Palm sells 1 million Centros, and counting
Thought the Centro was a non-starter, due to its middle of the road feature set and uninspired styling? Think again. Palm has just announced that they have sold 1 million of the little buggers. Citing the accessible $99 price point, the Palm press release goes on to tout the handset’s mass appeal, especially to customers entering the smartphone market for the first time. While it’s certainly not our device of choice around here, we understand the handset’s appeal and think that Palm has pulled off a bit of a miracle here. As availability spreads to more carriers, we wouldn’t be surprised to see sales numbers continue to escalate. Nice job, Palm! In the future, though, let’s just try and make a device that is actually 2008-ready.
Huh – I guess stories like this continue to show the gap between the ‘us’ (you know who you are) and the ‘them.’
Maybe Palm is smart – it knows it ought to stick to the ‘them.’
Palm successful? Is this an April fools joke?
Seriously, I can’t believe this is for real. Isn’t Palm supposed to be a dying company? WTF?!?!?!???
How?
I actually like the Centro, it has a great price point and it has a touch screen. I would say its a very worthy competitor to the Pearl…
I agree with nitesmoke. This has gotta be an April Fool’s story.
I like this color better than that white with green keypad but still think Palm is going no where.
Most of the people that have this phones are girls. And out of all them only ONE synchs it the PC. I am sure that is the case with most of these Centro users. Very entry level.
i totally butchered that comment. Meant to say of the people, THAT I KNOW…
this phone is for everyone who dont know any better they may think they have a BB HTC or iphone but little do they know thats just like someone buying a daewoo that dont know about cars to them its a new car but it was actually a fluke from the jump
Its cute how you can judge about a million people with…what…3 lines of text? That shows how smart you people are.
Let’s see…a company sold a million of something you think is crap and you have sold…uh…not shit
I know several people who have, use and love palm devices and I know 2 people with centros who think they are, for lack of a better phrase, the bees knees…one is a doctoral candidate and one used to be an engineer on a submarine…but I guess because your daddy bought you a side kick or you own a htc you think your in some kind of elite club
Yeah, your really cool. I bet you get like…3 emails on your phone too from your buddies cause your such an important busines icon that the corporate world will crumble without your insight!
Oh, please, save us! Save us with your wisdom!
No one else on this one either? Stupid fucks!
This phone is pointed towards teenagers and not for busniess execs.
As I see it, the base consideration is really the operating system of the phone. There are 4 major players (in no particular order): Windows Mobile, Palm, Symbian, and Blackberry. Other OS are fancy (like iPhone), but suffer from a lack of 3rd party software.
Windows Mobile is slow, prone to crashing, and too complicated for a phone. Blackberry is too darn simple. Can’t even find a decent task manager or outliner (like say Bonsai). Symbian, well Symbian – mostly Nokia phones. Very nice OS. But the phones are $$$ expensive. Which leaves me with good old Palm. Nothing flashy, but it plays music. Not flashy, but I get my email. Nothing flashy, but I have my phone calls. Nothing flashy but I get tons of 3rd party software to expand functionality. Everything I ever need to or want to do with a phone, I can do with a Centro.
As a serious business person, the iPhone, fancy it may be, is a waste of money which I will not approve to be purchased on company money.
Blackberry, well ok. But the best value is the Centro. Color it pink or red, then yes – for teenies and mommy’s. The black is serious enough. And it is small enough that I can finally put a smartphone into a pocket. And it is light enough that it does not pull my pants down.
I think the Centro hit the sweet spot of getting a fully functional smartphone for practically peanuts. It is the little engine that could.
i think palm always pull back too much on their product, THIS is make everything kill them…their product line is too out of date, in the end they lost their customer to other devices and they never return…1 milion sold?? but if you can’t keep up with your customer support quality? u will lost another new 1 million customer
It is the best value in smartphones – Period.
I owned Visors and Palms for several years before Blackberry even offered a phone. Then I worked for a wireless software company and had access to any phone from any carrier that had signal in LAX. I’ve supported Pocket PCs, Blackberries, etc. in Fortune 500 companies.
Just traded 2 full-kybd Blackberries for one of these.
And guess what? I can use the interface easily. I can actually develop my own software on it! I can fit 4GB of music and photos on it. I can draw a diagram and email it. I can enter text from speech. I can SSH to a Cisco router with it. I can VNC to a server over VPN with it. It fits in my pants pocket.
And _when_ I break it, I can replace it the same day, cheap.