Palm Treo 650 Smartphone

When my original Palm device (Sony Clie NR70) crashed, I was devastated. I loved my Clie because it was small, thin and the keyboard had a good feel. It had a decent digital camera with a rotating lens, and the screen was also a rotating screen. BUT, I hated having to tote around a phone and my Clie to my meetings. When it finally crashed, I decided to upgrade my Verizon phone to a Treo. The new 650 was available, and I heard good things about it, so I decided to go for it on Father's day. It took me a little while to get used to it, but I managed. I spent a better part of a work day with Tech Support trying to iron out how to transfer all my information from my broken Clie (luckily I had a recent backup on my PC to work with). This is how I found out that both Verizon and Palm had EXTRAORDINARY tech support. Verizon helped me to the point of their expertise, and then offered to call both Sony Tech support and Palm Tech support to solve some image (digital photos) transfers to my new Treo. Sony Tech support said it couldn't be done, but was unwilling to help me further unless I agreed to pay them $19.99. Forget that! Verizon then proceeded to call Palm support. The first PalmOne tech said that it couldn't be done. I discussed this with my Verizon support agent and we decided to try PalmOne once more. We got another PalmONe agent who said "Sure!, I can help you with that!" Verizon, had us exchange contact information and she dropped off the line and left me to work things out with the PalmOne Agent. We tried EVERYTHING for a good part of the morning. But we did it! Being a Verizon customer, you are eligible (according to PalmOne) for 1-year of free technical support).
With that out of the way, I only needed to hotsynch my Treo with my Lotus Notes calendar. This was easy to do using a Lotus hotfix and the new Lotus EasySynch Pro ver 4.2.2.

Now that all my hotsynching has been done and all my previous data was transferred, it was time to use the phone.
The device is cool. Very handy. The body may be a bit too smooth for me, in that it's weight combined with it's smooth contour slipped easily out of my hands on a cold dry day, or out of my shirt pocket. Out of the box, the Treo 650 comes with NO belt clip or NO holster of ANY sort (!!!!!?????). Why? I don't know. If you carry a purse, then you might be okay. But if you're a guy like me, your only choice (out of the box)is to hold it in your hands, or put it in your pocket. The pocket option would be okay if it was a small phone, or if it was lightweight. But being heavy and smooth (and larger than your average cell phone), I made the mistake of putting it in my shirt pocket. When I bent over to retrieve my laptop case out of my car the next day, my brand new shiny Treo 650 slipped out of my shirt pocket (like waxed skis on fresh dry snow) and went crashing down onto the pavement. Luckily, aside from some scratches, it still worked perfectly. I now can vouch that the 650 survives a 3-4 foot bouncing drop onto pavement.
That very same day I spent 20 bucks on a decent leather belt holster by Covertec. My experience so far with the Treo on my belt is -- well, okay. Due to it's "heft", it definitely feels like I have someone walking around with me who is pulling down on my belt with one of their thumbs. It's something that takes some getting used to.
The keyboard is small, and I found out that I can't "thumb type" on the 650 as fast as I was able to on my Clie. One BIG, HUGE annoying factor with the keyboard is that is lacks a dedicated "_" (underscore) symbol key! After doing some research, I found out how to do it --a bit cryptic, but press OPT S and then ALT. A pop-window will appear with additonal symbols. Whew!
The camera is nothing extra special, but it works well. When you aim the camera, you have to press the default Center key to snap it. But, after a few failed attempts, I figured out that you need to "pop" or "snap" the center key, rather than press and hold. If the center key is held down even a fraction of a fraction of a second too long, the picture won't take. We had some fun taking decent pictures of some colorful red, orange, blue and purple clouds during a picturesque sunset one evening.
On my previous Verizon phone, I loved the Voice dialing feature and Voice notes. This feature was not standard on the Verizon Treo 650. So I spent about $20 for a third party download to voice dial. It works pretty well -- but I need to find a good "Voice notes" program as well.
One last observation... I noticed that periodically my phone would stop ringing, but would vibrate (I programmed it to both ring and vibrate). What I found out was that the speaker switch at the top of the phone would be inadvertantly moved to the "off" position when I would remove the Treo from its belt case/holster. This switch should probably be relocated in future models.
The battery life on a full charge is OUTSTANDING!!! With all the phone functionality, I can actually go for a week before I realize that the battery indicator has shown any change. A definite plus.
I've never had a phone with a "speaker phone" function. This works well for me, especially when I'm driving. This a useful and much safer option for me especially in city driving with a stick shift.
So, I pointed out some of my observations during my first few weeks with this phone.
Overall, this phone is GREAT. I love it. It's almost an all in one device, but you have to pay for it by weight and size. I no longer have to carry two devices. I can check my calendar on the fly without wasting paper to print out my daily schedule. The phone works well (especially with my third-party voice dial software), and Verizon service is as good as it ever was. Oh...Did I mention that the screen is crisp and clear? I am able to see it clearly in direct sunlight on sunny days.
I can definitely get used to this....!