But buying a phone isn't strictly about features. It's also about the usage experience. And here, there's considerably more to discuss.

The software
The big difference, of course, between the two Treos is that the Treo 700w is a Pocket PC and nothing but a Pocket PC. If you liked the Palm Desktop, forget it. It's gone. If you liked the Palm OS, forget it. It's gone.

When you bought Palm handhelds in the past, you were getting a complete solution, with the software designed specifically for the hardware. The fit and finish of this approach was compelling. Now, however, when you buy the Treo 700w, you're buying a Pocket PC that just happens to be made by Palm.

Nothing made this change more clear than the prompt message shown in Figure F.

FIGURE F


What if there's no cradle? Roll over picture for a larger image.

The Treo 700w doesn't come with a cradle, yet the setup instructions specifically state "Place the device in its cradle." Now, you and I know that if there's no cradle, just connect the device and continue. But does everyone?

I'm a big fan of both the Palm OS and the Pocket PC, but I truly dislike ActiveSync, Microsoft's answer to the Palm OS HotSync. I've rarely ever had HotSync problems, but I almost always have ActiveSync hassles. Admittedly, both the Treo 700w and the PPC-6700 use ActiveSync 4.1, and that works quite nicely. Even so, there's always some sort of hassle when setting up the first sync.

The Treo 700's home screen, shown in Figure G, has been tweaked slightly and is really not particularly suited to phone use.

FIGURE G


The Treo 700's dial screen doesn't have any numbers Roll over picture for a larger image.

In fact, if you want to dial a specific number, you've got to hit the green phone button, select Dial Pad from a pop-up menu, and then wait for a second screen to be displayed, as shown in Figure H.

FIGURE H


Finally, here's the dial screen. Roll over picture for a larger image.

Although you can remap your screens and buttons, I find this interface inexcusable. When you're driving a car, you don't have time to hit the green button, hit the center button to unlock, hit the green button again, hit the up toggle twice, hit the center button, and then, finally, start typing out your phone number.

Compare that to the very clean interface of the PPC-6700, shown in Figure I.

FIGURE I


The PPC-6700 has a very clean, easy to use interface for dialing. Roll over picture for a larger image.

Palm claims they've added new features to help you use the device, but if their home screen is any indication, I'd rather go with the straight Pocket PC Today screen.

When we test new devices, we often install them on completely bare, new machines. We did this with the Treo 700w, specifically because we wanted to see what it'd install as a desktop solution. I was very surprised and disappointed to see that the Palm installer decided to install Outlook 2002.

Hello? This is 2006!

I hadn't seen Outlook 2002 since Outlook 2003 came out. It's been, literally, years since I've seen that version of Outlook. What? Palm couldn't afford to license a product that hasn't been discontinued?

Now, obviously, most of us already have the latest release of Office, but there's just something cheesy about shipping a four year old version of software with your hottest new product.