iPhone = iToldYouSo (i.e. weToldYouSo) for Palm

[Bob-C]

Just got done reading about the iPhone and it looks like Jobs just laughed at everything Palm has said cannot be done.... In other words, everything we've been asking them for over the past few years. Looks like Jobs was listening instead of laughing....

1) OS Stability - This thing has OS X on it. I doubt you are going to be able to load MAC apps on it - but OS X will give the iPhone the rock solid stability we've been asking for and the framework to add future hardware features without undermining the OS stability. Third party apps are not going to crash this bad boy because OS X has the protected OS memory that I've griped the POS has lacked for years.
2) Multitasking - I never really understood the concept of multitasking on a PDA or smartphone. Then I saw Jobs playing music in the iPod app, take a call, switch to a picture, mail it the guy, then hangup and have the phone take him right back to the part of the song he left the iPod in. I think iPhone is the first phone to figure out multitasking in a useful way.
3) WIFI - This thing AUTOMATICALLY switches from EDGE to WIFI when a WIFI network comes into range to save battery life and save data usage fees.
4) Form factor - This thing is only slightly wider and longer than the Treo but is half the width at .46". The sacrifice is a removable battery and QWERTY keyboard. I'll ditch the removable battery if voice time is five hours and automatic WIFI switch saves battery as advertised. I am still out to jury on the touch keyboard but Jobs point about a UI changing from app to app is well taken.
5) Integrated/included applications - No more buying 3rd party apps to get an MP3 player, MPEG4/AVI viewer, Bluetooth 2.0, Safari tabbed browser, better email app, etc. And being all Apple software, this stuff all integrates with each other. This is what the average consumer WANTS. No having to scour the internet doing research to buy and load everything they need. Instant power user!
6) Upgraded memory - There is 4GB and 8GB version available. That's right - no buying an SDHC card and then hacking the OS to get it to work.
7) Price - For all those people who said that including all of the aforementioined features, in a CONVERGED device, would make it unaffordable, iPhone laughs at your being blindly apologetic for Palm. With a two year contract, 4GB version is $499 and the 5GB is $599. And there is no extra purchase $200-$400 dropped on an SD card and 3rd party applications.

Drawbacks -
1) Cingular - We all know their data plan is much more than Sprint but they did say that a 3G version will be available at some point in the future.
2) Non-business - This is being targetted at non-business users as not having support for Exchange is going to be the one - and only - big sigh of relief that Palm and Blackberry can have from this bomb. I also heard no mention of being able to integrate Office documents. But you know there will be future versions.

Ditch the Resource Defense
Many apologists have made excuses for Palm not having the resources to deliver the above features. I remember Sega and Atari complaining about that when they couldn't compete with Sony's development or marketing for the Playstation. The bottomline line is that such excuses are purely reserved for companies that are pushed out of a market and into bankruptcy. That's just a cold hard fact. If Palm hadn't made the decision to relinquish control of the POS by spinning it off to PalmSource, maybe they would've had the resources to continue development of POS over the last 2 1/2 years that Apple spent drawing their plans against them.

Hope for Palm?
They did just buy Garnet and will undoubtably be trying to update and stabilize it - especially after the iPhone demo. But keep in mind that a lot of their OS engineer resources went with PalmSource. It would be nothing short of a miracle if they could transform Garnet into an iPhone like platform over a year or so. Maybe that's what Jeff Hawkins is working on. They better pray that Apple doesn't release an business centric version in the meantime.

Maybe Palm is just going to market Windows Mobile from here on out and let Microsoft worry about providing an OS to compete with iPhone. Maybe Ed Colligan will reconsider his laughing at the iPhone and beg Apple to package iPhone software on a Treo. And maybe, just maybe, the 700p firmware update will come out before the iPhone.

And BTW, Palm introduced the 750v or something at CES. It is GSM without an antenna.:shake:

 

[Leke]

All this does is forces competition to step up their game

 

[dslunceford]

2) Non-business - This is being targetted at non-business users as not having support for Exchange is going to be the one - and only - big sigh of relief that Palm and Blackberry can have from this bomb. I also heard no mention of being able to integrate Office documents. But you know there will be future versions.

Unfortunately, this is HUGE. Unless they link up with RIM, or a third-party developer like Marc can "Chatterize" this, we are looking at a device that will stay in the consumer realm and never make the jump.

 

[dkirker]

That is because this device isn't really in the corporate realm, yet. IMO, its competition is more the Nokia N95 and Nokia's multimedia computers, and other similar devices.

I suspect that as Apple adds more software updates, this will stretch to the business realm.

I know what I am getting in June instead of an iPod

 

[bclancy]

Unfortunately, this is HUGE. Unless they link up with RIM, or a third-party developer like Marc can "Chatterize" this, we are looking at a device that will stay in the consumer realm and never make the jump.

Give them time. I think you'll see Apple targeting the business market in a year and a half.

 

[meyerweb#CB]

Pardon me for interjecting a bit of reality, but no one in this forum has seen one in the flesh. no one has any real idea how the interface works, how easy it is to type on, how well the calendar, mail, or other apps work. Or, for that matter, how well the music interface actually works without a click wheel. There's no information on 3rd party developer support, or even how good the phone works. Will bluetooth really work? Will the swap to WiFi rally be seamless? What if the WiFi network isn't free? What happens to your call? No answers are available right now. Yet almost everyone is convinced it's going to be great, and popular, simply because the ipod is popular, and Steve Jobs has the charisma os a cult leader. It's almost funny..

Well, get some perspective. The ipod is so easy to use because it is very limited in its capabilities. If the iphone is as limited, I don't want it. And if it's not limited, everyone is making a real leap of faith that the interface is God's gift to phone users.

And let's not overlook the fact that not everything Apple and Jobs have created is gold. Remember the Lisa? The Newton? NeXt? Even the Mac owns only a tiny fraction of the market for PCs. When you get down to it, the ipod is the ONLY real commercial success Apple has had in as long as I can remember.

Let's not drink the KoolAid just yet.

 

[RICHINMJ]

Ummm, grape. My favorite.

 

[qb11g]

Pardon me for interjecting a bit of reality, but no one in this forum has seen one in the flesh. no one has any real idea how the interface works, how easy it is to type on, how well the calendar, mail, or other apps work. Or, for that matter, how well the music interface actually works without a click wheel. There's no information on 3rd party developer support, or even how good the phone works. Will bluetooth really work? Will the swap to WiFi rally be seamless? What if the WiFi network isn't free? What happens to your call? No answers are available right now. Yet almost everyone is convinced it's going to be great, and popular, simply because the ipod is popular, and Steve Jobs has the charisma os a cult leader. It's almost funny..

Well, get some perspective. The ipod is so easy to use because it is very limited in its capabilities. If the iphone is as limited, I don't want it. And if it's not limited, everyone is making a real leap of faith that the interface is God's gift to phone users.

And let's not overlook the fact that not everything Apple and Jobs have created is gold. Remember the Lisa? The Newton? NeXt? Even the Mac owns only a tiny fraction of the market for PCs. When you get down to it, the ipod is the ONLY real commercial success Apple has had in as long as I can remember.

Let's not drink the KoolAid just yet.

I'll have a sip of that Kool-Aid as well! I think everyone is just giddy about the fact that there could potentially be a viable alternative for us. I'm a little disappointed by the lack of 3G but I'll switch in a heartbeat. At least I know I won't get abandoned by Apple. Oh, by the way, word on the street is their working on an update for the 750v. Imagine that. I expect us 700p'ers to get our update around June! Just in time for me to make my big switch to the iphone (or something else comprable) Go Palm...not really.

 

[cyber]

2) Multitasking - I never really understood the concept of multitasking on a PDA or smartphone. Then I saw Jobs playing music in the iPod app, take a call, switch to a picture, mail it the guy, then hangup and have the phone take him right back to the part of the song he left the iPod in. I think iPhone is the first phone to figure out multitasking in a useful way.

what? no multitasking was the reason why I threw my 650 away for a nokia e61. works like a breeze switching between mail, browsing, calling and so on.

on the iphone it will even be smoother.

believe me, once you've tasted it nothing brings you back to palm's cute, outdated interface and OS.

 

[NextDream]

Pardon me for interjecting a bit of reality, but no one in this forum has seen one in the flesh. no one has any real idea how the interface works, how easy it is to type on, how well the calendar, mail, or other apps work. Or, for that matter, how well the music interface actually works without a click wheel. There's no information on 3rd party developer support, or even how good the phone works. Will bluetooth really work? Will the swap to WiFi rally be seamless? What if the WiFi network isn't free? What happens to your call? No answers are available right now. Yet almost everyone is convinced it's going to be great, and popular, simply because the ipod is popular, and Steve Jobs has the charisma os a cult leader. It's almost funny..

Well, get some perspective. The ipod is so easy to use because it is very limited in its capabilities. If the iphone is as limited, I don't want it. And if it's not limited, everyone is making a real leap of faith that the interface is God's gift to phone users.

And let's not overlook the fact that not everything Apple and Jobs have created is gold. Remember the Lisa? The Newton? NeXt? Even the Mac owns only a tiny fraction of the market for PCs. When you get down to it, the ipod is the ONLY real commercial success Apple has had in as long as I can remember.

Let's not drink the KoolAid just yet.

You sir can direct your attention to www.apple.com/iphone and go to "Watch the keynote" (some companies put out such a good product that...they actually have launches for said product and use the product at the launch......can you imagine Palm doing that for the 700P? Crashville) and see the entire 2 hour keynote address where the phone is shown...in the flesh doing things that will make you drive to Palm headquarters and throw your Treo at a window! Please have a sip of that koolaid then come back and tell us all how sweet it was for ya.

Clearly Apple's focus isn't taking over the pc market, in fact they renamed the company Apple Inc. from Apple Computers. and with the stock up ohh about 800% over the last 5 years, i'd say they probably have a clue of what they are doing.

And just for shi*s and giggles here is a little success comparison. The stock chart of Apple and Microsoft over the last 5 years

and to really rub it in, here is Apple vs Palm for the same time period.

Now ask yourself based on that financial picture. Who is in a better position for spending on research and development? Which guy to you want making your kool aid?

 

[znemas]

I've got cool-aid all over my face & I don't want to wash it off. I'm not even mixing it with water, just pouring the powder all over the place. yummy!

 

[Merlyn_3D]

Bob, I can't agree with you more, this is what I've been saying too. Look at the iPhone, I mean my god. Look at it.

On the other end, you get palm and the 700p, which after 6 months of beta testing and another 8 months after being released they haven't released one patch to make bluetooth headsets work like they're supposed to. Just 2 minutes ago I was about to throw my 700p through the window for not allowing the JX-10 to connect to it after the bluetooth had randomly turned off. Oh, and by the way, Palm suggested I buy a JX-10 if I wanted a bluetooth headset that works with the 700p.

Who was it on here that said we don't have a good case for a class action lawsuit? Are you sure?

 

[Dunc]

This is it for Palm - the Palm OS is decades old, the Treos, it's apps, none of them can hold a candle to this. Words of advice: sell Palm... short!

 

[oalvarez]

some people are finally starting to wake up....there are other alternatives.

palm is dumb

 

[Bob-C]

Not a Kool-Aid drinker myself.

I haven't owned anything with an Apple logo on it since I was in college. I graduated in 1993 and haven't touched a Mac since and prefer XP with the PC's lower cost. I don't even own an iPod.

I do know a winner when I see it though. I haven't been this excited about a smartphone since the Treo 600 changed everything.

I also agree the above comment it will be modified for business within a year 1 1/2 years if it is successful. The only Achilles heel I can see on this thing is the touchpad keyboard. I was trying to imagine walking down the street navigating with one hand as I do on my 700p. I have trouble convincing myself it will be as easy. But Apple did popularize the mouse & click wheel so I will wait until I try it before deciding.

 

[qb11g]

By the way, who actually thinks that Apple won't have some type of, what we'll call, "business user update/patch" close to or before the phone launches. Once again, it's the support and faith factor. The die-hard Palm OS user (at least the one's I talk too) has lost faith in Palm. We're even willing to jump ship before the other ship is even in the ocean! Palm will regret it...I assure you.

 

[MacUser]

Pardon me for interjecting a bit of reality, but no one in this forum has seen one in the flesh.

That's not true. Specimen38 did today.

 

[vw2002]

Ill go with cherry, although grape's pretty good too.

 

[bcaslis#IM]

Go to the Apple website. Unless they are lying up a storm that interface is spectacular. I was hoping for something special but this has exceeded all my expectations with two caveats:

1.) I can't get it until June.
2.) It doesn't have 3G.

I'll live with it to get the rest. I'm just stunned. There is absolutely no way Palm can respond to this for the consumer. And I'm sure that unless this is a huge flop (not very likely) that this is only the first attempt by Apple. There will be later generations with even more.

 

[vw2002]

make no mistake. palm is in serious trouble. their pda business is evaporating, and their future flagship product market - the treo - has just taken a serious hit. they will be losing marketshare there also.

though their next big thing is due in 07, you know it will be missing something critical just as ALL of their products always have - whether its stability, wifi, a new OS, etc.

I have confidence in APPLE'S potential for innovation. I no longer have confidence in PALM.

all they do is basically juggle and recycle outdated technology into each new device. That business model is old and tired, as is Palm.