The Treo 700p was officially announced on May 15, to be released by both Sprint and Verizon on their respective EV-DO networks.

The device sports a 1.3 megapixel camera, 128MB memory, 312MHz Intel XScale processor and DUN capability.

Palm Treo 700p Reviews

CNET has a review of the Palm Treo 700p, and talks about the device’s performance: “We tested the dual-band (CDMA 800/1900; EV-DO) Palm Treo 700p in San Francisco using Sprint’s network, and call quality was solid. We had no problems hearing conversations, and though our callers reported a slight hint of an echo, they said that overall, the sound quality was excellent. Audio quality diminished slightly when we activated the speakerphone, with the voices sounding tinny, but it wasn’t anything distracting. Plus, volume was adequate, even in noisy environments. Pairing the 700p with the Logitech Mobile Traveller Bluetooth Headset was a breeze; we were up and running in less than a minute. Palm also said it will release a special version of the Plantronics Discovery 640 Bluetooth headset.” Link.

PCMag reviews the Palm Treo 700p and finds, “As a phone, the Treo 700p is fine but not great. Sound through the earpiece in a noisy location was a little wobbly, and transmissions were clear but a bit tinny. There’s no in-ear voice feedback or noise cancellation. … Battery life is its one standout strength: The beefy battery gives it 5 hours 16 minutes of talk time.” Overall? “The Treo 700p offers an excellent balance of phone functions, PIM, media, and high-speed Internet access. It’s a joy to use and will satisfy all but the geekiest feature hounds. For that, it’s a worthy Editors’ Choice.” Link.

Infosync reviews the Palm Treo 700p, and finds its wireless options impressive, with the glaring exception of WiFi, which is missing from the handset. Overall? “The Palm Treo 700p certainly isn’t perfect: we wish Wi-Fi were supported, some basic calling features could use some shoring up, and the Palm OS is in sore need of a refresh. That said, with its vivid display, wireless modem capabilities, superior e-mail handling, and better-than-expected picture and video features, the 700p easily ranks as the most satisfying Treo to date.” Link.

MobileBurn reviews the Palm Treo 700p and concludes, “Overall I like the hardware and its form factor. The 320×320 display is also very nice, and the EV-DO data access to absolutely to die for. But in spite of those things and a very mature suite of applications, I still have a hard time liking the 700p because of the OS and its old fashioned looks and outdated methods for doing things. … But all that means is that there is going to be, I believe, more of a learning curve for new PalmOS users than we would see for new PocketPC or Symbian OS users. If you are in the market for this type of device, you are probably already fully capable of learning its ins and outs. If you have been a Palm user in the past, there will be next to no learning curve at all since the OS has changed so little over the years.” Link.

Unstrung reviews the Palm Treo 700p and compares it primarily to the 700w. The conclusion? “Given that Verizon has a wider EVDO data network than Sprint, offers the Wireless Sync product for free, and (in our opinion) has a better phone/PDA integration, there’s little reason to go with the 700p unless you’re a real Palm OS fan. The only two advantages the 700p offers are better memory management (which, admittedly, is a major pain in the rear on the 700w) and a high resolution screen. However, since the screen is the same physical size, it’s not clear how much of an advantage that’s going to be for anyone without superhuman eyesight.” Link.

Brighthand has a review of the Palm Treo 700p, and finds this Treo 650 upgrade to be solid but a little bit disappointing: “On some level, it’s disappointing that Palm didn’t do a little more with the 700 series. Seeing as it is currently the 600 pound gorilla of the smartphone market, it could have gotten away with a bit more, like adding Wi-Fi or a VoIP suite as standard. This speaks to design as well — the overall Treo styling hasn’t been significantly altered in two and a half years. While it’s still competitive, it would be nice to see a sleeker and more modern Treo, or perhaps a range of designs akin to HTC’s lineup.” Link.

Palm InfoCenter reviews the Palm Treo 700p and concludes, “The Treo is a device that can have a direct impact on your productivity both inside and away from the office. But unlike the BlackBerry the Treo can be much more than just a business tool. It can handle a number of different roles, from a high powered PDA phone, to a portable music and video entertainment device to a pocketable email machine and it does so with ease and style. Palm has ironed out the rough spots on the Palm OS Treo platform, making for one of the top smartphones on the market today. The changes and improvements to the 700p may not be drastic or earth shattering, it is definitely a much more refined device than the Treo 650.” Link.

TopTechNews reviews the Palm Treo 700p and concludes, “For die-hard Palm aficionados who really need the speed, and who can spend $399.99 plus the cost of a two-year service commitment, the EVDO-enabled Treo 700p might be just the thing. For the rest of us, a competing EDGE-enabled product such as T-Mobile’s MDA smartphone might be a tad less speedy but it does incorporate the Wi-Fi and global roaming capabilities that the 700p lacks.” Link.

LaptopMag has a review of the Palm Treo 700p and writes, “The biggest leap for the 700p is its support for EV-DO, Sprint’s high-speed network that blankets most major metro areas in the U.S. In our tests we saw very good average throughput of 500 Kbps. When we compared the Treo 650 and 700p side by side, the 700p took 1 minute to download the entire New York Times homepage (including images), while the 650 took 2 minutes and 16 seconds. That’s a huge but somewhat deceiving gap because the Blazer browser on both devices starts rendering text immediately, so you can usually find what you’re looking for on a site before the entire page loads.” Link.

MobileTechReview has a review of the Palm Treo 700p and writes, “Battery life and capacity is equal to the Treo 650, which is to say very good by smartphone standards. The Treo ships with a beefy 1,800 mAh Lithium Ion battery that’s user replaceable. … A smartphone / PDA phone that’s set the standard, with key upgrades: that’s the Treo 700p. Though evolutionary rather than revolutionary, the Treo 700p doesn’t mess with a good thing: it’s got fantastic phone ergonomics and usability, an attractive design, strong PDA features and EVDO for fast Internet connectivity.” Link.

NetworkWorld has a review of the Palm Treo 700p and writes, “Both carriers [Sprint and Verizon] support dial-up networking, which lets you use the high-speed wireless network connection on the phone to connect to a PC. If you’re out and about without a Wi-Fi signal or wired broadband connection, the Treo 700p can provide Internet access via USB cable or Bluetooth. In my tests, the Bluetooth connection worked perfectly, and I was on the Internet within minutes.” Link.

Gadgeteer has a review up of the Palm Treo 700p and writes, “So, do I think the Palm Treo 700p is a smartphone worthy of your hard earned cash? My answer is maybe. If you have already have a perfectly good Treo 650, I would say the upgrade doesn’t give you enough oomph to justify trading up. This is especially true for me as I’m on the Cingular network and so far there isn’t a GSM version of the 700p available. But for those of you that have yet to try a Treo smartphone, I would not hesitate to recommend the 700p. It’s an easy to use phone with a great feature set, tons of accessories, even more software and a large established community base.” Link

Infosync reviews the Palm Treo 700p and writes, “Call quality on the 700p was decent for a PDA/smartphone combo (we had no trouble pairing our Plantronics wireless headset with the Treo), although the speakerphone was a bit tinny. We got about two days of standby time from the 700p – again, not bad for a QWERTY smartphone. … The Palm Treo 700p certainly isn’t perfect: we wish Wi-Fi were supported, some basic calling features could use some shoring up, and the Palm OS is in sore need of a refresh. That said, with its vivid display, wireless modem capabilities, superior e-mail handling, and better-than-expected picture and video features, the 700p easily ranks as the most satisfying Treo to date.” Link.

CoolTechZone has a review up of the Palm Treo 700p, and concludes, “According to Palm, the battery life should last approximately 4.5 hours of talk time and 300 hours of standby time. We easily best the talk time with 10 minutes over the specified time. The call quality was amazingly good, even though there was little static in some of our test calls. The speakerphone isn’t nearly as impressive, but it’s acceptable. With EV-DO (unfortunately, there’s no WiFi support), streaming audio and video files was a delight, although video quality was substandard at best. All in all, Palm has released a solid smartphone in the form of 700p that deserves to be praised.” Link.