Well, I got my palm Centro a couple of weeks ago and have been using it as my full cellphone and Palm Tungsten replacement since. Well, i have though a lot about what to say about the phone. While it certainly does what I expected it to do, it does nothing beyond. That is, it does not excite me with “great” features. I bought it mainly because I wanted to not have to carry around a palm pilot and a cell phone as two separate items everywhere. Even if I set an event on my Palm it would be in my bag so I never heard the alarm attached to the event. Now I can easily set events and write tasks (due to the keyboard) and always hear the alarm.
Things I like:
- Easy to to find the app I need and the apps themselves are easy and clear to use. Setting an event or writing an SMS is easy.
- All things Phone are excellent. Sound quality is excellent also when using the speakerphone. log history of calls is clear and saves an unlimited number of calls. The search in the contacts is quick and clear too
- Syncs with Outlook with no problems.
- I use it to download short stories so when I am waiting somewhere like waiting for the dentist I can read though the screen is too small to use it as an actual e-book reader
- pTunes. Another item I am oft to carry around is my Creative Stone MP3 player. Undoubtedly, the Centro is a better mp3 player. I can see many songs at once, build and edit play lists and set bookmarks.
- The screen is clear and crisp. You can make it very bright when in the sun also very dark so it doesn’t blind you when in a dark room. Changing the brightness is fairly easy too
- Going in and out of silent mode is easy with a dedicated button at the top of the phone
- Reacts quickly to clicks. I would not even notice this if I hadn’t tried out Windows Mobile phones before and notices the lags.
Things I do not like:
- Crashes. Once every few days, it seems to crash. It never crashed by itself, I was always doing something on it like typing a new event or trying some new program out. It may be crashing more often now since I sometimes do lower level things like use the FileZ app to change file properties. When I stop playing around with it so much and just use it it should crash less though it crashed twice when just creating an event. The main annoyance is that pTunes will lose your location when the Centro crashes. So if I am in the middle of the 4rth mp3 in a play list of 9 and I didn’t pay attention where I am, it will take me a long time to find my place again.
- Look and size. I cannot say that I am proud to be seen with this phone, it is nowhere as sleek as the other new phones on the market. Smart phones or otherwise. It is a big white block. I actually think I look nerdy with all its buttons on the front . It is also twice as thick as an iPhone or HTC Diamond and you feel it when it is in your pocket.
- My boss has an iPhone and the way all the elements on the screen are large, and easy to touch with your finger is really a big difference to the tiny (especially scroll bars) elements on the Palm OS, and with the Centro’s small screen it make a big difference
- The camera make really poor pictures even in medium lit situations. I think they are worse than my old Nokia 6131 pictures.
- The headset jack is a 2.5 inch one. Even if you get an adapter to 3.5 you will only hear sound in one ear. You need to get one made especially for the Palm Centro. My boss game me his 2.5 inch headset that came with some Sony phone and I could only hear in one ear. If I want to use the phone as my MP3 player I will have to get an original one.
In conclution, though my list of dislikes is long. I do not regret getting the phone. If an iPhone was the same price and didn’t need to be hacked to be use in Israel I would say that is a better choice. Except for the iPhone, I have not seen a phone I would prefer (including Windows Mobile, but bot Symbian which I have not used). If the Centro was the exact same form factor as my Palm Tungsten E with a large screen and thin form factor I would be perfectly happy.
