For everyone that has sent me emails offering tips on buying phones, PDA’s, smart phones and great coupon offers as a result of my article on how to MacGiver a Treo 600 with a Q-tip, I just wanted to say thank you.

Please do not fear.  My old finned Cadillac of a Treo will be replaced sometime soon.  I have been stalling for a couple reasons.(ok the list grew, there are seven, but the last couple are the most important)

First, I am moving from the Atlanta area to the Charlotte, NC area.  And I wanted to get moved before I made the switch.  I’ve been caught up in lots of move details, real estate contemplations, and other mundane tasks.

Second, I am probably going to switch from T-Mobile to Verizon Wireless, and that’s causing some angst.

• T-Mobile only offers roaming networks in the Charlotte area and that makes checking voice mail a real pain.
• T-Mobile has been a great service and I hate to give up a great service.
• I wouldn’t touch At&t nor Sprint with a ten foot stylus as At&t robbed me blind several years ago, and Sprint fires their customers when Sprints customer service lines get worked to hard.
• Verizon Wireless is the only major network left and we have family already on the network so it makes sense from that perspective.
• I’m not crazy about the way Verizon layers service packages into their plans, so it feels like its going to cost a lot more.

Third, I?m going to import my existing telephone number to the new phone service and I suspect I will run into Murphy?s Law a few times when that takes place.

Fourth, Verizon has not released the new Palm Treo 755P nor the 800P and it?s unknown when they will release either of those. There are rumors that the 755P will come out any day now possibly tie the end of the month, but similar rumors were around two months ago. I?d hate to buy a 700 P. today and had to be outdated tomorrow literally.

Fifth, even if I can get a 755P, that doesn?t include a GPS chip and I would very much like to have the Verizon navigator service running on my next phone when I switched to Verizon. It is rumored that the 800P in the Treo lineup will include a built-in GPS service. So a combination of Verizon?s and Treo?s poor marketing and communications are preventing me from buying anything.

Sixth, Verizon wireless sells the 700P for $359 and the store and $259 online. The 755P sells for $200 at Sprint, and there are rumors of the price point will be the same at Verizon. I would definitely not like to spend more for an outdated model that Verizon.

Seventh, there are $200 blackberries that have all of the capabilities of what the 800 P. is rumored to have, however I don?t want to learn a new operating system with the Blackberry. I?ve been using Palm Treos since the year 2000 and I don?t really feel like learning a new operating system today. I have learned a lot of operating systems over the years, and learning an extra one just for the hell of it doesn?t really get me excited anymore.

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I have an old Treo 600 and I’m just about ready to upgrade, but I haven’t figured out which carrier I’m going with and so I can’t make a final decision on the new Treo I’ll pack next.

About a month ago, I lost the stylus for the phone when I was chasing my lost dog through the woods.  Its hard enough to find a stylus for a new treo let alone find one for one of the oldest treo’s made by Palm.  I haven’t really tried too hard either.

Well, its been getting harder and harder to work the phone without a stylus, especially my alarm clock (using the Butler program).  So the other night when I was cleaning my ears out, enabling me to hear my phone a little better, I thought about hacking the Q-Tip.

So I used a plastic Q-Tip, removed the cotton from one end, and it works great as a stand in stylus.

Here’s some quick shots of the Q-Stylus in action:

It may not be super classy and it definitely won’t turn your treo into an accessory for your diamond rings or bling collection in general.  You might not impress a client for having a lot of style, but you might get the job done more effectively.  So if function over form is your requirement of the day, then hack at it!

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Palm has brought the Treo 700p to market and will be offering the phone through Sprint and Verizon Wireless. Each carrier has yet to announce their respective pricing points or plans for this phone.

The phone functions on networks using EVDO (Evolution Data Optimized), which allows it to operate with on the cellular networks at broadband like speeds.

This is Palm’s first Treo with the Palm OS to become available on a smartphone for EVDO networks. The Treo 700W came out last fall featuring a Microsoft OS.

The PDA market has slipped in recent years overtaken by Smartphones and wireless laptops. This device capitalizes on Palm’s dedicated Palm OS user base. Not so long ago, Palm PDA’s held a 70-80% market share in PDA’s due to the flexibility of the OS and the plethora of cheap software titles that functioned on this OS. This new phone will be targeted towards the users still on this OS using these tools.

Among other things this new phone will be able to receive emails much faster and support the download of large attachments via email. The network allows for streaming of multimedia and the Treo 700p will ship with a streaming media application allowing users to watch live TV(see picture left screen shot of video), movie clips and audio from radio stations. For the corporate buyers it could even be used to run training videos and corporate communications.

One of the exceptional capabilities of the 700p verses the 700w is its built in ability to allow Dial-up Networking via the phone. [Of course someone has spelled out a useless acronym for Dial-up networking, which is DUN, but we can all rapidly forget that one!)

Basically DU . . . - Dial-up Networking will allow users to connect their laptops or other devices to the internet via there Treo 700p. Both Sprint, which purchased Nextel, and Verizon Wireless cater to users that need to be able to access the high speed internet from anywhere, whether the user is a Wall Street Broker, a DC lobbyist or a truck driver checking a load board for freight. (BJ and the Bear just got Broadband!)

Other great new features include:

• 1.3 megapixel camera and camcorder -[4 x resolution of a VGA camera]
• Photo & video album Organization software
• Slideshow tool that allows music and audio captions and transitions to be added to pictures and video
• NormSoft’s Pocket Tunes for MP3 files (plays anything from Microsoft’s PlaysForSure - Janus DRM technology - Screen shot right)
• Out of box support for Yahoo!, AOL & Gmail
• PDF Support w/ DataViz Documents to Go V8.0
• Palm OS 5.4.9

• Memory - 128mb total built in (68 supporting product as is, 60mb available for user)
• SD memory Cards will support up to 2GB of storage

For Treo enthusiasts on the Verizon or Sprint networks this is going to be a must have upgrade. For users on other networks, it may be one to wait for or it may be worth considering a move over to Verizon. While Sprint may be tempting, this reviewer is still receiving too many negative reports from current Sprint customers (former Nextel customers and regular Sprint customers.) Sprint may have an EVDO capable network, but they still seem to be struggling to overcome many fundamental issues.

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