The other day, whilst sitting in the waiting room of a doctor's office, awaiting the inevitable bad news to come down the pipeline (you're dead, you're dying, no that rash can't be treated), I attempted to do something daring with my iPhone 3GS. I attempted to work. I say attempted, because what dawned on me -- separated from my laptop, a netbook, or any viable computing system -- was that I couldn't really get much of my work done on Apple's bundle of joy. It wasn't the first time I tried to get work done on my phone, but it was one of the first times that I really thought about how frustrating the experience is. What follows is my heartbreaking tale of staggering lameness. Or staggering tale of heartbreaking lameness. Your pick.

You know, we like to keep the wheels turning here at Engadget (you'll be seeing even more big turns in the near future), so we thought we'd take a break in the daily proceedings to direct your attention to a few items of interest. Firstly, while you're probably aware of the Hubs (see the Palm Pre, HTC Hero, and iPhone 3GS iterations), you'll be pleased to know that we've added a video landing page as well. The new hang-out spot is an easy place to casually check recent video we've done as well as featured picks, and we think it's damned handsome too.

Additionally, you may have noticed we've been hitting a lot of feature and review content lately -- if you want to read through some of the best, you can see some recent reviews here, some nice editorials / columns here, and a slew of gadget porn here.

Finally, if you didn't already know, you can become of a fan of Engadget on Facebook, and you can follow the site (as well as editors) on Twitter. Here's a handy list of names:

Team Engadget @engadget

• Joshua Topolsky @joshuatopolsky
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Guess what, internoodle? Google Apps is officially out of beta. Do you know what that means? It means that Gmail, Docs, Calendar, and Talk are losing that "beta" signage / language you've come to know and loathe. It also seems to mean that Google will be taking a much more direct and serious approach to courting businesses for its Apps suite. At first blush, it looks like the company has all but squashed the "Standard Edition" free hosted Apps package that many now use, though that isn't the case (yet). We say "all but" because while it looks like the pro bono package has been zapped out of existence by the magic raygun of capitalism, a tiny link to the service still exists on an arcane page buried deep in the casefiles of one T. Google Merryweather III. Or just Google. To be completely clear, however, regular old Gmail will still be freely available to anyone and everyone who wants a crack at it. At any rate, you'll be happy to know that the beta tag will be scuttled later today, and you can start getting righteously mad at Google for not taking care of their proper, released products immediately. Now maybe they can get to coding up nice native versions of Gmail for the iPhone and webOS... eh?

Update: The folks at Google, bless 'em, have posted a quick note on their blog stating explicitly that the Standard version of Apps isn't going anywhere. In their words, "We have no intention of eliminating Standard Edition, and we apologize for any confusion." Nice!

It goes without saying that we've been pretty excited about the Olympus E-P1 (or "digital Pen") since we first laid eyes on the prototype the company was showing off. The Micro Four Thirds camera just seems to breed gadget lust amongst the staff, combining the best of modern tech with a throwback retro style that is somewhat irresistible. Of course, no one wants to drop $800 on a digicam unless it's actually capable of taking a decent shot -- so we thought we'd put the E-P1 through some basic paces to see if this guy is worth unloading nearly a grand on. Read on for some of our first impressions and observations.

When Ryan Block (our former Editor-in-chief) and Peter Rojas (founder of Engadget, Gizmodo, and RCRD LBL) announced last year that they were embarking on a new project together, alarm bells went off across the interblogs. Following nearly 12 months of rampant speculation, the duo's hard work is finally revealed. Combining the best of social networking, forums, news aggregation, and wiki-based sites, gdgt presents a fairly awe-inspiring range of tools for the hardcore gadget lover.

Imagine if Facebook, Wikipedia, your favorite forum, and Google Reader all got mashed into one gigantic, delicious smoothie, and you might begin to get the idea of gdgt. Instead of retreading territory in which they've already blazed a path, Ryan and Peter present a logical step forward for the gadget community -- a place where you can discuss, dissect, and grow your passion with other like minded individuals. It's an ambitious project with lots of really cool stuff to discover, like product comparison tools, the ability to track gadgets you own (or used to own, or want), news from top gadget sites (wink wink), and embeddable widgets.

Look, we've found the best way in life to learn about something is to scuttle the user manual and dive right in -- we highly suggest you do the same and take gdgt out for a spin. We think you'll like what you find.

Congrats Peter and Ryan!

If you're familiar with the emulation scene (and let's be honest, you are reading Engadget), then you know the name ZodTTD -- the brain behind some of the best jailbroken emus for the iPhone, including variations on the PlayStation, Game Boy Advance, and most importantly... the TurboGrafx-16. Now the master-hacker has brought his goods to the Pre, cooking up a version of psx4all on the Palm device, with the aforementioned GBA and TG16 ports on the way! Interestingly, he reports that the performance on the Pre is actually better than that of the iPhone 3GS, and of course he's hacked access to the keyboard, allowing for (more) proper control of games. There are still kinks that are being worked out (sound emulation, screen scaling, etc.), but it looks like we can expect big things in the near future. We at Engadget know everyone will rest a bit easier tonight knowing that real gaming on the Pre is at hand. We'll hopefully be getting our hands on a version soon, but for now hit the read link for more info, and check out the full video after the break!

If you want to get an idea of just how fast technology moves, a brilliant piece from the BBC should help light the way. The setup is simple enough: 13-year-old Scott Campbell is given a Walkman and told by his dad that it was "the iPod of his day" -- and that's when the fun begins. Having never used or even seen the device, the young man proceeds to experience the kind of equilibrium-destroying confusion which we can only imagine the elderly first felt when attempting to set a VCR timer (you do remember what VCRs are, right?). We've collected a few of the choicest bits from the teen's observations, but we highly suggest you read the full article... you won't be sorry. Our favorite picks (direct quotes):

• When I wore it walking down the street or going into shops, I got strange looks, a mixture of surprise and curiosity, that made me a little embarrassed.
• It took me three days to figure out that there was another side to the tape. That was not the only naive mistake that I made; I mistook the metal/normal switch on the Walkman for a genre-specific equaliser, but later I discovered that it was in fact used to switch between two different types of cassette.
• I managed to create an impromptu shuffle feature simply by holding down "rewind" and releasing it randomly - effective, if a little laboured.
• When playing, it is clearly evident that the music sounds significantly different than when played on an MP3 player, mainly because of the hissy backtrack and odd warbly noises on the Walkman.

[Via Richard Lai]

Now, we're hoping this isn't some elaborate hoax perpetrated on the kind citizens of the internet, because if it's real, it's amazing. Here's the deal: a man capturing video poolside with his iPhone 3GS somehow loses control of the device and ends up dunking the entire phone... while filming. Miraculously, he manages to fish out the handset and it's still rolling. We don't know what the lifespan was / is beyond this clip, but obviously long enough to upload the video or transfer it to a computer. Impressive stuff, though we strongly suggest you don't test this one out on your own. Check out the full video after the break.

[Via George Ruiz]

Been getting the feeling that your laptop was missing that certain something, that little detail, the perfect touch... crocodile skin, perhaps? Well check yourself, homeboys and homegirls -- Sony has just launched a line dubbed the "Signature Collection" which should suit all of your fashion / money havin' needs. Besides offering a handful of its laptops like the CS390 in new skins (the aforementioned fake animal flesh in multiple colors, "kaleidoscope," and all kinds of high gloss varieties), Sony is also introducing a snappier version of the VAIO P (the P699E/Q) -- a glitzy black iteration that will only be available to 1,000 customers. Sure, you'll have to shell out a totally barbaric $1,999 to get one, but it'll come equipped with a 1.86GHz CPU and a freaking radical 256GB SSD. A glorified netbook is worth $2k in our awesome economy, right? Ponder that and other philosophical conundrums as you peruse the new selections located in the vicinity of an area adjacent to the location of that read link.

[Via Sony Insider]

The last time we heard from Sugar Labs, its "Sugar on a Stick" project (a tidied-up build of Sugar OS which can be run live from a CD or USB drive) was just entering beta. Apparently all the company needed to take that version to a release-ready state was a month (give or take). A full, free version of Sugar is now available in a 383MB ISO file for anyone to take advantage of -- though the company is obviously setting its sights firmly in the direction of the education market as usual. The OS -- previously designed for the OLPC XO, but now targeted to any PC or Mac schools have lying around -- is based on the newly released Fedora 11, and is in a "Strawberry" release meant for real world classroom testing. The feedback the company receives on this edition will apparently be incorporated into a future version destined for your hands and eyes at the end of the year. In the meantime, you can take SoaS for a spin... ASAP.

[Via Ars Technica]

Been hankering to see what Flash -- via the Open Screen Project -- actually looks like on an Android (or any modern mobile) device? Well hanker no more, ya'll. Adobe has helpfully dropped a video on us which has Flash team member Adrian Ludwig demo'ing the newly minted HTC Hero (multitouch gestures included). Once the content loads up, it seems to run at a pretty snappy rate, though waiting on Flash content to appear doesn't look encouraging if you're in the midst of casual browsing (or on a weak connection). We'll be interested to see what this is like in the real world -- and for platforms beyond Android -- but for now at least we've got something to go on.

Read - HTC Hero: The first Android device with Flash
Read - New HTC Hero Delivers More Complete Web Browsing Experience with Adobe Flash Technology

According to Dieter over at PreCentral, real, honest-to-goodness usable apps are starting to "trickle out" for the Pre / webOS. Apparently utilizing a loophole in the operating system which allows unsigned apps to be sideloaded through email, homebrewers have taken to the interwebs with small utilities like the tip calculator (pictured above). This comes just a day after a group of DIY'ers figured out a workable solution for getting software onto the phone without rooting, so obviously Pre hacking is moving along at a healthy clip. These are -- of course -- very early applications, so don't expect perfection, and there seems to be some concern that Palm might want to patch up this hole, as it leaves the phone vulnerable to less altruistic endeavors. While the latter point is reasonable to consider, we do have a piece of advice for the folks at the front of this movement: don't wait and worry on how Palm will react to this stuff. It's important to push platforms like webOS, and the Pre needs all the love it can get on the development side right now.

Read - Right now: Install a Homebrew App without Hacking
Read - Homebrew Apps Tricking Out, but be careful

Worried that Apple might not be doing so well? Concerned the company will have to start breaking open the collective piggy banks to keep the lights on? Well rest easy, friends, as the folks in Cupertino have just issued a compelling piece of PR that will surely put your mind at ease -- one stating it managed to move a million iPhone 3G S units over the weekend. That's right, in a fashion not completely dissimilar to last year's iPhone 3G launch (though with far less hiccups), bucketloads of happy buyers flooded Apple's coffers with sweet, delicious cash money for the new smartphone. The buying frenzy was apparently even exciting enough to rouse recovering CEO Steve Jobs from his convalescent state. The seemingly-now-returned honcho is quoted (for the first time in months) in the press release as saying "Customers are voting and the iPhone is winning." Winning indeed Steve... and welcome back.

Sick of having to use your inconvenient mouse and keyboard to do "internet searches" for ROMs of your favorite retro games? Well a gentleman named Matthias might just have the answer to your prayers -- a USB SNES cartridge adapter. The enterprising DIY'er has created a combo hardware and software solution that allows you to plug in your dusty carts directly to your rig, and see the ROMs appear as standalone files which you can then load into the emulator of your choice. Apparently there are still some kinks to work out (like getting data rates up for larger games), and Matthias already has plans underway for a multi-system solution. Still, this is impressive stuff, even if it means we'll have to repurchase any titles we're missing from reputable online auction houses. Hey, at least it'll cut down our visits to "Russian porn sites." Check out the video of the whole thing in action after the break.

So, you want to be a webOS developer, huh? That's great kid, we're excited for you, but there's a catch: Palm won't be handing out an actual SDK to most people until the end of Summer. In a post just published on the Palm Developer Network Blog, reps from the company say that although they've been cranking away on getting their full SDK in shipshape (the version given out to current devs is apparently pretty rough), they won't have anything for a broader audience anytime soon. In their words:

With the Pre now in customers' hands and reports of webOS hacks in the news, we know that you are more anxious than ever to get access to the SDK and start developing for webOS.

We've been working very hard on the SDK and are eager to open access on a wider scale, but the software and the developer services to support it just aren't ready yet.

This should come as a bit of a blow to developers hoping to get cracking on Pre software, and will unquestionably turn those who can't bear the wait towards the fully stocked iPhone or Android platforms. However, Palm does say that they'll be opening the program up a bit wider, stating in the post that they plan to crank the number of devs with the early SDK in their hands up from "hundreds to thousands" over the next few weeks. Apparently, that's part of process the company is beginning to ration out access, building to a full release.

Another bit of puzzling wordsmithing in this post comes in the form of the company's stance on homebrew and DIY "experiments" (their words) which have come to light in the past couple of weeks. So says Palm:

As on any popular platform, we recognize that some developers will experiment in ways that cross official boundaries, but we believe that our formal offerings – and community efforts built around those offerings – will provide the best experience for the vast majority of webOS developers and users.

So while it's not exactly a keep-off-the-grass statement, it certainly reads vaguely as to whether or not the company will lock out jailbreakers hoping to dive deeper into webOS. Further confusing the matter? Palm has just released the Linux source code used to compile the Pre's firmware, making the possibility of cooked / custom ROMs a very serious reality, and obviously opening the floor to a lot of said experimentation. Mixed messages? Yes. Our word to Palm right now? Put every effort into getting that SDK out, or you're at risk of quickly burning through all the good will you've just engendered.

Update: We've added some info above which reflects Palm's statement that it will be considerably widening its pool of developers over the next few weeks with access to the early SDK.

Read - An update on the early access program and the SDK
Read - Open source packages

If it ain't broke, don't fix it -- right? We know countless reviews of the iPhone 3GS may begin with that cliché, but there's little chance you'd find a better way to describe the strategy that Apple has just put into play with its latest smartphone. In many ways, the 3GS is a mirror image of the iPhone 3G; externally there's no difference. It's inside where all the changes have happened, with Apple issuing a beefed-up CPU, new internal compass, larger capacities for storage, and improved optics for its camera. More to the point, the release of the 3GS coincides with the launch of iPhone OS 3.0, a major jump from previous versions of the system software featuring highly sought after features like cut, copy, and paste, stereo Bluetooth, MMS, tethering, video recording, landscape keyboard options for more applications, and an iPhone version of Spotlight. At a glance, what Apple seems to be doing is less a reinvention of the wheel and more like retreading the wheel it's already got (and what a wheel, right?). So, do the iPhone 3GS and OS 3.0 tweak the details in just the right places, or has Apple gone and gotten lazy on us? Read on to find out.

It's happening, if you hadn't noticed. Read after the break for live updates of all the keynote mayhem! iPhone OS 3.0, Snow Leopard and MacBook refreshes, just for starters.

Just a reminder to all you fine, fine folks out on the Interverse -- we're going to be live and direct from Apple's WWDC keynote in just a few hours. You should tune in, we hear there may be some kind of new phone announced.

Plant yourselves at this page (feel free to bookmark). Here's what time you'll want to do said planting:

07:00AM - Hawaii
10:00AM - Pacific
11:00AM - Mountain
12:00PM - Central
01:00PM - Eastern
06:00PM - London
07:00PM - Paris
02:00AM - Tokyo (June 9th)

Listen, E3, we had some good times. We shook like maniacs for your motion controllers. We jammed with the band (and our resident DJ, Stab Master Arson). We skated all over the place. We liveblogged like crazy. We basically took your news flow and funneled it into a succinct package of mind-blowing media snacks. But that was then, and this is now. We had to hightail it out of town, because a certain someone needs our special brand of tenderness... and that certain someone is Apple's WWDC in San Francisco. We'll miss you E3, but only a little bit.

Seriously guys, gear up for WWDC this coming Monday (June 8th), where some kind of new phone or something might get announced. Here's the page you'll want to plant yourselves at (feel free to bookmark), and here's what time you'll want to do said planting:

07:00AM - Hawaii
10:00AM - Pacific
11:00AM - Mountain
12:00PM - Central
01:00PM - Eastern
06:00PM - London
07:00PM - Paris
02:00AM - Tokyo (June 9th)

There's a lot new in the Pre. It's not just the phone and it's not just the OS -- it's the underlying ideas and bundled applications too. We're going to try and run down the stand-outs and standards -- from the heady promises of Synergy, to the basic stuff you'll be using every day.

Synergy

Besides things like Universal Search and unobtrusive notifications, another really big idea that Palm has for webOS is Synergy, a contact / calendar management system that aims to put an end to the confusion of having to juggle multiple accounts from multiple services on a single mobile device. Unfortunately, this is probably the aspect of the OS that needs the most work.


The Synergy premise is simple: it will take your Gmail account, Facebook profile, AIM identity, and / or Exchange data and merge it all together on your Pre, killing duplicate entries, joining together sources where there's overlap (creating "linked contacts"), and generally making your connected life super-duper awesome. What it actually does is dump pretty much all of your content into the phone without a second thought for what it's letting through the door. If you have a single Gmail account, you'll probably be okay -- it perfectly handles a set of data from one source just fine, and that source would be easily manageable because... well, it's your Gmail. However, it's totally indiscriminate about what contacts it pulls in, which means if Google has auto-saved anything, it's going to be on your phone. That's fine, we're used to this. The G1 does the same thing. The problem really arises when you want your Facebook profile integrated. Guess what? You don't get to say whose info gets pushed to the phone -- every single person you "know" on Facebook will instantly becomes a part of your contact list. And we're talking people who only give you access to their birthdate. How does it feel to have a contact on your phone that is simply a birthday? Annoying.

We don't know if you're like us, but we don't want every person we're friends with on Facebook in the contact list for our phone. Facebook kindly provides grouping for different contacts because it appreciates the fact that not everyone has the same kind of relationship. WebOS? Not so much.

The system works fine if you don't care who ends up in your address book -- in fact, it works really well at grabbing all that info and sticking it on the phone (while keeping it in sync with server-side changes). Where it breaks down is giving you any kind of tool to really manage and gatekeep the information.

Secondly, contact linking doesn't seem to work the way it should -- namely, it doesn't find duplicates in all contacts, whether an AIM, Google, or Facebook account and merge where appropriate. What we discovered is that that adding our AIM account to the Gmail contact list that lived on the phone didn't automatically bring the correct names under one roof (as you imagine it's supposed to). Instead, we had to manually link contacts, even when we could clearly see that the AIM name was already in our Google contact. That's the opposite of what Synergy is supposed to do... we think. We spoke to Palm and confirmed that for now, Synergy isn't pulling in AIM names, only email addresses, though they're considering one of those OTA updates to fix once the device is launched.

Don't get us wrong -- there are a number of good ideas at play with Synergy, but it clearly needs some kinks worked out before it realizes the vision that the company seems to have for it. For the time being, we'll likely only be juggling our AIM and Gmail account data, though we're ready and willing to see what happens with that aforementioned OS update.

Contacts and Calendar


Since contact management with Synergy can be handled in multiple locations, we expected fairly robust options when it came to our address book -- and we weren't disappointed. The contact app in webOS is extremely well thought out and easy to navigate. As you'd imagine, if you're using Gmail as your main contact list (as we were), changes to contacts are updated periodically. We were hoping there would be a push and pull, but no luck. Still, you can choose to manually sync when you want to update, and changes seemed to flawlessly take whether we made them in Gmail or on the phone. One option we'd like to see in the future is for Synergy associations to be allowed to migrate back to your Gmail / Facebook contacts. For instance, if you link an AIM account and Gmail contact on the Pre, when you sync back to Gmail, it will add the AIM name to that entry. Still, we think webOS provides a deep and useful platform for managing contacts, despite some of the shortcomings of Synergy.


The calendar app, like contacts and email, will automatically sync to your Gmail (or Facebook / Exchange) set and pull data in. Besides offering helpful views in a variety of colors (though not enough variety for our needs -- this app is hurting for user-selectable hues), it also can hook into / be hooked into other applications on the device. For instance, you can buy tickets for a movie via Fandango, and have it drop the event in your calendar. Like contacts, calendar merging is an all or nothing affair, though you can choose which calendars you see in your views.

Navigation in the app is actually really clever -- this is the first calendar application for a smartphone that didn't feel like it was trying to cram too much information into too small of a space. Admittedly, the week and month views aren't going to reveal lots of detail to you -- you'll have to go day-by-day to see that info -- but for giving a clear overview of your events (provided you know which colors are which), it does an outstanding job. We also liked the fact that it used the familiar left / right and up / down swipes to move through days, weeks, and months, which felt completely native and natural to the webOS environment. It's obvious that as with previous applications, Palm needs to work out the Synergy kinks, but this is clearly a place the company didn't skimp on.

SMS / Instant messaging


Unlike some of the misses in the Synergy arsenal, the way it brings together SMS messages and IM'ing is actually one of the coolest and most interesting parts of the phone. Essentially, Palm has taken the threaded messaging it pioneered in its Treos to the next level, allowing conversations that take place via SMS to be fluidly carried into an AIM or Google Chat session, and back out again. The messaging app on the Pre allows you to simply toggle which service you're using, and keeps all the messages in a clear, easy to read timeline. On your end, it looks like the same continuous chat, though you're jumping from space to space. In both theory and practice we love this idea -- it simplifies quick communication, and keeps a thread going where it might otherwise be lost. Visually and from a UI standpoint, the messaging app is clear and simple, leaving room for it to do what it does best. The only danger you have here is confusing the person you're talking to, since they're receiving those messages in multiple places.

Email


For us, the email application included with webOS is a double-edged sword. In terms of general usage and simplicity, it's excellent, and the inclusion of push Gmail is massively exciting. Unfortunately when it comes to deeper functionality, customizing, or more robust sorting and management options, however, we found ourselves wanting more. A lot more.

The basic design of the app is very similar to Mail on the iPhone, save for one big missing puzzle piece: there's no multiple message management. What that means is that you've got to individually delete or file every single message you get -- that was okay in iPhone OS 1.0, but it feels downright outdated here (and Android 1.5's check boxes are real salt in this wound). We're just reminded of what a huge pain it is. For a device that's meant to be focused on getting things done, this is a remarkable oversight. Additionally, we had hoped that since there was such tight integration with Gmail in webOS that we'd see some Google-centric features, such as threaded messages or labeling / archive abilities that played a little nicer with the big G's system. Unfortunately, none of that is present here. You do get to layer accounts, as in other aspects of the OS, though it seems a lot more obvious in mail, since managing multiple accounts in a single pane is really nothing new.

Other minor nitpicks concern the lack of options for changing font size, no choice on message preview length, and the fact that all of our emails from the Pre seem to be colored navy blue, and there's no way to change it. C'mon guys.

To be clear, mail on the Pre is definitely usable -- especially given push, which usually serves up messages within seconds of hitting the server -- but we would have liked to (and hope we will) see more. There's lots of room for improvement in this space, webOS or otherwise.

Phone

The phone app is extremely basic, but we assume that's because hooks for calling out are strewn all over webOS. Essentially you're offered an iPhone-like dialer, which gives you fast access to your voicemail (sorry, no visual voicemail here), contacts, and lists of your recent / missed calls. During a call, you have options for speakerphone, mute, back to the dialer, and adding callers. There's nothing drastically wrong with the phone app on the Pre, but there are some gaps in logic that we don't follow. For instance, when you dial digits, it doesn't search your address book for strings and pull up matches from your contacts list... it just lets you dial. And though we had originally observed that you couldn't use the QWERTY to type-to-find your contacts when using the dialer, it turned out there is an option to switch on this functionality. Why it's not automatically switched on to begin with is anyone's guess.


Other than a few confusing elements, making and receiving calls on the phone is about as straightforward as one would expect. We were incredibly pleased to see that Palm has included speed dial for your contacts, making use of the entire QWERTY (save for E -- that's for voicemail) for long press insta-dial. If the contact hunt in the iPhone has you down, this is the antithesis: a beeline to your most used numbers.

Browser

The webOS browser is obviously central to the operation of the OS as a whole. Since many apps on the device leverage web standards for their core operation, it could be said that the browser is the OS. But in terms of a straight-up web browsing, we found the Pre's out of the box option fantastic -- not only in speed and navigation, but with rendering and compatibility. Built atop WebKit (just as Apple's Mobile Safari), the webOS browser displays pages almost exactly as the iPhone does, though due to the fact that Palm is implementing a lot of hiding icons and app controls, it actually feels like you're seeing more content despite the smaller display. Additionally, its cache management seems better to us, allowing for fairly speedy back and forth through multiple pages. We did see a few rendering issues on pages here and there (like being able to scroll beyond where any content lived), though in defense of the browser, most of them cropped up in places like lyrics sites and old Angelfire pages (we kid, we kid).


Zooming is accomplished via double taps as well as pinching, but unlike the G1, the rendering and snap points on the Pre are formatted to follow columns, just as Apple's iteration is. That means that when you double tap on a chunk of text or an image, nine times out of ten you get exactly the right sizing for that content.

When it comes to multiple pages, instead of creating tabs, the browser just opens another instance in your cards. This can be a little confusing at first, but once you get used to the idea, it's actually a really great tool for managing a handful of data at once. Meanwhile, history and bookmarks are always accessible from a drop-down menu, but Palm also provides a kind of speed-dial screen when you first open a blank browser page, giving you quick access to your top bookmarks.

As far as mobile browsing options go, the Pre is about as good as it gets -- nearly on par with the iPhone in rendering, though more cleanly laid out, easier to navigate, and (in our tests) downright faster.

Media playback and management

Palm definitely scores with its concepts about handling media in webOS, particularly when it comes to music. First, they've given users more than a single option to load media onto the device, allowing for a straight iTunes sync (more on that in a moment), but also giving you the option of loading media onto the Pre in mass storage mode. The phone automatically recognizes file types and throws them into the appropriate application regardless of location in memory (which means you can organize however you like).

iTunes sync (or "Media sync" as they call it), however, really helped ease us into using the Pre as a media device. In essence, the process works exactly as it would if you were using a standard iPod. You get options for (un-DRM'd) music, TV, movie, podcast, and photo syncing just as you would on an Apple device, and in our experience, the actual process was no different. iTunes offers up a contact sync, though it doesn't actually appear to do anything but store a backup file on your phone -- not a huge deal, but it would be amazing if it worked. Regardless, the ability to easily manage your media library will take a big load off of the minds of potential switchers worried about how to deal with a new platform... but we can't imagine Apple is super stoked by the concept.


As far as playback goes on the phone itself, we couldn't be more pleased. The Pre forgoes glitz like Cover Flow, instead relying on clearly delineated lists and a really smart (and attractive) shuffle function that make it easy to get around your collection. One of our favorite features is the ability to jump to an artist or song search via YouTube, or an artist search in Amazon's MP3 store while browsing or playing back music. It's a really smart little perk that makes it way easier to go deeper on something you're enjoying -- and it's the kind of 'why didn't anyone else think of that?' concept that makes webOS so enjoyable to use.

Video

Video management is pretty straightforward, but we found that's not quite so simple to get that content playing right on the Pre. Mostly the device seems a bit finicky about what formats / conversion types it will take. Anything converted for an iPhone should work perfectly, but if you're throwing on other MP4 / M4V content, you might run into some snags. Obviously, anything protected won't play, and even movies that we'd converted for upload to YouTube (MP4, not Flash, obviously) didn't seem to want to work. Still, H.264 videos we grabbed from the internet, such as a Tekzilla video, played just fine. Running video and music content definitely puts a little strain on the system, and when you've got something loaded up and playing, you'll notice a speed hit in opening / closing of cards and applications.

Amazon


The included Amazon MP3 store integrates with the Pre beautifully, save for one glaring omission: you can't download files over EV-DO. Just like the first iteration of the iTunes Store on the iPhone, you've got to have a WiFi connection if you want to bring down tracks. We don't know if this is a network issue for Sprint, or just a weird quirk the two companies didn't see as a problem, but we're not happy unless we can actually use the Rev. A we've got here. Palm and Sprint: fix it.

Applications

Memos, Tasks, Clock, YouTube, Maps


Just like most modern smartphones, Palm throws in the old standards here. YouTube and Google Maps operate largely as they do on other platforms, though admittedly, we prefer the look and feel on the Pre. In particular, Maps seems much easier to get around in with its pop-over menu for deeper options. Directions seemed better implemented to us too; webOS gives you dedicated controls which don't alter your view for moving forward and back through each step. If you have to look at the list, jumping into and out of it is a one-tap process.

Palm also offers up the kind of utility apps you'd expect. A snazzy looking retro clock, the eye-candy Memos app (sticky notes on a corkboard... cute), a decent calculator which also sports a kind of 70's vibe, and most notably, a Tasks app. The latter is notable for two reasons -- the first being that we're totally in love with the design, which takes more than just inspiration from Moleskine notebooks. Secondly, it's a really useful app that lets you keep sets of to-dos and create due dates and alarms -- though what we'd like to see some integration with Google's recently minted Tasks for Gmail.

One other note (no pun intended): we made a promising discovery with Memos -- you can actually search the content of your notes within the application, find-as-you-type and all. We're hoping it's a sign that Palm means to implement searches for other content in webOS... like email, perhaps?

Sprint Navigation


We won't go into detail on every Sprint app included (especially not the NASCAR app), but we wanted to briefly talk about Sprint Navigation. Since most other smartphones of this class either don't come with on-board GPS navigation, or charge you for it, we felt it was notable that Sprint and Palm are giving away what feels like a very usable GPS app with the Pre. We used the software -- which does turn-by-turn / text-to-speech directions -- while driving from San Diego to LA, and it worked flawlessly. Our only complaint is that you can't put the phone into landscape view while using it (hey, what is that accelerometer for?), and there doesn't seem to be a car mount available, so finding a place to keep it wasn't exactly a cinch. Still, when you consider that this comes as part of any Pre plan you pick on Sprint, it's a really, really nice addition.

PDF View / Doc View


We're not heavy document users, but we do need to load the occasional PDF or spreadsheet. The Pre seemed to have no trouble opening simple PDF files and Word documents in the two provided applications, though we started to see some nasty memory management issues when we busted out large files, like a 7MB PowerPoint document. PDF View also seemed to buckle under a 3.9MB file, essentially freezing the phone, then giving us a memory warning that we needed to close cards (we only had two others open). Clearly this stuff hasn't been optimized, but we're hoping that when DocsToGo makes its way onto the Pre (apparently it's forthcoming), it will be able to tackle larger files without so much heartache.

App Catalog


We really liked the interface for browsing and downloading apps on the Pre. Instead of landing on a homescreen which only gives you a small amount of info, right off the bat the App Catalog presents you with a cleanly laid out list of featured apps, popular, and then a nice selection of tag-based sorting methods if you want to go deeper (most recent, category, etc.). Once you get into a tag, you're given a menu for parsing by date added, app name, rating, or cost.

Getting more info (including screenshots) and downloading was a pretty pleasant experience, and the layout is spacious but still info-packed; you feel like you're not missing anything. Screenshot browsing was nice (something we regularly desire in Android's implementation), and actual application pages had easy links out to developer websites and support. In case you're wondering, everything was free on our review unit, so we didn't get to try out any pay-to-play apps (thanks guys!).

We do have a gripe, of course. App Catalog doesn't seem to support background downloads within the application itself (you can use other apps while it works), so if you begin a download and want to go back a page and browse the list, your file stops transferring. It's a little ironic that the phone which boasts multitasking as one of its big features couldn't give us a queue for ongoing downloads.

Third party applications


At the time of this writing, there were but a handful of third-party applications available in Palm's App Catalog for download. Some of the standouts to us include AccuWeather, Pandora (obviously), Tweed, Fandango... and Classic (the Palm OS emulator, in case you've been on a desert island, under a rock, etc.). We're not going to work through all of the applications which will be ready at launch because it would probably make this a four-part review (and no one wants that). Still, we do have a few random thoughts.

Classic is most interesting because it shows the possibilities of what the Pre can do -- though it's obviously one of the few here that isn't built using just the web-standard tools which Palm is pushing on developers. To be honest, we had hoped to fire up the app and run Dream Engine, a Turbografx-16 emulator that was a favorite of ours back in the Treo days. Unfortunately, it doesn't look like the app has access to any file systems -- we couldn't get the program to recognize our ROMs folder, no matter what configuration we tried. Attempting to peek at the directory structure with FileZ also proved futile. We're hoping that Palm will open this up a bit more... but we're also hoping they'll open the platform a bit more too.

Speaking of, developer courting still seems like an area where Palm needs work. They've got a great OS to work with, but they have yet to really extend a hand to a wide selection of developers or help explain how working in webOS will be beneficial to their business. The platform is nothing without the support of creative and active partners -- just ask Apple. Here's a chance for Palm to further set itself apart from the competition. We're hoping they take it.