Review: Treo 700p

It wasn't long after Palm's first-ever foray into the Windows Mobile market with the Treo 700w that rumors started flying about a Palm OS version of the hardware. Well, five months later we have it: the Treo 700p.

The 700p is nearly identical to the 700w, the only difference is a 320x320 screen instead of the 700w's 240x240 screen, and some minor differences in key labeling to accommodate the different OS requirements. It is also almost identical to the Treo 650, with a few major improvements. Chief among those is the upgrade of the 650's 0.3 MP camera to a 1.3 MP version (the same as the 700w's) -- which takes 1280x1024 resolution pictures -- and a bump from 32MB of memory to 128MB (again, matching the 700w.)

The increase in memory will be the most welcome change for power users, as memory limitations were one of the top complaints. Unlike the 700w, most of the 60MB of user memory is actually available for use. In testing, the device was responsive and didn't suffer any major hangs, with one exception. Overall, however, performance is significantly and noticeably faster on the 700p compared with the 650.

The Blazer web browser continues the tradition of poorly performing, buggy web browsers that has been a hallmark of the handheld computing experience. One improvement is that you can now see full URLs, unlike on the 650, which limited you to a seeing only part of a URL at one time.

The Treo 700p comes with several tools for mail, contact and calendar management. VersaMail, the old Palm workhorse for e-Mail is included, as are an Exchange client called Sprint Business Connection and a tool called GoodLink. GoodLink looks to be equivalent to the Wireless Sync product offered by Verizon for the 700w, which allows mail, contacts and calendar items to be synched remotely via a data connection. Unlike the Wireless Sync feature, which is available to all Verizon customers with the 700w, GoodLink is only available to Sprint business customers, and at a significant cost.