The Palm Pre, yes it can get smudge-tastic. (click to enlarge)

“This is a day I’ve been looking forward to for two and a half years,” said Steve Jobs back in 2007 when the original iPhone. “Today we’re introducing three revolutionary products… a widescreen iPod with touch controls… a revolutionary mobile phone… and a breakthrough internet communications device… and we’re calling it the iPhone.”

Ever since, the rest of the mobile phone industry has been playing catchup.

The Palm Pre is not the iPhone. It’s not the iPhone 3G. It’s not the iPhone 3GS. The Palm Pre wasn’t made in Cupertino. It doesn’t shoot magical fairy dust that heals the sick.

I’m glad we got that out of the way, because while the Pre may not do any of those things, it’s still the best phone I’ve ever reviewed. (Note: I have never been given an opportunity to review any iPhone model).

For Better and worse, the Pre does a lot of things fantasically, but there is some improvement to be had. Sprint and Palm are married to the Pre’s success. Both have a lot riding on the Pre’s success. I would say that things look a bit more rosy for Palm, because WebOS (a Palm property) has tremendous potential, while the exclusivity window for Sprint and the Pre is closing (it’s rumored to only last until January).

The Pre is not without its flaws and but it excels in almost every aspect and where its faults are glaring there is hope on the horizon. This review is coming from me as actual consumer. I’ve owned the Pre since launch day, more than three weeks now. I wasn’t given any special access or service. I’ve experienced exactly what you would if you were to go pick one up right now. I think after reading this review, you might be more inclined to do just that.

To get some of the basics out of the way, the Palm Pre is a slider phone with a touchscreen. Its screen measures 3.1″ (smaller than the iPhones 3.5″) but sports the identical pixel count of 320×480 (which means it has a greater pixel density). Some people have attributed that density to a sharper image, which is fine because the screen looks great but I’d rather have the extra real estate (okay, yes, I just asked for an extra 0.4″ of screen size and I’m good with that). Where the iPhone’s home button would sit, there’s a nub on the Pre which accomplishes a similar function with some added features that I’ll get to in a moment. The only thing on the left hand side of the phone are volume buttoms. On top, there’s a 3.5mm headphone jack (woo!) and ringer switch (which I guess is standard on Palm phones) and a hold/power button on the top-right corner. On the right side is the cover for the micro USB cable.

It's thick, but not too thick. The Instinct is on the bottom, a Blackberry Curve 8900 in the middle and the Pre on the top, it likes to be on top. (click to enlarge)

The Pre has what no current iPhone on the market has. Slide the screen up and you’ll find a hardware QWERTY keyboard, with dedicated @ and . buttons. Now, some people have lamented the omission of double-space entering a period (on most other smartphones if you tap the spacebar twice it automatically inserts your period for you). But after getting used to the period being there, it didn’t bother me all that much. The @ key is a Twitter-lover’s Godsend. Even in normal email situations, the @ key is pretty great.

I wasn’t a fan of the touchscreen keyboard on my Sprint Instinct after a while. At first, it was okay, but I soon began to dread it. I’m fairly proficient however with the iPod Touch’s keyboard, but still was looking forward to seeing how much I’d like the setup on the Pre. The buttons are rubbery, not the hard-plastic found on Blackberry devices. The keyboard is not quite as wide as the Blackberry keyboards.

That being said, I’ve taken a liking to the keyboard. After three weeks, I’m quite proficient using it and am able to tap out messages with blazing speed. It’s not the best QWERTY keyboard I’ve ever used, I still like the Blackberry Bold keyboard a lot, but I’m not going to send it back by any means. It’s better than my old Instinct by a mile, and I prefer it to the virtual keyboard offering from Apple.

As for the construction of the unit, I have a couple of reservations with the Pre in my possession. As other reviewers have noted, the slider gear feels a bit loose. I’m not scared that the Pre is going to break (even if it did, I have insurance), but there is a bit of give to the system. This may have been an isolated problem though, as I read in the Ars Technica review that of the three Pre’s he’s gotten his hands on, only one was loose. Which led John Stokes to say “Clearly, Palm had some quality control issues with the first batch of phones, but I hope that these are behind them now.” As do I.

A side view (click to enlarge)

Then there’s the matter of the Palm Pre cutting cheese. No, not like that. I mean ACTUALLY cutting cheese. When I first got the Pre, I was a bit taken back by the edge on the bottom of the phone when the slider was open. Did I cut myself? No. Do I think I could have cut myself if I tried? Doubtful. Maybe I got a dull unit comparatively.

When the Pre is closed, it’s a smooth phone. The original design goal from Palm was to make it like a pebble you’d skip on a lake. In general, it’s a nice size, fitting nicely in my pocket without a case. I actually don’t know how you’d put a hard case on it with the slider mechanism, but I’m sure there are solutions out there. I don’t plan on using one myself though. The Palm Pre’s outer casing is a smooth black plastic and is smudgetastic. It picks up my fingerprints with frequency, but I’m kind of used to it because it was a similar situation with the iPod Touch.

Battery life on the Pre has been about what I’d expect out of the device. I’d love to have a larger battery than the 1150 mAh that ships with it. But, it’s replaceable, which means I can carry another battery around with me for when I know that I’m going to be using my phone a lot. I wish Palm would have included a backup battery and charger (which was one of my favorite parts about the Instinct), but alas these thing get cut when trying to chop the price down. Most days, the battery life gets me through everything I want to do, browsing, email, music and video included. I haven’t had a day where I’ve been mad with the Pre’s battery life, but I have run out of charge on a couple of occassions where I had12+ hour days. This was only with heavy use though, and since I’ve gotten all of the settings plugged in for Wi-Fi where I travel, the battery drain is lower. If Palm offers a higher capacity battery though, I’ll probably investigate to see if it’s for me.

Speaking of batteries, there’s a pretty cool charging solution for the Pre, called the Touchstone. The marvel of innovation (in the cellphone world) is actually pretty similar to how I’ve been charging my toothbrush for years. I love the Touchstone. One of my least favorite parts of a cellphone was having to take off the nub covering the charger. Now, I don’t have to do that anymore. I just throw my phone on the charger, literally. The Touchstone requires a different back for your Pre that has a soft finish, instead of the smooth plastic back and magnets inside so that it attaches in the right spot. The convenience of charging the Pre on the Touchstone comes with a fairly exorbitant pricetag though. For the kit with the dock and back cover, you’ll have to shell out $70 (purchased seperately, they’re the same price). I actually managed to find a deal on the dock though and picked it up for $30 last week at Amazon.com. (Currently, it’s $37.99 instead of the normal $50.)

A couple other things before we jump into the plethora of screenshots of the the wonderful WebOS. The Pre’s Bluetooth is pretty phenomenal. When playing a movie (Serenity, for the enquiring mind), it sounds fantastic coming through the 8 speakers on my Milan. I can also use the USB cable to charge the phone and output over the Bluetooth, so I don’t have to worry about killing the battery. I have run into a couple of connection problems though. The Pre says its connected to my SYNC, but the SYNC isn’t reciprocating. A quick disable/re-enable of the Bluetooth solves the issue, and it’s only sporadic, so it’s not infuriating. I would like to see a fix though, and they’ve already released a couple of fixes, so I’m sure there will be refining.

For what really makes the Pre standout check out part two.  This is a three-part review though, so if you’ve already read parts one and two, you can skip to part three which is more about making noise.