, first you haven’t used the phone. And if you have, you’re purposefully misleading people. Either way, you’re useless.

1. You CAN receive phone calls with apps open.
2. The print is going to be tiny on any phone with a screen smaller than your monitor. That’s why there’s this thing called ZOOM.
3. The touch works of conductivity, not heat.
4. The YouTube only buffers if you have a bad connection, which will happen with any phone anywhere with a bad connection.
5. I’ve downloaded plenty of songs on wifi, and it’s worked fine. And I don’t see how a lack of wifi hot spots in your area, is the phones fault. (I would like to see downloading over EVDO offered though.)
6. The Palm Pre is not awful and given the alternatives, AT&T – too expensive, T-Mobile – Crap, Verizon – Breaks their own phones, disabling native features. Sprint is by far the best service, best value, with the best selection of phones.

By: Mad asHell

Mad asHell — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 11:46:09 +0000

I love Sprint, but am mad as HELL that I bought the new Palm Pre and it SUCKS!!!!!!! I was told that it was better than the iphone. I don’t know how good the iphone is but can tell you the Palm Pre sucks. When you have an app open, you can’t recieve calls, they go to voice mail. When you get on the web, the print is so tiny you need a maginifying glass to read it. If you turn the phone sideways, it gets a little bigger. But not much. It is hard to touch where you need to cause it is so small in comparrison to your finger. And you can’t narrow it with a stylus, because they don’t work since the touch works off heat. And the u tube sucks big time. U watch 2 secounds and it starts buffering again. And u have to have wifi on to download songs from amazon and can’t get wifi most places and when I do it still won’t download my songs. I just warn you not to waste ur money. I would love to have an iphone. But AT&T sucks too because after using them for 5 years they kicked us to the curb and told us we had to find a new carrier, because we didn’t make 50% of our calls in their area. So not my fault. They had my area when we first got them. Not my fault they sold the tower in my area or didn’t want to pay rent n e more. So I am just all around pissed that I can’t get what I want or have paid for. But buyer BEWARE, the PALM PRE IS AWEFUl!!!!!!!

By: Collin

Collin — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 22:39:47 +0000

It seems like there is just a lot of smack going on in here. My experience with the iPhone is that it is so completely AWESOME i almost can’t stand it. It does what it does so well, it is almost a substitute to my laptop. Honestly, I’ve never used a PRE, but I agree, you’ve had all these other phone manufacturers making pieces of crap for years…and now there seems to be resentment and bitterness just because of a blockbuster awesome piece of equipment (stop being whiny bitches, cause that’s what you sound like). As for network, I have personally used sprint. I dumped it not because of coverage per se, but because the phones never worked very well in doors (the pricing was great though). I love the fact that AT&T is GSM and that I can use my phone all over the world when I travel. Can’t say that for the Sprint phones. In fact, I’ve used my phone in probably 40 foreign countries (did not work in Japan, Burma or Rwanda).

I think the Pre comes across as a decent phone, but if the iPhone is so freaking bad, WHY ARE ALL THESE OTHER COMPANIES DOING THE BEST THEY CAN TO *COPY* THE IPHONE!!!!?

By: Colin

Colin — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 16:29:56 +0000

I am so tired of people trashing Sprint. I have been with sprint for over ten years and I can vouch that in almost all areas that I have travelled, I have had absolutely no problems with Voice or Data. This has especially true in the last three years. While living in NYC I was amazed how good the service was and had alot of friends that AT&T service that either went directly to voicemail (no ring) or would start to ring then cut off to dead air. Also, Sprints data coverage is excellent and throughput has been consistent. Lastly, they have stepped up to the plate and have really started working diligently at getting their customer service issues worked out. For the cost and quality of service, they cannot be beat right now.

By: Frosty

Frosty — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 14:19:27 +0000

My response to your 1,500 contacts was due to the fact your original complaint was that you had playdates you couldn’t find. I offered you a temp solution, and you didn’t want to do it.
- I mentioned in this specific case, they dropped the ball and it should have been in there… Please also note my previous post where I said they put in a fix for this. Your notes and reminders are now used.

The only things I have “acknowledged” is that YOU have a problem(s), not the phone.

If sliding the icon is too hard, slide the phone open.. here again I gave you another option, but apparently you can’t be bothered to slide the phone open, because that is just too difficult and not the way you want to do it! You sound like my 3 year old…

And, it looks like you are not only guilty of not reading anything on/about the phone, it would seem that when you do read something you are hallucinating:

“I also love how you acknowledge that there is no universal search”
No.. this is my response to your universal search:
“This is just completely false.”

“Despite my insistence on repeating myself the phone still won’t do universal search”

I think you might be confused on what a universal search is, so here’s the defintion:
Universal Search:
“Also known as blended, or federated search results, universal search pulls data from multiple databases to display on the same page”

See the key words there “pulls data from multiple databases to display on the same page”?
Yes, the Pre DOES do this, and it does it well.

“it still won’t shoot video”
It will shoot video, and Palm has already stated this. Again, you knew about this when you bought it, yet you are still complaining about it…

“it still won’t answer a call the way it was designed to”

I’m pretty sure all the rest of us Pre owners who manage to answer our phones on a daily basis would disagree with you.
Maybe what you meant to say was: it still won’t answer a call the way “I” want it to?

“it doesn’t truly do cut and paste and what it does do it does badly, selecting text blows”
Just because you have problems with it, doesn’t mean that it doesn’t work.
“and it doesn’t select or cut and paste anything but live text.”
Again, this was known upon purchase and release…and again, it’s in the works.

It’s like buying ice-cream and complaing no one told you it was going to melt…

“I’m not going to continue listing things here as the subject tiresome, like you.”
Thank God, because I’m getting really tired of looking up answer to all of your “problems” and proving you wrong!

By: Rahav

Rahav — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 13:29:36 +0000

Let me correct myself, maybe this forum is the right place for you.

By: Rahav

Rahav — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 13:25:43 +0000

Now this is devolving into silliness. This is the last time I will post on this forum about this but Frosty if you want to deny what’s as obvious as the nose on your face go ahead.
No I don’t have 1,500 people in my database that have a keyword playdate in the notes field, or the custom field or various other places – don’t be ridiculous. But I do have 1,500 contacts with notes that I can’t get at using the Pre. Sheesh if you want to act like a retard go somewhere else.
I love the part about you acknowledging that there’s an issue with answering the phone so your solution is I use a different method that I don’t want nor shouldn’t have to use to solve it.
I also love how you acknowledge that there is no universal search and then turn around and say that the only problem with the phone is it doesn’t have video – lol. Oh yeah and then there are all the other things that “are not wrong with it” that I’m being redundant about.
The fact that I’ve been ‘redundant’ in my summary of why I gave it back doesn’t make the problems with the phone go away.
Despite my insistence on repeating myself the phone still won’t do universal search, it still won’t shoot video, it still won’t answer a call the way it was designed to, it doesn’t truly do cut and paste and what it does do it does badly, selecting text blows and it doesn’t select or cut and paste anything but live text. I’m not going to continue listing things here as the subject tiresome, like you.
I only wish that by repeating myself I could make the issues with the phone that I have and that others do go away, but unfortunately I can’t. Your pointing out that I’m repeating myself as if that invalidates what I’m pointing out is laughable.
Bottom line – as far as I’m concerned – the phone sucks. I’ve outlined my reasons for giving my phone back. In the cases where I was wrong about something I’ve acknowledged that. In many more I’ve just been ‘redundant’ LOL.
The phone feels to me like being tied up inside a pretty box instead of free like I feel with the Centro a piece of old, but good technology.
Maybe someday soon the issues I’ve brought up and that others have brought up will be addressed and solved but for now the phone totally earns the other name I made up for it ; The Palm “Not Yet”.

By: Frosty

Frosty — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 12:17:31 +0000

I’ve gone back and re-read a lot of your posts here, and the majority of the things you say don’t work have been corrected or never existed.

I’ll give you that the notes field isn’t searchable (which you redundantly restate as multiple problems), but your main concern was playdates. I gave you a temp solution to this until it’s patched and then you said you didn’t want to go back through all 1,500 contacts to update them… Are you telling me your kid(s) have 1,500 friends to have playdates with?

“The reason is that I want my phone to do it’s primary function well. That is, to make it easy for me to find a contact and communicate with that person.
The Pre does not do this.”

This is just completely false. It doesn’t search the 1 field that you want…I have been reading all the main forums and you are the only person I’ve yet to see complain of this.
The fact is, the contact search is insanely fast to find who you are looking for. I’ve since added another 200 contacts, and I still have no problem finding who I’m looking for in seconds.

“I found answering the phone to be a harrowing experience. Having to move the icon over the rainbow to answer would often not be enough to get it to answer and the phone would frequently continue ringing a couple of more times before I could talk. Ditto with call waiting – completely buggy.”

And here I think we are starting to see the big picture. You haven’t read anything or searched for anything on the phone. As we in the tech industry like to say RTFM!

If sliding the icon was too hard for you…. slide the phone open!
And for call waiting.. I just can’t see how you have problems clicking the giant button???

“Ultimately what I need and want in a phone is a; phone, email/browser and camera with video in that order.”

….. The only thing in this list the Pre doesn’t do (yet) is video… and you HAD to have known this when you purchased it…

The Pre’s email solution is one of the best I’ve ever seen. I have 4 different accounts set up right now that I can check all in one place. Gmail, Yahoo, a POP connection and an EAS connection…
Not to mention the instant calendar integration…(which could have been used for playdates…)

I think PJ stated it best with this:
“Yeah, you don’t know the phone, or haven’t checked out the online forums.”

Your comment to PJ in “8b. I notice you didn’t comment about the tap-C non-functionality of cut and paste.”

He DID answer you.. it was:
“Umm..you’re not doing it right then.”
And he would be very correct. It works flawlessly (if you read the instructions).

“10. Synching your data is pretty much impossible…”
“Hotsync didn’t sync fully and reliably so you had to go out and buy missing sync or something else because Palm’s own (!) bundled desktop sync was so despicably incomplete”

Again.. guilty of not reading anything. And from the majority of what you posted, it almost sounds like you were attempting to use the previous “HotSync” created for the old Palm OS????

“11.Your contacts folder suddenly becomes populated by all of your gmail ‘contacts’ if you decide to use your gmail address. The only problem with this is that I have about 2,400 ‘contacts’ in my gmail account of which maybe 300 are meaningful contacts.”

Again, guilty of not reading…

“12. Search in the contacts folder is absolutely useless…”
- redundant…
“13. Oh, did I mention that there are no more categories?”
- see redundant above.
“14 Attached Notes? Gone. All those reminders you wrote to yourself about someone’s kid’s names or what their favorite baseball team is? Gone.”
- redundant…annnnd:
This was fixed. ;)

I just don’t have the time to go through and correct/respond to everything you’ve written..
I can’t even believe people are still posting to this story that was written before the Pre was even launched.

By: Frosty

Frosty — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 11:29:45 +0000

Vance…are you sure you’re posting in the right thread? I can’t find in anyone’s post what you have quoted.
The closest thing is:
“I have been using Sprint since 1999 in SF and LA and have always been satisfied.”

By: Vance Decker

Vance Decker — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 04:09:49 +0000

I just wanted to correct something:

“Sprint provides the best service in LA”

ROTFLMAO!!!

Put down the crack pipe!

Sprint has the worst service of any provider in the LA area. You can’t drive down Hollywood Blvd without getting a dropped call.

Sprint People, stop posting spam from Kansas!

By: Rahav

Rahav — Thu, 23 Jul 2009 16:57:26 +0000

Bye bye Pre.
I gave my Pre back two days ago and am so incredibly happy to have my Centro back. You win John, the phone sucks.
So many things left out of it that worked perfectly on the Centro and were useful, if not indispensable.
Thinking about why I gave it back I realized it’s not that I don’t want bells and whistles.
The reason is that I want my phone to do it’s primary function well. That is, to make it easy for me to find a contact and communicate with that person.
The Pre does not do this.
As I mentioned in a previous post, for some unfathomable reason, the developers of the phone ignored what was good about Palm OS, especially universal search. I don’t understand how they thought that the millions of installed users of Palm OS who have been using their databases for years and years would not freak out that they could no longer search within their notes, categories, custom fields and on and on. It’s just retarded – REALLY.
I found answering the phone to be a harrowing experience. Having to move the icon over the rainbow to answer would often not be enough to get it to answer and the phone would frequently continue ringing a couple of more times before I could talk. Ditto with call waiting – completely buggy.
I feel like the phone is so concerned with looking pretty that I’m supposed to forgive it for not working well. I can’t do that.
Ultimately what I need and want in a phone is a; phone, email/browser and camera with video in that order. All the other bells and whistles are great, love good graphics, love gps navigation, love bluetooth stereo, love fun games…
But if I don’t have the first three all the rest are close to meaningless.
The Pre is like a really gorgeous car with tremendous styling, great appointments, kicking sound system and a shitty engine.
Sprint has reinstated my old plan on my Centro which originally they told me they wouldn’t. I’m thrilled to have the Centro back and still be on Sprint.
Had Sprint not done that I would have switched to ATT and bought the iPhone 3GS. That’s a phone that unlike the Pre has it all NOW not at some unclear date in the future and for a phone where everything works the way you want it to I’d have paid extra for their plan.
So long Palm Pre-mature, maybe one day you’ll be where you need to be and I’ll revisit the idea of owning you.

By: Frosty

Frosty — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 14:05:12 +0000

If your Sprint contract is expiring…why would you be paying $400 for the Pre?

I upgraded my old Sprint phone to a Pre and didn’t pay that much. Both phones are listed as $199 with rebates. I get a feeling like you are leaving out some info?

If you have 2 phones, then it is $50 cheaper per month on Sprint’s network than it is on AT&T’s for the same plan.
And if you really want a new phone and you really want to use that new phone’s features, you’ll need one of those types of plans. (unlimited data, messages, Sprint TV and roaming)

If you really are interested in a fancy phone, you might want to check into what the Sprint rep was talking about in regards to MMS.

By: Jewsus

Jewsus — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 02:48:54 +0000

Here’s my take on the Pre-Iphone argument.

My wife and I want a fancy new phones, My sprint contrast ends in a few days

I called Sprint. Asked for some kinda discount for a long time costumer 10+ yrs. on a Pre.

They said no.

The costumer rep. went on and on about how in the long run the Palm Pre will be cheaper. Since the their plan would be cheaper.

He really piled on the iphone negatives, battery life, insurance, mms messaging,…blah blah blah..

Bottom line is I need 2 new phones.

Palm Pre 400 bucks.
Iphone 200 bucks.

I’m calling tomorrow from the at&t store and asking again before giving them a swift kick in the ass. Because in the long run I will have the extra 10-15 dollars extra each month the at&t plans will cost me.

but what I dont have is 400+ activation fees for 2 pre’s

on a side note, cant seem to find a proper rubber phone cover for the pre, since it slides up.

thanks for pushing a loyal costumer away sprint.

By: drew

drew — Sat, 11 Jul 2009 05:31:03 +0000

I beta tested the pre for two weeks. While there were some great features, they dropped the ball with the keyboard. It would not have taken a rocket scientist to have realized a horizontal layout would have made the phone a sure thing- all of these developers keep missing the mark- too many cooks in the corporate kitchen…they water down our cars with boring designs and there little focus groups are clueless they rely upon for guidance…

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By: Frosty

Frosty — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:56:04 +0000

I agree that someone dropped the ball on the contacts integration/data import.

It could be something that Palm will fix in a patch. I haven’t searched for it, but they may have a list on their site perhaps?

Also, I just wanted to point out that not all apps will have a fee. There were a ton of them (useful ones) that were free on the older phones.

I, for one, wouldn’t charge for anything I write. And I’d be willing to bet there are many others like me, who are just itching to dig into the code and start creating their own apps.

By: rahav

rahav — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 13:25:54 +0000

1. The problem with this solution is it only works for new entries. I’m not going to go back into 1,500 records in my Palm desktop and change the locations of the notes. The Centro would find everything in a record – the Pre will not. So I have no way to effectively search established records in the Pre and I know your solution is not to go into each of my old records and start jiggering with the location of the tags.
With the Treo I didn’t need to wait for third party applications. It worked the way you needed it to right out of the box.
Until these third party solutions come out – that I HOPE address my issue – and that I will have to pay more money for – I do not have access to the depth of my database on my handheld.
And here’s the craziest part – it’s not like I put my tags in some obscure place – they are in the f*ing notes field! When the designers of the phone thought about where this thing was going look when you do searches they didn’t think the notes field was a useful place to index!
Why that’s just brilliant!!
2. You are correct about this, thank you.

By: Frosty

Frosty — Tue, 30 Jun 2009 11:45:44 +0000

“12. Search in the contacts folder is absolutely useless.”

I have over 500 contacts from business to random facebook people, and I have no problem what so ever finding the person I’m looking for in a matter of seconds.

I know this isn’t an ideal solution, but, If you can’t remember the parent’s names of your “Playdates”, add “Playdates” as a company name for them..then you can search/sort on that.

The contacts list needs some bells and whistles added to it, but it is still functional. I’m sure once they release the SDK you’ll start to get more options.

“2. One event that re-occurs three times a week, like class at the gym you like to go to. Even if it’s AT THE SAME TIME, Mon, Wed, Sat. you are not going to be able schedule it in one go on your Pre. You could do this easily on the Centro.”

You need to do a bit more exploring, or search online. The calendar CAN do what you are asking.

Select a day and add your event. Click the little “i” to add more details, and where it says “No Repeat” click that, and select “Custom”.
Now, in the custom options, where it says “Daily”, click “Daily” and change it to “Weekly” and select the days you want it to repeat.

You can set to skip weeks here as well, and you can also set it to repeat this event on said days forever.