Palm Pre 2

“After several months of delays, HP's Palm Pre 2 is finally available on Verizon. Like the first version, the svelte Palm Pre 2 is a finely crafted smartphone with a beautiful operating system. But the Pre 2 suffers from a thin app catalog, a cramped design, and last year's hardware. It compares poorly with the Apple iPhone 4 and Motorola Droid 2 Global, not to mention Verizon's upcoming 4G LTE devices like the HTC Thunderbolt and Motorola Droid Bionic.”

“While the software of the Palm Pre 2 is on a par with anything else out there, the hardware still doesn't do it justice. It certainly has some great features – like wireless charging – and is generally easy to use but its small screen, lack of onscreen keyboard, small physical keyboard and poor camera means it trails the competition by some way.”

“We like the Palm Pre 2 a lot, and while we aren't convinced it's going to be a market hit, would very much like it to be. It is a well sized, ergonomic handset with a great UI and an incredibly intuitive phonebook experience thanks to the Just Type functionality. It also offers enough fun to keep you entertained on a commute home and is very well connected. Our experience of it was let down by instability and a lack of apps that we use on a day to day basis, however, with fantastic onboard Facebook functionality it also has a huge advantage over competition such as Android. We can only hope that with future updates, the manufacturer will take care of those stability problems.”

“The Palm Pre 2 is a decent little smartphone which sticks to the trusted formula of previous models and adds some nice touches. However, it is hard to forge a new opinion on what is basically a re-hashed version of what we've seen before.We still have the same hang-ups regarding the Palm Pre 2 as we did with the Pre Plus. And the focus of our criticism still centres around build quality. The Pre 2, albeit with more of the soft Touchstone induction material on board, and the glass capacitive screen, still feels very plasticy and very out of touch with the metal and glass heavy handsets that dominate the smartphone market at present. The slider mechanism does feel a lot smoother than the Pre Plus, but it still feels a tad out of date.Sure, the glass screen looks a lot crisper, and there are some nifty new features in webOS 2.0 (stacking is particularly useful), and maybe that points towards a bright future for the Palm Pre. But, if you were expecting big changes in the first webOS 2.0 model, then you're going to be disappointed.Overall, this is a nice, slick little smartphone that performs well, and offers a number of unique features (such as gesture control and Synergy) that first got us excited by the Palm Pre back in 2009. The only trouble is, the excitement surrounding these features has somewhat worn off.”