Palm and Orange have announced the Palm Treo 680 smartphone, running on the Palm OS platform, is now available in Switzerland. The Treo 680 smartphone is ideal for the professional consumer who wants a more advanced phone experience on a single device, including access to email, web browsing, messaging and a range of features that are easy to use.

Palm has posted a new note on its online store to indicate that the Copper (aka orange) unlocked Treo 680 is no longer available. At this time its not clear why the unit is no longer being offered or if any additional colors will be offered. Arctic, Crimson and Graphite are still listed and available for purchase.

Colored versions of the Treo 680 are only available from Palm.com and Palm retail stores. All other carriers that offer the 680 only offer the Graphite version.

Palm has posted a new document to their support site regarding the new Treo 680's compatibility with older versions of the Palm Treo Cradle.

Despite fitting the formfactor of the Treo 680 and sharing the same Athena/MultiConnector interface, Rev A & B variants of the Palm Treo Cradle with part # 180-10022-00 are supposedly incompatible with the Treo 680's battery and power system requirements.

StyleTap has announced that a preview version of StyleTap Platform for Windows Mobile Smartphone edition is now available. StyleTap Platform enables the world's largest base of mobile applications, the estimated 30,000 applications written to run on Palm OS, to run on some of the latest Windows Mobile Smartphones, including the Motorola Q, T-Mobile Dash and the Samsung Blackjack.

Palm today introduced the Palm Treo 680 smartphone, a GSM/GPRS/EDGE quad-band world phone, in the Philippines. Globe Telecom customers will find the Treo 680 smartphone easy to use, slim and compact, yet packed full of features beyond its stellar phone capability, such as email, web browsing, messaging, multimedia, calendar, contacts and more.

A member of the GPSPassion forums recent posted an excerpt of an e-mail from Matt Kuenzel of Mapopolis stating that the company was going to discontinue sales of their "PDA Software products". A subsequent post (2nd in this thread) by "lamar" from Mapopolis confirmed this and added a considerable amount of additional information.

Mapopolis seems to have a very reasonable and sincere plan in place for gradually winding their business. They will continue selling new activations of their product until March 31st 2007. Their map server and customer service departments will continue to be operational for another year past this date so that all current customers' terms can be completed in full. Upon the conclusion of the final customers' 1-year term in March of 2008, Mapopolis will cease operations. Their software technology will be assimilated into the product line of another firm whose name is currently not being disclosed.

Responding faster than usual to problems with newly-released devices, Palm has just released an update for the new Treo 680 smartphone. The 680's disappointing battery life is the #1 complaint from most users so this patch's expedited release is welcome news indeed.

Palm says they have identified that the Treo 680 can experience reduced battery life when the camera is used. The camera may continue to draw power from the battery when the device is in standby mode. The Treo 680 Camera Update addresses this issue.

The download is a single 88kb PRC file and is intended only for the Treo 680. This update is applicable for all carriers and colors of the Treo 680.

Engadget Mobile has posted a leaked Sprint device launch estimate schedule, which includes a mention of a new device from Palm. No details whatsoever other than the code-name of Palm Sherlock and a June launch period.

Nordic Wireless Watch is reporting that European consumers have been faster to adopt ‘smart’ mobile phones than their American counterparts, according to Telephia. In Q3 2006, smartphone penetration in Western Europe was 8.8 percent among recent device buyers; more than double that of the U.S. which was 3.8 percent. Via MobilityBeat.

During the 16-bit console wars of the early ‘90s, Sega’s answer to Nintendo’s Tetris juggernaut was a game called Columns. While it essentially mimicked the basic premise of Tetris, Columns did provide a few unique twists. Instead of focusing on rotating geometric shapes, Columns dealt with arranging multi-colored jewels into matching patterns. The color screen of Sega’s Game Gear portable console made this color-centric gameplay possible, whereas the Gameboy’s monochrome LCD was better suited to the gameplay of Tetris. While Columns was mostly ignored by the critics as one of dozens of Tetris-inspired kockoffs, the game developed something of a cult following. Read on for the full review...

Computersplusnyc.com is listing a new Palm GPS Navigator 3 kit for Smartphones in its product listings. The sales price is given at $287.42 and is currently not in stock.

In addition, Palm's latest Estimated Street Price List sheet shows the GPS Navigator 3 kit as being compatible with Treo 650, 700w/p/wx, and Treo 680. The current GPS Navigator 2 kit is incompatible with the Treo 680 and only unofficially supports the 700wx.