Any Palm Centro users here?

T

That Linux Guy

Limp Gawd
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Aug 24, 2008
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I've been eyeing the Centro for a year now, and I still want one. It's the longest I've wanted something without really swaying to something else! :)

I'm up for an upgrade at Sprint, in Eastern Michigan (Flint to be exact). What I love about the Centro is the millions of millions of apps, scripts, and hacks available for the PalmOS (without screwing around with Java Micro Environment like you would to run 3rd party apps in Blackberry OS). I know the keypad is small, but so are my fingers and I have no problem typing on it. I am still slow because I've never had a QWERTY keypad.

I'm curious to know how the Palm Centro holds up to normal use. I've read every professional review of it on the web, and I've read 1500+ user reviews, but most of these aren't long term. I need a phone that won't crap out on me every few months like my current Samsung A640 (It's nicknamed "Number 5" because I was on replacement five after only 18 months of basic use).

Tell me about your Palm Centro. Anything a new purchaser should know before getting one. Thanks guys and gals!

(If you had one go bad, it happens. But if you've had nothing but problems or more than 2 replacements in a year, then I'd really like to know).
 
I love my centro. Had it since the end of may and I have had no problems with it except the occasional out of nowhere reboot, but you can't call that a prob cause it might have been a bad app that caused it. Pull the last app off and all has been well. Just make sure you get a 2gig or more mem card and NVbackup. It will back up the phone for you in case something goes wrong and you can restore back like you can in windows. Also if you want to use IM's with it get Mundu 4.1, so much better than the ones that comes with the phone and only $11
 
I own a centro. Had it for around 6 months now. I like it a lot. The music player ain't that bad, speaker phone's nice and it's not gigantic like other smartphones. Best phone I've owned, by far.
 
Sounds like a good one. I've been looking for open-source and freeware for it, and have found tons of apps like LJP (SNES/NES emulator), the included music player, Opera Mini, etc.

Do any of you have a data plan for internet with it? Also, hows the battery? On my current Samsung, It can go about 3 days stand by, but most days, I can charge it every other night. Is the included 1150ma battery good for a day of heavy use? I plan on using the internet with it, as well as basic phone use, texting, and the music player at work.

It sounds like this phone is pretty good. I'll probably pick one up next week.
 
I have the unlimited Data plan for it and unlimited texting. I use that thing all the time and I have had no problem with the batter dying on me. I can go all day and be busy as hell with it. 16 hours and still have a lot of battery left. I do own one of those energizer chargers that holds 2 AA batteries and I have it with me at work in case I need it, never used it there yet. But I do charge it every night, so I can't help you with multiple day standby.

LJP is a cool program, but it likes to crash every so often. I do find myself playing mario and tetris on it a lot. I have a Sprint also, and I am gonna teach you something. Get a program called PDAnet, if you get unlimited data. With that program you don't need a PAM account. It makes Sprint think you are using internet on the phone, but the program sends all the data to a computer and you can surf with it. I have used it a few times and there has been no additional charges on my bill. We lost power one night for about 3 hours. I surfed the whole time.

I hope all this helps.
 
That's great to know about the battery life. I was hoping not to have to get an extended battery. The only extended batter I've found renders the phone too big to fit in most cases or holsters, and also the extended battery cover comes in white (yick!) I want something with a calander and an organizer to help keep my forgetful mind on track, a PDF viewer as I'm currently studying for my CCNA and RHCE certs and need all the reading time I can get, an MP3 Player since my Iriver T10 died over a year ago (I hate MP3 players that use AA/AAA batteries for power!!!), internet for checking the forums ([H], SPCR, MaxPC, XS, LQ.org, the Linux Geeks MySpace group, not to mention email and working on my blog, thatLinuxguy.wordpress.com. I'm glad to hear that I can do all this and still have some battery life left over).

DNA, Thanks for the tip of PDAnet. I have actually been looking for a free or open-source alternative for the last few months, but I may just eat the $35 for PDAnet.

Thanks for all your help. I should be picking up my Palm Centro later this coming week, time permitting. I'm glad to find out that the Palm Centro is everything I've thought it was and more. Thanks again!

-Andrew
 
I love my Centro. My only complaint is that I wish the screen was a lil bigger. I almost got a Katana II or a Rumor instead of the Centro. I am very glad I didn't. Flexibility, great batt life, a mem card that is actually useable, and it's better than the razr I used to have. Oh and there is a PDF program for it called PalmPDF. mytreo.net is a great site to get info and program for the phone.
 
anyone know if there is a way to configure a centro to use ATT medianet? i have unlimited data usage but don't feel like getting the more expensive pda plan. been wanting to upgrade to something with a keyboard.
 
In general, Palm devices are well built in my experience. We create some Palm apps at work and have pretty much every Palm Smartphone since the Treo 180 and all of it continues to work with various people beating on the good regularly. The only broken one I can recall is someone launching a Treo 680 off the roof of there car and it shattered the screen when it hit the gound.

For usability the Centros do not have a lot of lag and shit that comes with Windows Mobile, general navigation is overall faster. Window Mobile encourages you to multitask then kicks you in the nuts by turning into a pile of slow dogshit.

Anyway the Centro is great and I wish I had one in my pocket for daily use. When I got a new phone from Sprint I was stuck getting the Moto Q9C simply because I needed a GPS :(

My other Win Mobiles experience is mostly with a Mogul and Tilt btw, before any Windows Mobile defenders jump in here just saying my Q9C sucks. I know it sucks.
 
Anyone have experience with the Centro with AT&T? I wish I could go with another provider but where I live the only provider with acceptable coverage is AT&T. Are there any draw backs with it that I might run into that others know of?

My main concerns are:

1.) Music playback. I really want a nice all in one device and music is a key part. It just has to be adequate. I like basic Artist->Album->Track navigation. Could careless about playlists or whatever.

2.) Calendar. Is there one included? Is it easy to use? How about third party?

3.) Browsing. How is it? I'm not sure about this one, honestly of these three it's the most minor. I would only use it to check a few of my email accounts (personal, school/work).

Sorry I haven't researched the Centro much but this thread really peaked my interest from the positive comments and the great sounding range of available applications. If it can do well with music playback and has a available calendar that is useful then I could jump on it.
 
1) Music Playback - It sound pretty good from the speaker on the phone, but I don't have the headphone adapter for it so I can't tell you how audio quality really is. (I know where to get the adapter for $2, but I have an iPod) The way you navigate songs is by folder. Nothing like you you would get on an iPod.

2) Calendar - It has a good calendar. It syncs up great with Palm Desktop (which is easier to enter most data in). I use it enough to say I like it. If you don't think it's powerful enough for you, there is one called Agendus that is supposed to be perfect. I am happy with the Calendar the phone came with.

3) Browsing - The Blazer browser that came with the phone is pretty good. I wouldn't rank it with firefox. Now you can get Opera Mini for the phone and it works ok. I stick with Blazer and 99% of websites I have no problem gettin into.
 
Well, I picked up my Palm Centro this morning and have yet to put it down. Its a lot thinner and smaller than I had thought it was, but its still big enough. I'm loving it so far. Thanks you guys for the input. BTW, I'm writing from the Centro right now and it's surprisingly easy.
 
That Linux Guy said:
Well, I picked up my Palm Centro this morning and have yet to put it down. Its a lot thinner and smaller than I had thought it was, but its still big enough. I'm loving it so far. Thanks you guys for the input. BTW, I'm writing from the Centro right now and it's surprisingly easy.
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yeah i also picked one up as an upgrade this week. course AT&T decided to remove my MediaNet bundle without telling me. it was unlimited data, unlimited texts to AT&T customers, and 200 texts to other networks for $15 a month. they were trying to justify buying one of the PDA plans. kinda funny as i tried my mom's sim card in it and got data fine and she doesn't even have a plan. there is no difference in the plans besides price gouging. can't even send or receive MMS anymore now. thanks AT&T. :rolleyes:

as far as the phone goes, i like it so far. gonna have to get used to the keyboard but otherwise, its a tiny little device and will certainly keep my life organized. best part is not having to tap letters in on the screen with a stylus like i had to on my Rokr E6
 
I've been using one for a couple of months now, pretty solid phone and reception. I've rough with my phones and some of the paint on it has chipped away but still works fine.
 
I'm actually testing the battery at work right now. running ptunes while working and blazer on breaks. the battery seems like its holding up good, but its still too early to tell.

I have some other questions. anyone know how to get Java on the palm? All I can find is stuff saying that palm no longer has the right to distribute JVM for PalmOS. Blazer is OK, but I really want to try Opera Mini.
 
DNAlevelC said:
I'm glad you love the phone Linux Guy. How is the battery life for you?
Click to expand...

DNA, I'm so totally loving the phone. It's very cool, very easy to use, and the keyboard is great. Once I get going, I can type pretty good on it for a QWERTY phone newbie.

My likes for the phone are too many to list. My main gripe was with a 2.5mm to 3.5mm headphone adapter. I paid $11 at Radioshack for one of these adapters to use my phone as a media player. While I can get sound, it's mono, and only on the right side. After doing some research, I've found that few of these adapters actually work with Palm devices. I'll be ordering an adapter from Palm next week, and if it doesn't work, I'll be through the roof and calling Palm myself. Also, I was kinda hoping for better battery life. I ran pTunes with full volume on the speaker phone, for about 3 hours, and I used the internet for about 20 minutes. After 8 hours, the battery was nearly dead. I'm hoping battery life will improve, but I did have the phone out a lot, checking email, checking forums, playing music, and fiddling with pTunes. Perhaps using the headphones and at a lower volume, cutting the screen brightness a bit, and more conservative overall use, I can make the battery last a bit more. It lasted through a night though of playing music though.
 
I have my phone set to receive mail from aol and gmail automatically, I use the browser a lot, i play some games on it, I do a lot of texting, and I take a decent amount of pics with it. I can get my batt to last 24 hours easy, and that is a lot better than the razr that I had.

Now as for the Java to get Opera on the phone. Palm cannot distribute it anymore, but it's still out there. I will pm you the link to get it.
 
That Linux Guy said:
DNA, I'm so totally loving the phone. It's very cool, very easy to use, and the keyboard is great. Once I get going, I can type pretty good on it for a QWERTY phone newbie.

My likes for the phone are too many to list. My main gripe was with a 2.5mm to 3.5mm headphone adapter. I paid $11 at Radioshack for one of these adapters to use my phone as a media player. While I can get sound, it's mono, and only on the right side. After doing some research, I've found that few of these adapters actually work with Palm devices. I'll be ordering an adapter from Palm next week, and if it doesn't work, I'll be through the roof and calling Palm myself. Also, I was kinda hoping for better battery life. I ran pTunes with full volume on the speaker phone, for about 3 hours, and I used the internet for about 20 minutes. After 8 hours, the battery was nearly dead. I'm hoping battery life will improve, but I did have the phone out a lot, checking email, checking forums, playing music, and fiddling with pTunes. Perhaps using the headphones and at a lower volume, cutting the screen brightness a bit, and more conservative overall use, I can make the battery last a bit more. It lasted through a night though of playing music though.
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i got more than that for the most part. it ran most of the day for me, but i had less than 25% left at the end of the day. sprint sells an extended battery and cover IIRC so i might be looking into that later on if i can't get any good usage habits down. my moto rokr E6 got better battery life and it did a lot of the same crap that my centro does. oh well i guess.
 
Honestly, I've found that playing music on it at full volume is the most battery draining thing it does. I'm on a mission to find some over the ear headphones that won't drain the battery like my HD280s. The battery is great for casual web-browsing, playing NES roms with LJP, texting, and regular phone usage. The camera is great if you have a steady hand, haven't tried the camcorder. As a PDA, setting tasks and dates is as intuitive as it gets, and it gets better reception and clearer calls than my Samsung A640. Honestly, having OperaMini and LJP makes the Centro worth owning. pTunes is great too.

My only cons for the Centro so far is battery life for playing music, the headphone adapter dealy, and also, transferring songs with the Palm USB sync cable took about 4 hours for 600Mb worth of songs. I don't really want to know how long it would take to fill up the 4Gb MicroSDHC card I got along with it (not part of the deal.).
 
That Linux Guy said:
Honestly, I've found that playing music on it at full volume is the most battery draining thing it does. I'm on a mission to find some over the ear headphones that won't drain the battery like my HD280s. The battery is great for casual web-browsing, playing NES roms with LJP, texting, and regular phone usage. The camera is great if you have a steady hand, haven't tried the camcorder. As a PDA, setting tasks and dates is as intuitive as it gets, and it gets better reception and clearer calls than my Samsung A640. Honestly, having OperaMini and LJP makes the Centro worth owning. pTunes is great too.

My only cons for the Centro so far is battery life for playing music, the headphone adapter dealy, and also, transferring songs with the Palm USB sync cable took about 4 hours for 600Mb worth of songs. I don't really want to know how long it would take to fill up the 4Gb MicroSDHC card I got along with it (not part of the deal.).
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sounds like its still USB 1.1 then...though even 1.1 could finish 600MB in a decent amount of time. and you were transferring songs how? if you open up ptunes while the cable is connected you can sync it up with WMP i believe.
 
Hi guys, I need a new phone soon (verizon) & have a question...

This phone looks very good for me...
I have separate phone, digital voice recorder, sansa mp3 & camera.

Does it have a SIMPLE "voice memo" function... like one button record hot key?
- also - can you sit in an hour long meeting and record it?

That is most important to me...

Also - I'd like to see some pics from the 1.3 mp @ 1280x1024.
- can you guys post some pics of your GF's. ;)

Finally - I assume this phone can play mini-movies?
- my sansa came with "media converter" software to convert & save to Micro SD.

BTW - youtube is loaded with reviews of this phone, but no VOICE MEMO info!
- this guy is a slow talking hilljack, but gave one of the best run-throughs...
- http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PTtMCUjtXuM&NR=1

EDIT - BINGO!
- end of the video - activate voice memo by press and HOLD the SIDE button!
 
markt435 said:
sounds like its still USB 1.1 then...though even 1.1 could finish 600MB in a decent amount of time. and you were transferring songs how? if you open up ptunes while the cable is connected you can sync it up with WMP i believe.
Click to expand...

I'm trying that right now.Does it matter that I'm running WMP 10? 11 wanted to make sure my Windows XP copy was Genuine, and though it's completely bought and paid for (The OS came from a torrent, but the COA key is original to Emachines), Windows Genuine Advantage says it's not.....

Ok, I've just spent the last 45 minutes screwing with Sprint Music Manager, Windows Media Player 10, and Ptunes. I updated Ptunes, I've followed the how-to for connecting via Sprint Music Manager (which is pretty lame BTW), and I've made no headway with Windows Media Player. Everytime I want to do anything regarding device settings, it links me to Some site that shows what MicroSoft considers cool players for WMP 11. I wish I still had my damn card reader now because that would be easier. AAAAAARGH!!!
 
Awww man... Verizon only sells the blue phone.
- my contract is over though.

I gotta' go to AT&T to get the black phone.
- any opinions on the service? I am in Chicago suburbs...
- 900 national minutes w/ rollover = $60

Do I need a DATA plan for another $30?

What plans do you guys have?

If I have wireless web at work, lunch spots, bar, do I need a DATA plan?
- I never had a "internet" capable phone, so I don't know....

Thanks for any info...
 
for music I use my flash drive adapter for my mem card, but I only have a few songs on it to mess with. I might do more when I get the headphone adapter.

Talk2Troy, I am on sprint, and they don't require a data plan, and you don't need one unless you want internet. I do have an unlimited data plan for mine. I think mine costs $9. The phone does not have wifi on it so if you want internet you need a data plan. The no wifi thing is really my only problem with the phone.
 
Does anyone else have issues with random reboots of your Palm? There've been about 3 times now in the 9 days I got the phone that it's rebooted on me under normal circumstances. Once, it was when I started the messaging app with the touchscreen, another when I pushed the email button, and another time though I can't remember what I was doing at that exact moment. The unit in question is completely updated from Palm and Sprint. Any ideas? Could buggy programs do this, even if I'm not trying to access them? I have LJP and Opera Mini on the thing and was wondering if they could possibly be culprits.
 
The one program I have had reboot problems with is TCPMP. When I exit the program the phone reboots I would say 3 outta 10 times. I think its just a buggy program.
 
If you have the newest firmwre in your phone, I think it's 1.07 it reboots once in a while. I never had that problem till I went to the new firmware. I might have a backup of my phone with 1.06 on here. I think I might try goin back to it. It doesn't really bother me cause the phone is 20x better than my razr and that thing would reboot every day.
 
DNA, I think you're right about the firmware. Either way, I uninstalled LJP, TuSSH, and OperaMini for the time being. I haven't had it reboot, and I haven't really cut back on my usage. It's great for watching you tube videos, working on my blog at work (to some extent as I use copy/paste a lot from a UNIX terminal), and browsing the net (IE, checking the [H] forum ^_^). I find my self plugging the thing in to charge whenever I can. I still haven't gotten my headphone adapter from Palm, so I haven't been using my 4Gb MicroSD card, but when I'm home, it's charging. If I wasn't selling my car and drove more, I'd be charging it there too :)

I'm still loving the phone like no other. My friends with their LG Rumor and Voyager look at my phone with mystery. Part phone, part PDA/handheld, completely cool :D
 
yeah my friends girl has a Rumor and she loves my phone. I charge mine when I can since I don't know when I will be by a charger. I am on the move a lot. I did a Hard Reset on my phone (after a backup to the comp and one to NVbackup). Then I did a sync to the comp to get all my info back in it. I have only had one reset since then. If I get anymore Sprint told me to take the phone in and have them check it out.
 
I got a Centro when it came out.

Had it for two days- then exchanged it for a Moto Q9. The Centro felt like a toy, and the keyboard was ridiculous. The Moto Q9 has one of the best keyboards ever (on a phone, at least), and feels pretty solid.

However, dust under the screen issues abound. Motorola quality FTL. (I'm a diehard Sanyo fan, for their unbeatable quality, but I needed a PDA phone). Eh, still does everything I need it to, without feeling like it's gonna break in my hands like the Centro...

My next phone will be better, I hope...
 
TOOL1075 said:
I got a Centro when it came out.

Had it for two days- then exchanged it for a Moto Q9. The Centro felt like a toy, and the keyboard was ridiculous. The Moto Q9 has one of the best keyboards ever (on a phone, at least), and feels pretty solid.

However, dust under the screen issues abound. Motorola quality FTL. (I'm a diehard Sanyo fan, for their unbeatable quality, but I needed a PDA phone). Eh, still does everything I need it to, without feeling like it's gonna break in my hands like the Centro...

My next phone will be better, I hope...
Click to expand...

dropped my centro twice since i got it. if its a toy...its a durable one. :p
 
youre one of the few people I've heard praising the Q?over anything. I wanted a Q before I heard about all their problems.

I agree that the Centro could use less plastic and more aluminum, but ive never thought it to be toy-like.

(BTW- I replied on the Centro. It's my first QWERTY phone but I can type pretty fast if I dont think about it. The tiny keys can seem impossible at a glance, but if you give them a real chance. it's not difficult to use at all.)
 
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