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More Palm Treo pros/cons and Clean Desk Challenge report #17

Clean desk #17
Slightly blurry–having some light/exposure issues with the new Palm camera.

Have a few things to add to the like/dislike list for the new Palm Treo 755p:

Likes:

  • A kind reader wrote in and got me to look at the search function again in the Contacts mode. Turns out I have to push the alternate function key button before hitting the search button. Oops. (Thanks for the help, S!)
  • After test driving several “smartphones” at the store, I’m very happy to have chosen one with the keypad on the face of the phone rather than having to slide the face up, or pop it open like a pocketbook. Mostly I liked the cleaner look of those, but functionally, not so efficient.
  • Since I had to program numbers into the old phone, and since I carried around a separate PDA which sync’d to my address book, I didn’t carry all that many phone numbers in the phone. Since the old phone (just like the new one) displays names of people it sees in the address book, the old one often didn’t call up a name. Since the new phone syncs with the address book, the majority of the calls are recognized. Works just like caller ID. Cool!

Dislike:

  • No time display when the device is in sleep mode. I don’t like to wear a watch so I used to use my phone as a time piece at meetings. Turning the Treo on everytime I want to check the time isn’t so cool, so now I’m wearing a watch again until another brilliant idea comes along.

That’s about it for now. The days have been full and I’ve been out and about mostly, away from the computer. Have a great weekend!

Related Entries:
  • Clean desk #18 + Bluetooth headset
  • New Palm Treo captures the clean desk
  • Super clean desk #4
  • Half-way through the Challenge
  • Treo 755p does, in fact, HotSync via bluetooth
  • 2 Responses to More Palm Treo pros/cons and Clean Desk Challenge report #17 »»


    Comments

    1. Comment by woodlark | 2008/06/10 at 16:15:59

      Thanks for posting the search key info! I depend on search mode to track the calendar dates when clients need to pay me, and had tried all combinations of likely function buttons with the search button — but not in the right order. I’ve already found one lesson I almost “gave away” for free recently, now that Search is back. :)

      BTW, I could have written your whole entry - same hardware history & preferences. Though my contact list, being over 3000 names, won’t work with the third party Voice Dial app offered through Palm. I run this on a Mac. Do you (or any other readers of your blog) know of a Mac-compatible voice dial add-on that’ll handle a big contact list. Dialing a seldom-used number is downright dangerous when driving with this setup! Thanks.

    2. Comment by shawn | 2008/06/11 at 14:20:11

      I don’t have any experience with Voice Dial apps–hopefully someone else will speak up with a suggestion. I’ve heard that the Treos aren’t so good with the Bluetooth voice recognition (which has been my experience) but I hadn’t taken the next step to try a voice dial app. Which do you use?

      I’m glad this solved your search function mystery. Chalk that function up to “not quite intuitive enough”.


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