Considering 650, Web Browsing/Email

[larrytxeast]

I am considering a Palm Treo 650 as my 1st smart phone. I've merely used old-fashioned Nokias with watch-style LCDs, but have found myself texting a lot (what a pain with only a numeric keypad) and wishing for email/web-browsing abilities on a phone.

I do realize the Treo 650 is not the latest model, but I'm thinking it might be good enough for a start, maybe for the next year or so. I considered the iPhone--I loved its web browsing--but when I found it doesn't do copy-paste, I was appalled, that was a deal-breaker. I would use copy-paste a lot, I'm sure.

I did use a Palm Pilot before, so I know about Palms somewhat and how they work.

What I would like to use the Treo 650 for, besides phone-calls, is texting (about 5 a day) and web browsing--and I'd like to be able to POP3 my Gmail and have it check it (say) every 5 minutes or so.

My questions are--would the Treo 650 be good for this? I know it won't web-browse as well as the iPhone, but with Opera Mini or (say) Piscal (or whatever it was called) would it do as well as (say) the Blackberry Curve or Treo 755 etc would do, or close to it? Is there any freeware software that would allow me to POP3 my Gmail account?

I will read the FAQs and whatever else I can see, but there is such a sea of it I don't know if I can find what I need all that easily. To wit--are the batteries user-replaceable, as opposed to being all sealed up like the iPhone?

I tried registering at treonauts or whatever, but they are taking forever to register my email so I could post there. It's been 2 hours, still nothing.

Also, it seems everyone is going Windows Mobile, does this mean Palm OS is drying up? Any other tips?

[plunker]

The 650 texts great and I love the format that it shows the entire texting session that you are in.

Email will work for you as well. I am not up todate on gmail, some times you have to pay for an upgraded version on some of the email apps. Not sure if gmail is one of them.

I surf my fav sites and others ok. I am not in the fastest service area (sprint) has to offer but speeds are ok.

[benjie]

You would be better of with something newer, such as a Centro. The Centro has 70mb of memory and is very stable. My wife loves the one I gave her more than she loves me.

Ben

[larrytxeast]

You would be better of with something newer, such as a Centro. The Centro has 70mb of memory and is very stable. My wife loves the one I gave her more than she loves me.

Ben

Oh okay. Well, how about the 680? I ask because I don't think AT&T does the Centro (I could be mistaken), but besides that I see more 680-s for sale and its form factor seems more like the 650. The Centro seems more "entry-level" with its interface, I could be wrong, not trashing it anyway, I just tend to like a more "business-like" interface, the 680 strikes me as such a model.

[dollface]

Hi, I love my 650 and browse quite a bit on using Blazer; not the best browser but I just could not get Opera Mini working right, even though it is a superior browser. Some websites though are just not mobile friendly or even usable, but a lot are.

As far as email, I use gmail and had it set up for pop3 retrieval on Versamail, again not my favorite application. I ended up buying ChatterEmail and wow what a difference!! I now use ChatterEmail and use IMAP for my gmail, since they now offer that. I have Chatter set up to retrieve every 12 minutes and it is flawless. You can even set up a schedule for retrievals which I have set for between 8AM and 11PM. Even when I had Chatter set up for constant retrieval (push email) I still had over 55% battery left at the end of the day, now with it only retrieving every 12 miutes, I have over 70% battery left at the end of the day. The batteries on the 650 are awesome.

Good luck to you, hope you get the model that works for you.

[plunker]

Sounds like the 650 will work for you...but if you are looking at new treos look at the latest and greatest models. I have looked at palm and windows based treos and they do the same stuff. Windows you can use a wifi card with the unit. palm does not.