When Palm launched the Pre smartphone last June, I considered it a close second to the iPhone in the race for best smartphone on the market.
The smartphone market has changed a lot since then. Unfortunately, Palm hasn’t kept pace.
Last week — at long last — Verizon began selling Palm phones running its new webOS operating system. The move to Verizon addresses what many analysts have seen as the biggest problem with the Pre and its sister phone, the Pixi: the carrier that was offering them. Sprint, the carrier that exclusively carried both phones up until now, is far less popular than Verizon and has tended to have poorer coverage.
Palm has also updated its phones and software. Last month, the company announced that the Verizon version of the Pre, dubbed the Palm Pre Plus, would have 16 gigabytes of flash memory — double that of its Sprint-based predecessor. And the company showed off some new features for webOS, such as the ability to record videos and to play three-dimensional games.
There’s a lot to like about the Pre Plus and its underlying webOS. The new 3-D graphics capability is a great addition. One of the most popular uses of Apple’s iPhone and iPod touch devices has been playing games. With webOS’s new capabilities, developers can now create games for the Pre that are as graphically compelling as those on the iPhone. I played Electronic Arts’ “Need for Speed Underground” on the phone and was impressed.
The additional memory is also a nice change, allowing you to store more music, games and movies on the phone.
Palm promises to soon offer two more welcome updates for the Pre Plus. One will allow it to record video. The other will be a version of Adobe’s Flash software written for webOS. The software should allow users…