The Official Palm Blog

South by Southwest and the One-Millionth Centro

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Just over a week ago, I joined the hordes of people descending upon Austin, TX to catch, or be the latest music discovery. It didn’t take too long to learn that SXSW is a tidy little field study for what makes the Palm Centro so popular for today’s mobile lifestyle–in fact the Centro is such a hit that today we announced we’ve sold one million of them.

Palm helped host a music showcase at SXSW with 11 nationally touring artists, who shared what it’s like to try to stay in touch with their family, friends and fans while they’re on the road.

It’s not a very glamorous life. Many up-and-coming musicians spend much of their time on long road trips in cars or motor homes and often go for days or weeks without sitting at a computer, yet they are under constant pressure to keep their fans up to date on their whereabouts and get people to every gig. More and more musicians are using smartphones to connect with fans and everyone else during their hectic touring schedules, including several who are using their Palm Centro to text, email, upload videos and photos, moblog and, oh yeah, talk on the phone.

I’ve posted a video of Alexa Wilkinson talking about her experiences on the road. Women have become one of the breakthrough markets for the Centro because of the combination of its touchscreen and keyboard, as well as the small size and color choices.

Centro is available today from AT&T in glacier white and obsidian black, and from Sprint in onyx black, ruby red and pink.

-Paul Loeffler

AT&T Palm Centro...obsidian black is here...

   

People have been asking when the AT&T Palm Centro will be available in obsidian black - well today is the day and it's now in AT&T retail stores and online at www.att.com/palmcentro and www.palm.com/centro.

AT&T customers, if you prefer another color for your smartphone, the AT&T Palm Centro is available in glacier white as well. Sprint customers can get the Palm Centro in ruby red, onyx black and pink.

Phil M. - Product Line Manager, Consumer Smartphones

Editor's Note

When we launched the Palm blog last year, we shared that we would be talking about a variety of topics from product information and demos to general company information and events. In response to some of these types of posts, it is not surprising that we receive comments regarding customer support. While the Palm blog was not designed as a channel to field customer support inquiries, we certainly want all of our customers to have multiple access points to receive help and be able to share their thoughts on how we can be doing better. So I have been working closely with out customer support organization to respond to people who comment on the blog with product support inquiries.

John Moses, Palm's vice president of worldwide customer relations, will be posting about the various customer support options we have available in the coming weeks. In the meantime, if you need help with your Palm device, you can visit the Palm customer support site. You can also visit the Palm Help Forums, which have regular discussions taking places regarding various product topics.

These other sites also have helpful forums regarding Palm devices:

• Brighthand
• MyTreo.net
• PalmAddict
• PalmInfoCenter
• TreoCentral
• Treonauts

Paul Loeffler

Daylight Saving Time is coming

As of last year, Daylight Saving Time (DST) now rolls around a little earlier in the first part of the year and ends a week later: this year DST begins on March 9th at 2 a.m. and ends on Nov. 2 at 2 a.m. People who have recently purchased a Palm smartphone or updated their smartphone using a Palm software update are pretty much all set with the latest DST calendar rules, but we want to make sure everyone is prepared so your devices are up to date, including your calendars (previous post on DST rules).

• Palm Centro (AT&T and Sprint) and Treo 755p (Sprint and Verizon Wireless) customers, all the latest DST rules are already built into your device, so you are set as far as your device is concerned.
• Palm Treo 700p, 750 and 680 customers: If you have already installed the most recent software updates for your device, all the latest DST rules are included in your respective updates and your device should be all taken care of.

Keep in mind though that your desktop must also have Microsoft's DST update in order for all your information to be in sync. Not sure if you have it or need it? Check out Microsoft's support page.

All other Palm customers, please visit the Palm DST support page for more information and to see if your device has the most up to date DST rules.

-Palm Customer Support Team

Instant messaging from mobile devices

Instant Messaging on mobile devices isn't as popular as text messaging, but I find myself doing more and more IMing on my Centro smartphone. According to a joint study by AOL-AP on IM usage patterns, the number of people using IM is increasing, but it's still relatively small compared to text messaging. As I'm sure many of you would agree, to me, web-based mobile IM services don't come close to the IM experience you get on your desktop computer. I think one of the issues for mobile usage being significantly lower than text messaging is awareness that there are mobile IM clients available that address some of the key shortcomings of browser-based mobile IM (varies by client):

• Hitting the refresh button to see if you have received new IMs and waiting for the page to load
• Waiting for pages to load when switching from the IM session to the IM friends list
• Not being able to see all contacts on the same page
• Overall design is less aesthetically pleasing (e.g. colors are not different for each IM chat participant)
• Lack of functionality, including less cool emoticons (let's face it, they are a part of IMing)

One of the things I like best about using an IM client is that it gives you the ability to see who is available vs. idle. And if you are talking to multiple people at the same time, you're able to chat with them all in one place (my record is 9 at a time).

Try out one of the various mobile IM clients available (Palm's mobile IM client is available on Sprint Centro and Treo 755p, and on AT&T Centro and Treo 680) and see for yourself if it's a better experience for you compared to the web-based IM clients. I don't think IMing from mobile devices will replace text messaging anytime soon, but it's certainly becoming a better experience and more like the IMing that many of us enjoy from our desktop computers.

-Paul Loeffler