Open Thread: Post Pre Launch User Reports

DC's M Street store had a line forming when I arrived at ~7ish.. but started really forming as the doors were opening. Their stock is plenty someone said an employee said they had plenty for a line around the block.. There was a palm guy there and some paparazzi that was taking photos of people using it.

All and all it was a rather normal experience.. no one went crazy or fought. they let several people in at a time and when I walked back by around 9-930 the line was down to 5 or so people. So I'm sure the store has plenty to go around after the line goes away.

I'm pretty impressed so far with the interface, once I get contacts into the phone and start using it for work, msg'ing and the like.. I'm sure it'll be a very much needed upgrade to the 755p.

My wife and I managed to get into the Palo Alto Sprint store last night around midnight. I'm a former Palm employee, so I'll spare you my subjective reaction, but the AppStore worked well enough for me to download Classic and the Twitter client Tweed. I didn't have a way to transfer PalmOS apps to Classic, but Tweed worked well enough for me to post a few Tweets from the store.
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http://pobox.com/~flash

First I have the iPhone and I am an application developer for the iPhone as this has made me very wealthy in a rather short time. I'm going to base it off my experience of over a year on the iPhone now to the Palm Pre.

Now let me address the Mob at the local Sprint Store in Marlton, NJ on Route 73. I walked right into the store, added my name to the list then sat down on a nice cushion chair. I waited 28 minutes to be called up, and I'm thinking that a Sprint Customer as I am with a Family Plan of 4 Phones, all Palm versions probably got a push to the front of the list a little faster then a non Sprint customer. I don't know if this was the case or not, but when talking to some others that had been there since 8am for over 2 hours, and I walk right in and get called in under 30 minutes is very nice.

Much to my surprise I got a very nice deal with the family plan I had already. My concern was what i read on having to get the unlimited plan for all phones which would have made my monthly payments got from $180.00 to $429.00, which was the deal you get online in the pricing page. NONE of this was the case at all, in fact my Minutes for the Shared Plan of 1400 went up to 1500 minutes a month, and my Bill went down $10.00!!! Now that's a real Deal. Phone cost me $300.00 plus some other accessories I wanted. I get a Cash Rebate of $100.00 in the Mail.

Now on to the Phone, well all i can say is WOW!!! SUPER WOW!!! First the coolest thing is how as I'm a Mac User and this connected right up to my Mac Mail, showing all the sub folders I have setup just as i was sitting on the Mac using the mail App. The setup was quick, and all i had to do was enter my Email and Password, none of the SMTP stuff you always had to do in the past with ports and SSL's. Just a real nice way to pull this off on Palm's end. The Web Browser is STELLAR! FAST! and I'm seeing 3x the speed for sites to come up verse the iPhone with both having a clean cache so nothing is stored to increase the Web Page Pull Up. The Service it surprisingly fast on their network compared to the Treo 700P I was using prior to this upgrade.

I've got a lot of playing to do, and learning new stuff now too. I will update soon this write up as i have more time to play.

ScottG
ScottG

Small Sprint Store, lower Manhattan:

Seven people at 7AM, doors open at 8AM.

When I next passed by at 10AM, fifteen new people on line.

Inside, I saw two live Pres people were molesting while waiting their turn to buy.

I would have had to wait on line to fondle a Pre. Eh, I can do that anytime in the next week.

I don't know how many Sprint Stores there are in Manhattan. This was a small store on Broadway near J&R/Wall Street. Two AT&T Stores in that area had larger lines for the iPhone - but remember, sales for that started at *6PM* (IIRC), not 8AM.

On Twitter, someone in Denver reported it and surroundings are already sold out (as of about noon EDST).

I think people didn't line up because of the pre-press about possible shortages. Only the maniacs did. If I eventually do decide to get one (prove you're a NEW Palm, Palm!), I can do so when stocks are replenished. And also *after* Palm has fixed that craptastic camera. (Really, that camera is a frikkin disgrace compared to the iPhone. I hope what's wrong is in software and not in the hardware optics!)

I didn't actually buy a Pre but I did stop by a downtown Sprint store to check it out. They had about 32 Pres for sale and about that many people lined up to buy them and people were still arriving when I left. Sadly, the demo units were kind of flaky. But the sales staff was friendly and helpful to the people who were ready to buy making sure that their phones worked before they left the store.

It's hard to make a real assessment from the demo when they tell you that its software is older and flaky compared to that of the retail units. That seemed counterintuitive to me. Why take a chance on losing a potential customer by letting them play with a buggy demo unit?

Anyway, here's a shameless bit of self-promotion for my blog where I've posted a full "fondle report."

http://mind-grapes.blogspot.com/2009/06/fondling-palm-pre.html
Screw convergence
Palm III->Visor Deluxe->Visor Platinum->Visor Prism->Tungsten E->Palm LifeDrive->Palm TX
Visor Pro+VisorPhone->Treo 180g->Treo 270->Treo 600->Treo 680->T-Mobile G1
http://mind-grapes.blogspot.com/

I will be waiting at VERIZON for my PRE...BUT I'll live my life till then.

I started in Gary Indiana... in Madison Wi. There was a line of about 20 at 0600. I wasn't able to locate a Best Buy or a Sprint store I could get into until I made it to damn near St Cloud Mn. Needless to say they were all out... However he had one for me to play with... Sorry to say the little bit of time I had with it didn't impress me at all. The keyboard is about half the size of the 755... I have a hard enough time with this and my fat thumbs... I may end up going to a BB Curve

I was first in line today, arrived around 4:30am, and it did not take long for more people to show up. Despite being first, a couple other people got finished before me due to a bad workstation my Sprint rep had.

In the end, I picked up the phone, a Touchstone, the leather case (the plastic holster was tempting, but looked like it could break easily), and a car charger.

One very interesting thing about the Touchstone, since it gets power through the USB cable already included with the phone, and the car charger uses the same micro-USB connector, it would be conceivable to use a Touchstone in your car, and never have to remove the reportedly easily-breakable USB port cover (except when used in USB drive mode, of course). Unfortunately, the USB car charger they sold has a plug that won't fit into the Touchstone's receptacle. Since the car charger does not appear to be an official Palm-manufactured accessory, however, this is not surprising.

The device itself appears to have one bad pixel on it (grrrr), and some discoloration in the LCD on the upper right (tinted slightly yellow), and across the bottom (darker blotchiness, but only really visible on certain screens where the image is already fairly dark). I wonder if the spots of discoloration are due to the Touchstone battery cover's magnets (I'll have to swap the cover back again to check).

The device itself seems to work fine, though. I still have the plastic cover on the screen, and it still responds to touches. I'm sure dust and grit will get under it, but it should last until someone comes out with a scratch protector (heck, I should check Boxwave now to see if they already have one).

Dropped by the Chattanooga (Hamilton Place) store the afternoon. This was a ''official reseller'' store.

Dude said they got only 10 Pres and they were all pre-ordered (no pun intended) in the pat two weeks. No posters or anything in store.

He said he could put me on a waiting list. Also, he said the BB a block down had 220 and they were gone in 1.5 hrs. Every store in Chattanooga out according 2 him.

If anywhere near true, Palm / Sprint really botched this one. I wasn't planning on buying, and it still feels like a slap in the face. How many with money to waste were turned away today?

No user report from me... I'm waiting. I did want to go to a local store just to fondle one but I live in a rural area and none of the local stores had one yet.

Even if I could have looked one over, I'm still waiting. I absolutely need...

1. to have it work on Verizon. Sprint is not an option for me.

2. to have SD card support. I have many gigabytes of audio files and Word documents that I keep on my device at all times. No SD = me no buy.

3. to be able to sync to the Desktop. I don't use "the Cloud" and frankly never will. I sit at a desk all day and enter data, notes, contacts, and appointments... I NEED to sync my desktop to my Palm device, period. No sync = me no buy

Purchased opening day at a Sprint store along with touchstone and car chargers with no problems. Showed up at opening time and had minimal wait. Configured bluetooth headset, transfered Outlook data via USB cable, and all is working great! Considering setting up with current hotmail rather than a new gmail account now that hotmail allows POP access. Screen preferences didn't show up in application launcher, but was located by searching for "screen." This one was for my wife. I'll be purchasing as soon as it comes out on Verizon. Hopefully by then they add video recording and full Outlook sync capabilities. Love Palm and based on this product it looks like they will be around for a long time.

I dropped by a Sprint store in Durham. They had 25 in stock, and only 18 folks in "line."

I got one but didn't port my number yet to check on service quality. It's very nice so far with a few minor issues. I'm coming from a Treo 755p and my wife uses (and loves) an iPhone.

The digitizer isn't as smart/accurate as the iphone's and the scrolling resizing doesn't work quite as well. I preferred the keyboard on the treo, and sometimes the gestures don't register very well. I don't know if that's software or hardware.

Overall, It's very nice so far. The multiple cards has already been useful and is way more convenient and faster than app switching on either the treo or iphone.

The form factor is great. It's way smaller than the Treo. Despite the the added thickness vs the iPhone, it feels much smaller.

Jury is still out on battery life, and my work doesn't have an exchange server, so I'm not sure about PIM data will work for me. I've downloaded Classic but haven't tried it yet.

-a