Years ago, when I had gotten a Windows Mobile PDA phone, I soon lamented that I didn't get a Palm instead, as it had many more programs and was much easier to use. Reading the news today, it seems now that Palm instead, is about to go under with some rating companies pegging their stock at a valuation of zero. Go figure. >.< I now have an Ipaq 210 series plain jane PDA (no phone).
It's a shame. Their stock is taking a thrashing. These guys were quite dominant with their PDA's back in the day. I was hoping the Pre would revive things for them.
they were certainly the contender back in the day, but they never had anything innovative to offer lately, which i think became their downfall. there was no innovation to compete with apple, htc or any leading contenders. the pre doesn't really scream innovation.. within the last 5 years, there was no product that were developed that were considered innovative. i sorta knew they were going to crash soon, but didn't know when.
I wouldn't necessarily say they didn't have anything innovative. When the pre came out, it created quite the buzz and threw them back in the game for a bit. However, at the rate HTC and Google are throwing out devices, seems they needed to do more than just offer the pre with this supposed new os to keep up with the game. Aug to Sept 09 they were at 17.39 a share. Can't seem to pinpoint the date the Pre was released, but i'm sure at the time, it did bring them into the game. Knoc
I've had my iPaQ rx1950 since 2005. I went through 6 pairs of headphones, went through multiples usage: from PDA to "mini" PC ( I had an infrared keyboard that folds in half lol). Then, it slowly became my mp3 player when I switched to BlackBerry.I'm still using the same battery supplied by HP, still holding the charge like in 2005. I bet 100$ no iPhone will be able to do that.
i guess you're right about that knoc, perhaps innovation isn't the right term.. i guess i was referring to the "new" factor.. htc, google, even apple, like you said, are continuously pumping out a bunch of devices... it doesn't give a chance for a product to fully saturate into the market before it gets replaced, so it's always new technology in the newer devices. but i guess what i mean by the "new factor" is this: the way HTC and Google stay alive in the market is by offering hardware at a lower price, being that Android is free. The phone's hardware is fundamentally the same, the innovation in this case is Android. Android users have more freedom with their device than other devices, say Symbian devices or other proprietary OSs. new features are always released for Android, keeping people interested. Apple stays in the market by innovating the overall design of the device. it's sleek, new, simple, futuristic. Apple's main customers are early adopters, so they continue to feed this audience by coming out with newer and newer designs. palm has been and still is a manufacturer of solid devices. its products are of high quality and easy to use. the problem is, it's not really known for anything else, other than being a high quality device. it's software is not as innovative as Android, its looks can't compare with Apple's device designs, and, like knoc pointed out, it pumps out new devices once in a while. sharing the same customer base as blackberry, who also offers solid device geared towards business users, blackberry has the upper hand on palm, due to its continuous releases of new devices. the pre really doesn't have anything "new" about it. sliding phone? old. qwerty keyboard? old. touch screen? old. the look of the device? it's not really THAT appealing and new. HTC's old touch duel phone from a few years ago had the same design. perhaps the pre's UI is new and easy to use, but compared to the iphone's OS or Android, it doesn't compare. the pre was developed with the average consumer in mind, so it basically ignored the business consumers (which blackberry has taken over). not to mention, palm made no attempt at competing with Apple and Blackberry in terms of promoting it in ads and stuff. so yea... all in all, when i first saw the pre, i didn't really find anything "new" with the device.. it is however sad that palm is fading out of the spot light =(
Who here still have/own a palm PDA? I found one lying in one of the xerox boxes during the regular spring cleaning. I am surprised that Palm is going down; taking into consideration that they have been in the PDA stuff before others and should be ahead of the game, not behind. Sad indeed .. sigh .. another familiar brand is fading out.
well i think the pre is actually pretty decent. but then again the palm lacks in apps compared to google and apple's offerings which is prob why even though the pre created a lot of hype cos it is very powerful and has a lot of functions it kind of died down. but i guess this could be good news for people who want a pre. the price of it may fall and u may be able to get it for pretty cheap.
im gonna try to get my hands on a couple of devices. as a kid I was an owner of a Palm III and Palm V, and they were my introduction to technology.
damn .. your family is wealthy huh .. i got all of my palm as gifts when i was in hs. wonder if those palms worth anything these days .. hmmm .. ebay??
the palm V was 20 bucks >.< and i had to buy that with my own money and the palm V was outdated by that time. the tungsten series came out.
