Launch of the Palm Pre

Palm has finally introduced its long awaited handset, named Palm Pre on January 8, this year. It is thought to be a mysterious yet amazing New Year gift from the company to all gadget lovers who have been keenly waiting for its launch. Although Palm vice president Stephane Maes has not given any solid information about its actual price to the media, it is expected to beat the majority of competition. Below are some of the specifications of this amazing gadget that will soon be available to buyers:

1. Touchscreen with 3.1-inch 320 x 480 multitouch display. Its curvy look provides it a sleeker and fine finishing, and has a "gesture" area below the silver center button.

2. A full QWERTY keyboard that slides out from the phone in a portrait orientation.

3. Palm's webOS platform for functioning with TI's latest OMAP CPU. It's another brand new launch from Palm, which is claimed to provide laptop like power to the handset as well as fast scrolling and application switching.

4. The Pre boasts 8GB storage along with Bluetooth/Wi-Fi/GPS facility.

5. Multitasking facility as in other smartphones (e-mailing, calendar, browsing etc.).

6. Other internal specs include a 3 megapixel camera with LED flash, microUSB plug for friendly mass storage, a 3.5mm headphone jack, EV-DO Rev. A, and a first of its kind wireless charger.

It is available from Sprint only as of now, and will be sold alongside the Touchstone. Touchstone is a charging dock for the Pre for its wireless charging by just keeping the phone on top of it.

The company has not provided many details on the media player used in the phone, however, the users will be able to download their favorite tracks using Amazon music store.

Appearance-wise the Pre might seem to resemble Andriod-powered G1, and the Apple iPhone, however the boxed model is a curvy one, and sleeker than those smartphones. The first impression of its look might not be very thrilling; however the real handset may leave you much amazed as the company has worked a lot on its appearance apart from its functioning.

Overall, the Pre has all the qualities of a "standard" smartphone as well as certain "special" features unique to its own model that can only be revealed when the users get a hand-on experience on it.