Review: Palm centro
By David Flynn | theage.com.au | 29 May
Palm Centro
Price $299
Rating 4
http://www.palm.com/au
Keen to trade up from your standard mobile to a smartphone? Despite a few cautions and caveats, the Centro could be a near perfect fit.
It's almost certainly your most affordable option, selling for $299 through Telstra without any contract. All you need do is keep your pre-paid account topped up for voice as well as data. Telstra offers several "browser packs", starting at $5 for 5MB, although how much data you need each month will depend on your usage. This will be the Centro's hidden cost. However, because the phone runs on the slower GSM network rather than Next G you'll probably stick to low overhead options, such as email and checking your location with Google Maps.
Of course, you could just use the Centro as a PDA-phone and never go online. You still get your diary, address book, to-do list, MP3 music and loads more, especially if you install some of the thousands of free programs that add features and functionality, such as video playback.
And the Centro could barely be easier to use, thanks to its fast and elegant Palm operating system. So where are the catches? We're not sold on the small and cramped keyboard: you need small fingers or, more likely, manicured fingernails, as well as an accurate aim and some patience. In the end we settled for tapping away on the touchscreen with the rather flimsy plastic stylus.
Synchronising the contents of the smartphone to your desktop or laptop will also require a compromise if you're using a Mac with the latest OS X 10.5 Leopard operating system.
The Centro works only with Palm's own Macintosh organiser software, instead of syncing with the Mac's iCal and Address Book.
Despite those flaws, the Centro is an impressive offering for the first-time smartphone buyer.
First published by TheAge.com.au on May 29 2008
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