Gizmodo seems to think that the company’s new WebOS is a diamond, the Pre’s hardware is the rough:
Think of it like this. The software is agile, smart and capable. The hardware, on the other hand, is a liability. If Palm can get someone else to design and build their hardware—someone who has hands and can feel what a phone is like when physically used, that phone might just be one of the best phones on the market.
On the other hand, Engadget and the New York Times’ own David Pogue like the hardware. First, Pogue:
The Pre is a shiny, flattened black plastic capsule, coated with a hard, glossy, scratch-resistant finish. When it’s turned off, the screen disappears completely into the smoky finish, leaving a stunning, featureless talisman. It’s exactly the right size. It’s smaller than the iPhone — half an inch shorter, though a quarter-inch thicker — and therefore more comfortable as a phone.
And now Joshua Topolsky from Engadget:
There’s no question that Palm has built this phone on the foundations laid by numerous devices before it – most obviously the iPhone – but the Pre clearly carves out its own path as well. Some of the ideas and concepts at play in webOS are truly revolutionary for the mobile space, breaking down lots of the walls that separate the experience of using a dedicated PC versus using a handheld device. One feeling that we were constantly stuck by while testing the phone was a kind of revelatory, ‘Hey, this actually feels how a computer feels.’ It was an experience not completely unlike our first encounter with the iPhone – that little light that goes on that tells you that things can really be different than how they’ve been before. We also felt that same thing the first time we picked up a Treo, so it’s fitting that the Pre should inspire a similar response.
Like I said the other day: Palm needs this thing to knock people’s socks off when they pick it up. Will it succeed? Who knows. The Pre will make both friends and foe once it hits street in a few days, but I’m in Palm’s corner here. Competition is good for everyone.