It doesn’t appear that long since we have a tendency to initial laid eyes on the Palm Pre two, however its successor, the HP Pre three, is already here — or a minimum of it'll be this summer.
First impressions of the device are promising. Where the Pre two was a small upgrade from the exceedingly underwhelming Pre, the Pre 3 may be a “rip up the plans and begin again” job.
To start, it’s a much bigger device, with a 480 x 800 three.6in touchscreen, finally bringing WebOS into the globe of big-screen smartphones.
HP’s gone back to the curves of the first too, with rounded corners and edges that build it look somewhat sort of a high-tech bar of Imperial Leather. It’s a bit dumpy, measuring sixty four x sixteen x 111mm, however it feels nice within the hand, and like the HP Veer, the keyboard has been flattened and therefore the lip removed, therefore it’s much more pleasant to kind on than previous Pre handsets.
The slide-out keyboard still has those slightly rubberised, grippy keys – that we’ve continually liked – however it’s the additional width that produces this a dream to kind on. The individual keys have simply the correct quantity of spacing, feedback and travel. It’s too early to deliver any quite sweeping verdict nonetheless, however within the keyboard stakes this might eclipse the RIM’s BlackBerry daring for typing comfort.
Another huge headline with the Pre three is its rip-snorting one.4GHz Qualcomm processor. Yes, you browse that right – one.4GHz. It’s single-core solely, though, not like such a lot of of the new devices being announced at Mobile World Congress this year. And it backs up that processor with 512MB of RAM, 8GB or 16GB of storage, dual-band 802.11n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth two.1, AGPS and HP’s Touchstone wire-free charging system.
The camera, meanwhile, may be a 5-megapixel unit with one LED flash capable of shooting 720p video, and there’s conjointly a front-facing one.3-megapixel camera for creating video calls.
As with the HP Veer, the Pre three conjointly uses its Touchstone system to transfer knowledge from the HP TouchPad, and if you own each devices, you’ll be ready to answer calls and browse text messages received on the Pre three directly on the pill over Wi-Fi. not like the Veer, there’s no magnetic port for charging, though there’s lots of space for a physical micro USB port on this handset.
Worryingly, at a mere one,230mAh, the battery doesn’t look terribly high capability, which means the Pre three may well be suffering from short battery life. If HP will overcome that potential pitfall, we will see this being a rival in to the BlackBerry daring.