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Hands-On: HP Pre 3 and Veer

Feb 9, 2011, 4:05 PM by Eric M. Zeman

Phone Scoop goes hands-on with the new HP Veer and Pre 3 smartphones. These fresh webOS handsets pack more of a punch than their predecessors did.

HP and Palm have updated the Pre line of smartphones with the latest Pre 3. The Pre 3 builds on the same design language and functionality of the Pre and Pre 2, but takes things a few steps further.

The look and feel of the Pre 3 is very similar to that of the original Pre. It is a stone-shaped vertical slider that has a full QWERTY keyboard for messaging. Button placement is about the same, as is the mirror on the back side of the slider. Most other controls remain nearly unchanged.

The fit and finish of the pre-production units they had on hand was much better than I expected it to be. The slider worked well, the seams were smooth and matched nicely, and the gesture area for swiping works as it does on the Pre Plus. If production units are as well-made, HP has done at least one small thing right.

Pre3

One aspect of the hardware I was not pleased with is the keyboard. The keyboard of the original Pre was widely bashed by everyone as terrible. Palm has *not* updated the keyboard enough. It offers a little bit more space between the keys, but the keys have the same terrible rubber feeling to them and the minimal travel and feedback. It's been two years, HP, you can't design a better keyboard?

The display looked absolutely gorgeous. At 3.6-inches, with 480 x 800 pixels, images, graphics, icons and text looked luscious. It really makes a big difference in the overall impression you get when using the phone. (One complaint about the original Pre was is less-than-spectacular display). The added real estate is a major help, too. Giving webOS more room to breathe really makes the OS feel better.

On the user interface side of things, there's not much to set webOS 2.x apart from 2.0 that we've already discussed. What's most noteworthy is that the user interface absolutely flies. The Pre3 has a 1.4GHz processor on board, and it makes all the difference in the world. The OS is smooth, fast, and doesn't hang up or crash like it did on the original Pre.

On the whole, the Pre3 is a better device than its predecessors, but I still worry for it. The Pre was announced more than two years ago. The design of that phone was OK, but not compelling, especially in today's world of Android super phones. HP / Palm did not go far enough to set the Pre2 (and the Veer) apart from their under-performing older brothers.

I was hoping to see genuinely new hardware today, and that's not what HP delivered. The phones are nearly indistinguishable from the Pre, Pre Plus and Pre 2. While the Pre 3 does offer the best version of this form factor, it would have been great to see HP really go all out with a brand new super phone of its own. Alas, it didn't.

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About the author, Eric M. Zeman:

Eric has been covering the mobile telecommunications industry for 17 years at various print and online publications. He studied at Rutgers Newark and University of Kentucky, and has a degree in writing. He likes playing guitar, attending concerts, listening to music, and driving sports cars.

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Today HP announced the Veer, a webOS smartphone with a full side-out QWERTY keyboard, 2.6-inch screen, gesture area, HSPA+, Wi-Fi mobile hotspot, and a 5-megapixel camera. Under the hood is an 800 MHz Snapdragon processor and 8 GB of storage memory.

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Speaking today at the AllThingsD conference, HP CEO Leo Apetheker said that the company is open to licensing webOS, which it acquired when it purchased Palm in July 2010. Apotheker said, "WebOS will also be adopted by many partners who provide services to small and medium businesses.

HP Pre 3 (CDMA)

3.6" display 480 x 800 pixels
Snapdragon S2 MSM8655 processor
1,230 mAh battery
Hardware Text Keyboard, Headphone Jack (3.5mm)

HP Veer

2.6" display 320 x 400 pixels
S2 MSM7230 processor
910 mAh battery
Hardware Text Keyboard

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Comments

This forum is closed.

This forum is closed.

kingskid

Feb 9, 2011, 8:31 PM

HPalm

Way to go HP/Palm. These products will be a hit. I can't wait to see even more phones, tablets, etc., using the WebOs platform.

PaulAlcohol

Are you being sarcastic? That's the only way I see this last post making any sense.

...

hombre_melaza

Feb 11, 2011, 7:52 PM

HP WebOS

Everyone forgets how long it took Andriod to be what it is now and you can thank Verizon for staring their Driod campaign if not iPhone would still be ruling.

Anyway this is a great OS, those who don't agree are already use to their Android or iOS platforms and don't think anything else is better. Everyone like something different that's why competition is good, they keep everybody on their toes!

If it wasn't for Palm when it came out with the Pre no one would of been looking at multi-tasking (which WebOS still does best), Touchstone (wireless charging) every battery company is trying to come up with one, cards look at Honeycomb and Playbook how they design their OS... can you really say WebOS is crap when so many other companies are ...
(continues)

crammy1

i agree 100%

Nitrus73

The one thing I can say about the Pre Phones is that I love the OS. I have moved on to the Galaxy S Epic4G and I really miss the WebOS. The gestures were very intuitive and the built in apps seemed to work very well together to me. I would go back ...
(continues)

dgrave2929

Feb 9, 2011, 4:12 PM

HAHAHAHA

Who in the world would be dumb enough to purchase such a mistake. It didnt work the first two times, it wont work now. Please stop while you are ahead.

txsprintrep

You'd be surprised how many people are actually waiting on a device like this.

...

muchdrama

dgrave2929 said:
Who in the world would be dumb enough to purchase such a mistake. It didnt work the first two times, it wont work now. Please stop while you are ahead.

A very well thought out and mature post. Thank...
(continues)

JoeyEsquire

Have you ever used a webos product? It's hands down the most polished best OS out there. Having the 1.4ghz processor is going to make this thing a dream.
The only problem even the original Pre had a was:
1) the Hardwear was admittedly crap and
...
(continues)

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Jeromeo1980

Feb 10, 2011, 5:48 PM

Palm Pre1,2,3,4,5??

Every review I've ever read says the biggest downfall of webOS is NOT the software, but eh HARDWARE. EVERYONE thinks it's hideous and ugly.
A smaller pile of dog sh*t is still a pile of dog sh*t.

PaulAlcohol

Feb 10, 2011, 11:05 AM

My reaction

🤣

Are they serious? WebOS ... was this the game changer? Was this the Michael Jordan of their little world? When there's 10 seconds on the clock, down one point, who do you want taking that final shot? This phone is a bench warmer. The crappiest Androids kick this phone out of the water. The Windows 7 Phones are laughing their @$$ off right now. I'll take my Captivate over this phone any day of the week. Give me a buggy HTC Surround. Anything. Just keep this phone away from me.

I will not sell this phone to my customers ... well, unless I want to overload my sales with returns. BOOOO on all levels.

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