Palm Treo 700p

Available now (United States)
15th May 2006

The Palm Treo 700p is a PalmOS smartphone that complements the Windows-based Treo 700w, and it's the natural successor to the Palm Treo 650.

Physically, the 700p looks almost identical to the 700w except for the keypad which has a significantly different layout. You can see from the picture below that the 700w (bottom) and 700p (top) are different enough to cause confusion. In fact, the 700p's layout is much closer to that on the Treo 650, which is really the 700p's target market.

One much more important difference is the display - the Treo 700p boosts the resolution of the screen to 320x320 pixels in 65,000 colours, compared to 240x240 pixels on the Windows version. This means that the 700p has pretty much the same display as the Treo 650. As with previous models, this is a touch-sensitive screen.

Of course, the key difference is software - the Palm Treo 700p runs PalmOS version 5.4.9 (the 650 runs PalmOS 5.4). Overall, the capabilities between the two platforms are roughly similar - the 700p comes with a web browser, email client, multimedia player and it can edit Word and Excel documents.

The internal memory on the Palm Treo 700p is 128Mb with 60Mb available to the user. This can be expanded by up to 2Gb using MMC/SD cards, and the memory slot also supports SDIO peripherals. The processor is the same Intel Xscale 312MHz unit found on the Treo 700w and Treo 650. Physically the Treo 700p measures 111x53x23mm (4.4 x 2.3 x 0.9 inches) and weighs 180 grams (6.4 ounces). Again, as with the 700w there's a 1.3 megapixel camera and Bluetooth 1.2.

At present, the Treo 700p in only slated for a speedy US release on the Sprint and Verizon networks, using CDMA 800/1900 with EvDO high-speed data. There's no word on a GSM/UMTS version yet, although the rumours are that Palm is clearing stocks of the GSM Treo 650 in preparation for an announcement.

The major drawbacks with the Palm Treo 700p are the bulky external antenna, and the lack of WiFi connectivity. In particular, the Treo 700p struggles with new-generation smartphones such as the Nokia E61. It's also very heavy at 180 grams, making it one of the heaviest handsets on the market. Still, it appears to be a capable smartphone and we look forward to seeing a version for the rest of the world.

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