Official I'm returning the Palm Pre because... - Page 13

prevermont · 10-22-2009, 11:18 PM

I am not that used to forums but my experience over the past 4 months has been a rollercoaster! I have used the palm platform since the Palm III came out. Since then have used a handful including my favorite machines: Sony Clie NX73 and Sony Clie NX80. I have had a Zire, Centro and maybe another unit or two.

THE PRE: so I am on my third unit in 4 months! Plus I just got a HTC Hero to see if that would afford my an easy way out. I find AT&T/Iphone to be too much at $165/month. Sprint is very doable at $99 for the comperable package.

But where do I start? The first phone had a problem where I would take the headset jack out and the phone thought the jack was still in and thus would only allow me to use speaker phone. Then on my second phone the same problem happened PLUS if you touched the jack it would make a pretty horrible noise in the headset. I have blown multiple fuses trying to get what I think is reasonable customer service - I could write a book about it.

So, I have 29 days to decide HERO of PRE. I will probably keep the PRE b/c I want to support PALM and because I bought about $100 or more worth of accessories including 3 extra batteries (they are cheap on ebay - $12.00/piece and very easy to keep on hand - I keep one in my wallet some times). I hate how slippery the phone is. I bought a $27 protection kit from BobdyGuardz that is pretty well designed to cover almost the whole phone. However, it definately cut the screen's sensativity down. The first phone I returned I lost the protection kit although it did come with 2 full sets. The plastic body casing between the micro USB and the slider broke - it is so thin I expected it would ... but not so soon.

I totally feel like a guinea pig on so many levels. I'm not glad to hear that so many others are running into so many problems but at least reading some of this forum has made me feel like I have company.

Boy I wish I could root more for the Pre. Hopefully I will have a lot more reason soon! Here in Vermont I do not run into many others who use a SMART? phone so I guess I will need to turn more to the forums.

By the way, I did get to like the CENTRO and even now pine for it. That little bugger is rugged! and pretty well designed considering it had a much lower sticker price. - I have not seen any PRE for $99 by the way.

Good night for now,

PreVermont

highwayman1224 · 10-24-2009, 03:26 PM

I tried to love the pre, but it fell short on so many levels. Don't get me wrong, i think it's a nice device, but it's the little things that were left out that really confuse me. Not being able to change a simple thing like notification sounds, come on palm. My kids free phone can do this & so has EVERY phone i've ever owned!! I drive a truck for a living, and its very hard to here the stupid ding dong sound when i'm driving down the road. I constantly have to pick it up every few minutes to check if i've gotten a text or email. The sound can be heard clearly as long as theres not too much background noise though. I know i can use webOS doctor or whatever else to be able to change notification sounds & forward text messages, but why should anybody HAVE to do this just to have the basic functions that a free or very cheap phone has standard? So now my pre is up on craigslist & i went with the hero. I'm sure palm will get this stuff added with updates, but the updates they've put out so far haven't fixed the basic stuff i want quick enough.

missy brown · 10-24-2009, 07:49 PM

omg we all feel the same way well i am getting a replcement too matter of fact my replacement only last 1 month and 28 days before given me errors 37 and 67 codes mostly data code then yesterday came the no signal it had a big x there so i call and had to resotre the whole thing it work good for a couple of hours until 130am when yahoo mail stopped working thats where i got another code so ok i deleted the maill aqccount and tried agin nope didnt work, restatred it didnt work took out the batteyr no luck was ont he phone with sprint or over 2 hours nothing its a shame that we are having all the issuese with this one device i knew it would have problems whne i got it but come one palm/sprint they have to do a better job something has to give does anyone else get dtata errors and have a lot of dropped calls and loose signals and have trouble getting ther yahoo email to work when hotmail and gmail works fine on the device????

Coggy · 10-27-2009, 05:14 PM

I had mine charged to 100% at 7am. By 5pm it was down to 45%. No phone calls were made, I only took about 3 emails, an appointment reminder, and 2 minutes of web browsing. Very poor.

nstan · 11-19-2009, 02:28 AM

I really enjoy(ed) my Pre(s). But I can't say that's its meeting the standard I expected of it...

Number 1 had the open/close battery issue - it was replaced by Asurion without incident.

Number 2 had the internal screen crack issue. I have no idea how it happened - I took it out of my pocket, and the screen had cracks fanning out from the main button. Asurion charged me $150 to replace it because they considered it physical damage (I'm with Bell Mobility).

Number 3 had the screen crack issue again. I ended a call with a friend, slid the phone shut, and it cracked right in front of my eyes. After spending hours on the phone being shuffled between Bell and Asurion, I finally decided that they would be of absolutely no help, called Palm, and vented about my experiences the minute a customer service agent answered.

He told me that Palm considered the internal screen cracking as a known issue, and that the information hadn't yet been relayed to Asurion, so that's why I had to pay for my phone replacement. Palm is sending my a new Pre, and getting Asurion to refund my $150 payment for my last phone.

Hoping this one lasts at least more than a month. Joking aside, if I have anymore issues, I won't be getting another Pre. Fingers crossed.

NoiseTherapy · 11-19-2009, 08:56 AM

my main problem is that I can't use my songs from itunes. I already have a mac so an iphone is in my distant future if that can't be fixed

chris · 11-19-2009, 09:04 AM

Originally Posted by NoiseTherapy

my main problem is that I can't use my songs from itunes. I already have a mac so an iphone is in my distant future if that can't be fixed

This is easily rectified. You have two routes you can travel:

You can burn them to a CD and then reimport them into iTunes. This removes the DRM, allowing you to use them on other devices.
Apple allows you to "upgrade" your library to iTunes Plus. This also removes the issue with using your music on other devices.

I've purchased plenty of iTunes music in the past, but started the process of truly owning my music. This allows me to use it on a variety of devices, most notably the Zune HD, which has become my primary MP3 player.

-Chris

NoiseTherapy · 11-19-2009, 11:42 AM

How do I upgrade my library and what will it cost?

chris · 11-19-2009, 11:43 AM

Originally Posted by NoiseTherapy

How do I upgrade my account and what will it cost?

Open iTunes and on the right top you'll see a link to iTunes Plus. Today, I have 297 songs available for upgrading. They are charging a "special offer" of .30 per song to upgrade.

bradb · 11-24-2009, 10:22 AM

I'm officially an Apple / Mac hater, so I'm really down for the cause to unseat the iphone. I never considered getting an iPhone and I actually have an unactivated one here at home (using WiFi), so I'm very familiar with using it. Its not bad, but I think it could be better. I also like Sprint and have a nice discount there. Their plans are unbeatable.

I got the palm pre and came from a really REALLY old (2005) crappy Sanyo phone. I was very into the webOS operating system, its very intuitive, notifications are nice and the multitasking cards are way cool. I don't think I had any software problems, but even if so, software problems can be fixed and they wouldn't have phased me. I returned the Palm Pre because of hardware issues and a perceived lack of longevity.

If Palm wanted to really destroy the iphone, they COULD have done so with webOS, if ONLY the hardware was better.

I had the Palm Pre and knew that it wasn't going to last me so I returned it after using it for about 5 days. Those 5 days weren't all bad, but here are the reasons why I returned the Pre.

1. Slider Crashes. Yes there is a published fix for this, business card (didn't work 100% for me) and sprint has a new battery. I have a suspicion that the battery is not at fault. The battery contacts are sprung and should mitigate any temporary jostling, and a momentary disconnect seems unlikely to shut the phone off like that. I powered my fone up, removed the battery cover and tapped, shook, pryed, hit, flicked etc the phone and battery and it would not shut off! So I personally think the slider crashes are DUE TO SOMETHING ELSE. Now, I know that is against what the established cause is, but I just have that suspicion. The future will tell.... Ribbon cable?

2. Layout...the Pre isn't a one handed device unless you get a virtual keyboard... and then what is the point of the hardware keyboard. Just seemed more awkward to use. Note, i dont have a big preference for either, and was into the idea of the physical keyboard, but think the pixi's implementation was better than on the pre. The on off button was awkward to use and when pressing it the phone would slightly open and close making it harder to actuate. The charger cable entry is so awkward. it makes the phone hard to use, it stresses the port when you hold the phone up in a normal position. Not smart at all.

3. Splotchy screen... not a deal breaker for me, but not a good foot forward. I normally wouldn't complain about this.

4. Plastic face... this is supposed to be an iphone killer. it feels cheap, plastic will scratch. Get a screen protector you say... sure, but still... plastic screen? Lame.

5. moving parts.... the oreo effect wasn't a dealbreaker to me, but i just imagined overtime the phone was going to get worse.

So i moved on to the HTC hero and while its not as friendly as the Pre, it is a lot less frustrating. I like the virtual keyboard a lot. Typing on it is easy and actually faster than on the pre (for me). its taking me a bit to configure it and tweak it and learn the menus and buttons, BUT over time I'll get it down to a second nature. i'm not worried about that. I'm also feeling that the htc hero is better than the iphone in a few key ways, but it doesn't have that ease of use thing which will probably not elevate it above the iphone. The pre had the potential to unseat the iphone. If only they bet the farm and made better hardware for it!

When I returned my pre, there were 3 other people in the sprint store (Manhattan, NY) with pre problems. Not a good sign.

Make a pre in the pixi format and I would have stayed. Pixi w/out wifi is a dealbreaker for me.